Residential Life: A Home Away from Home

Stevenson’s seven-day boarding program is warm and welcoming, and provides resident students with a strong sense of connection within the larger community of the School.

Student Resources

Dormitory Faculty

Deeply committed to residential life, the faculty members selected to live in our dormitories really understand adolescents, relish living among them, and welcome being a part of their lives. Each team of dormitory faculty, which varies in number relative to the size of the dormitory, is supervised by a dormitory head; daily and weekly duty assignments rotate among the team members.

Prefects

Prefects are seniors and juniors who have been carefully selected on the basis of their generosity of spirit and exemplary approach to the academic and social demands of School life. They live among their peers, are alert to their needs, and help care for their well-being. Working in close concert with dormitory faculty, they help tend to community life within the dormitory.

Traditions and Weekend Activities

  • Residential life at Stevenson is enlivened by a range of inclusive traditions, like dorm dinners and dessert gatherings, outdoor movies, Dorm Olympics, Monday Night Dinner (which involves sitting at assigned tables with peers and faculty members and wearing semi-formal dress), Senior Coffees, and Vespers, an occasional evening service for the residential community during which one or two students or faculty members volunteer prepared remarks about personal experiences. The student-led Resident Activities Committee helps facilitate these traditions and designs new ones with the input of their peers.
  • We believe in the restorative value of weekends, so while there are a number of weekend activities from which to choose, students are generally free to move at their own pace. A leisurely brunch may precede some light chores (like laundry and vacuuming!) and homework, which may then yield to a hike with friends to Bird Rock, a bus ride to Carmel Beach or to Del Monte Center to see a movie, or pick-up basketball in the gym. With the permission of parents/guardians, a student may also accept a day student family’s invitation to join them for dinner and to spend the night at their home.

Additional Support

The Health Center aims to support students’ overall health through education, medical triage, and limited emergency care. Staff also facilitate access to medical professionals, dispense over-the-counter medications when indicated, and provide prescribed medications in a safe and confidential manner. Located on the lower level of Rosen Student Center, and open when School is in session, walk-in services are provided by one of our School nurses. Our consulting pediatrician is on call to support our School nurses 24 hours a day when School is in session. After hours and on weekends, a School nurse is available by phone at the request of dormitory faculty to advise students. If a student requires more support, School transportation is swiftly arranged to one of several urgent care facilities located within a 12-15 minute drive. In an emergency, an ambulance is summoned to convey students to Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula, which is ten minutes from campus.

As a licensed mental health professional in good standing with the state of California, the School counselor works with students individually and in group settings on issues related to mental health. The School counselor works with faculty advisors, as well as residential and day faculty to track student and community wellness, and develop and implement educational and experiential interventions. The School counselor collaborates with families and the Health Center for all outside mental health referrals. 

Athletics