Learning through hands-on experience is a cornerstone of PCD’s Middle School program. The Middle School’s small size and emphasis on collaboration and cooperation fosters numerous activities that require students to think and solve problems outside the structure of the classroom. Students make new discoveries about the world and their role in it, and return to campus with a deepened respect for themselves and their peers.

Whereas some experiences are designed each year to complement course material and/or respond to student interest, other programs occur annually, and provide benchmarks for learning and development.  At the beginning of the school year, each grade level participates in excursions that range from two days to a full week. These trips establish a set of norms and shared experiences to which all students, new and returning, can relate. The annual eighth grade week-long trip to the Chewonki Foundation in Maine is a culminating experience for middle school students.  Through a thoughtfully directed program, students learn about sustainability and ecology and acquire outdoor skills as well as a heightened appreciation for nature. During the week, students live in tents, prepare their own meals, and attend to chores in their shared natural environment. They are divided into groups and given challenges each day that call for individual mental and physical reasoning, as well as collaboration and teamwork. It is the rare experience that does not elicit the emergence of new leaders, as students are encouraged to step out of their comfort zones and urged to take risks.

Other annual field trips include a visit to New York City that focuses on art, culture, and history, an historic tour of Boston’s Freedom Trail, environmental studies at Nature’s Classroom, a literature and history trip to a New England mill, attending a production of a Shakespeare play, and a night on a docked whaling ship focusing on science and history.