Emma Willard School

The Emma Willard School, originally called Troy Female Seminary and often referred to simply as Emma, is an independent university-preparatory day and boarding school for young women, located in Troy, New York, on Mount Ida, offering grades 9–12 and postgraduate coursework. The first women's higher education institution in the United States, it was founded by women's rights advocate Emma Willard in 1814 (first in Middlebury, Vermont, as Middlebury Female Seminary, later moved to Troy and renamed Troy Female Seminary). As of 2022, it had an endowment of $179 million. In 2018, the school was ranked by The Post-Standard as the #1 private school in Upstate New York. Academics Emma Willard is an independent college-preparatory day and boarding school enrolling students in grades 9–12 and post-graduate studies. Class sizes are kept at a 16-student maximum; the typical student to teacher ratio is 6 to 1. 83% of the faculty hold advanced degrees. Advanced Placement preparation is offered in all disciplines. Students also may enroll in college-level courses at neighboring Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Most students take five courses each semester. Classes meet four or five times each week for fifty minutes, though lab sciences, seminars, and AP sections meet for varying lengths of time. An ESL program offers intermediate and advanced-level curriculum for international students. Core requirements for graduation include a minimum of four units of English; three units of history, foreign language, mathematics; two units of lab science (one each in biology and physics), two units in the arts, and one-fourth unit in health. All students must fulfill a community service requirement and take physical education or its equivalent each semester in the ninth, tenth, and eleventh grades. Seniors must take at least ten weeks.