Buckingham Browne & Nichols School

Buckingham Browne & Nichols is a day school in Cambridge that engages boys and girls in grades pre-K (called Beginners) through 12 in a rich and invigorating educational experience of the highest quality. The school excels at helping students discover their unique talents and passions and develop them to the fullest.

The curriculum is challenging, forward-thinking, innovative, and flexible, designed to help qualified students from a range of backgrounds and with a range of talents and interests reach new levels of accomplishment. Co-curricular opportunities in athletics, the arts, community service, and other areas add important dimensions to students’ learning.

Students learn on three age-appropriate and developmentally appropriate campuses. The Lower School (Beginners through grade 6) and Middle School (grades 7 and 8) are a short walk from Harvard Square. The Upper School (grades 9 through 12), on the banks of the Charles River, is about a mile away. At every grade, we take full advantage of the range of opportunities our location affords us.

We are a community of engaged learners and compassionate people who embrace the school’s motto: “Honor, Scholarship, Kindness.” This creates an environment where students become active citizens in our school community, and where they feel comfortable taking the kinds of intellectual risks that are vital to learning and growth.

BB&N has an eclectic student body with students from a wide range of backgrounds throughout the Greater Boston area. The diversity of interests, experiences, and perspectives students bring with them to BB&N is one of our greatest strengths. They learn from gifted faculty and from each other as they embrace the challenges of a premier educational experience.

Students come to BB&N with intellectual curiosity and an eagerness to learn. They leave with a clearer sense of what’s possible, well prepared for the next step in their lives, and with a very good idea of which direction to take it.

BB&N’s mission is to promote scholarship, integrity, and kindness in diverse, curious, and motivated students. The School prepares students for lives of principled engagement in their communities and the world. Our values:

• We value a learning environment distinguished by a broad, deep, and challenging program of study that inspires thorough, sustained engagement among our students.
• We value a diverse and inclusive community that fosters respect for the identities and perspectives of all.
• We value balancing a culture of high expectations with a strong commitment to support intellectual, social, emotional, and physical well-being.
• We value kindness and compassion among all members of our community.
• We value the widespread, authentic connection with students that our teachers, coaches, and mentors seek to cultivate.
• We value a program that reinforces key characteristics for 21st-century success—especially creativity, curiosity, resilience, and teamwork.
• We value the importance of helping students develop keen ethical standards in their behavior, habits of thought, and decision-making.
• We value a vibrant, healthy, and safe community where engagement and risk-taking promote lifelong learning.
• We value encouraging our students to learn and serve in their local, regional, and global communities.
• We value a well-rounded education that offers our students ample opportunity to explore, evolve, and excel in academics, arts, athletics, and all phases of school life.

First and foremost, families choose BB&N because we offer an education of the highest quality, delivered in a distinctive style. There’s a messy vitality to learning here, an energy that’s palpable, and it grows from close relationships between motivated students and skilled, dedicated educators. Learning is intense and challenging, but also creative, invigorating, and vibrant.

Our students are bright, inquisitive, and curious. They are mainstream, iconoclasts, and everything in between. They are BB&N, and what they bring to school with them every day contributes in a huge way to the learning and growth of everyone in our community. Most important is the impact that the BB&N experience has on each student. We excel at opening students’ minds to new possibilities, helping them uncover their potential and tap it to the fullest. After BB&N, they succeed in the finest colleges and universities, and in all that follows.

Our teachers, coaches, and advisors make it their mission to establish an authentic connection with students in their classrooms, labs, studios, and playing fields. Our faculty create a learning atmosphere that both challenges and cares for students. In the striking of this balance, magic happens. There is no such thing as a BB&N “type.” We take pride in the diversity of backgrounds, talents, and interests of students. You’ll learn as much from your classmates as you do from your teachers, and that’s saying a lot!

We make a guarantee to students as they start their journey at BB&N: You will discover at least one (and usually more) passion during your time here that you wouldn’t have imagined on day one. The opportunities are boundless here and we encourage students to explore new challenges, to embrace new interests.