BASS ESL is both an English as a Second Language school and an adventure recreation camp for co-ed, American & international students ages 12-18.

Brewster Academy is located in the picture-perfect village of Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, a safe and cozy summer resort, where the days are warm, the nights are cool, and the scenery and outdoor recreation are unmatched.

Brewster is widely recognized for its ESL programs. Since 1992, Thailand has sent us its top high school graduates for ESL and cultural training. More than 750 Royal Thai scholars have learned English here in preparation for their university careers in the US. We are the only school to be selected for this honor.

We are equally proud of our six-week summer school. Last summer, our ESL students improved their scores by an average of almost 10% (+9.89%) in English fluency based on comparing their pre-tests and post-tests (we use the SLEP® test).  This result is much higher than other schools report for a short program like ours.

Our students tell us that our approach to English teaching is enjoyable and rewarding beyond their expectations. Further, they tell us that BASS is fun and exciting, like being on vacation in a most beautiful part of New England.

We balance serious academic work with a fun-filled, outdoor summer adventure camp. Students get the best of both schooling and camping. In both school and camp they are surrounded by and teaming with native-English speakers in every part of every day.

Each student is provided with a Macintosh laptop for the duration of the program. Access to the internet and email is available everywhere on campus. Students like that too. But there’s much more to our story…

Ideally, in BASS we try to enroll an equal number of American and international students. This provides us the opportunity to attempt to give every ESL student a native-English speaking roommate. The dormitories are mixed and English is used constantly. We do not enroll large numbers of students from any language group. We want our ESL students to have to use English everywhere. We also make up our adventure teams with that in mind. It is impossible not to learn English in our environment.

We limit our enrollment to 60. We want a small school so that we can get to know each student as an individual and to custom fit each with a program that optimizes their experience academically and socially. Our faculty: student ratio is 1: 2 and students spend 27.5 hours per week in class. We have numerous levels of classes ranging from beginner to advanced. We, of course, teach the traditional Reading, Writing, Listening, and Speaking courses, but we have added a truly innovative approach also. It’s called Video ESL.

Please visit our website for more detailed information. And be sure to watch our academic video and adventure video where you will get a great “look and feel” for how we do things. It loads and plays immediately.

BASS ESL - June 26 to August 7. Shorter programs may be negotiated.

BASS English and Math - June 28 to August 7

These are the same school. We mix American and international students in dorms, in adventure camp, and in some classes.

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