The bitter emotional legacy of boarding school

I remember very little apart from going on the ferry with my dad and then being dropped off at the school in Wales. I just remember being sort of dropped off and imagining my dad driving and being somewhere else. I remember standing, looking and thinking, 'He's over there now.' I was very young."

There is a sombre tone in Brian D'Arcy's voice as he recalls that September afternoon in 1981 when, at the age of seven, his father accompanied him to Llanarth Court Preparatory School in Wales. His father was in the British military, and the family had been posted in 14 locations (including Hong Kong) in 12 years. Wanting to ensure continuity in their sons' education, Brian's parents sent him and his two brothers to boarding schools in Britain.

Hong Kong families have never shied away from sending their children to boarding schools. For some it is a question of tradition; others seek stability for their offspring while the family moves from country to country. The reasons are many and varied, but almost all parents considering a boarding school education face similar questions and doubts.

For many ex-boarders and their families, it proved to be a wonderful and enriching experience, providing opportunities and life-long friendships. For others, such as D'Arcy, the positives aspects just don't add up.

"I have a mixed outlook. Some of it was great and I made some very good friends," he says. But he also says boarding school pupils learn to hide their emotions and that, overall, the experience "changes who you could have been". Today, D'Arcy is a 40-year old father of two boys and says he will not send them to boarding school.

One of the issues parents face is managing their children's expectations to avoid disappointment. When confronted with the prospect of going to boarding school, children are often enthusiastic because they have expectations based on literature, such as Enid Blyton's St Clare's or the Harry Potter books. While they are highly entertaining stories of adventure, they do not paint a realistic image of the life most boarding students experience.

Nick Duffell is a British psychotherapist and author of The Making of Them: The British Attitude to Children and the Boarding School System. He says children have been idealising boarding school life through books and films for decades. "Today we've got Harry Potter, but there was always the industry of boarding school literature where people were having a jolly good time."