David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants

average class size? Twelve students.
The same condition that Teresa DeBrito
dreads, Hotchkiss—just up the road—
advertises as its greatest asset. “[Our]
learning environment,” the school
proudly declares, “is intimate,
interactive, and inclusive.”
Why does a school like Hotchkiss do
something that so plainly makes its
students worse off? One answer is that
the school isn’t thinking of its students. It
is thinking of the parents of its students,
who see things like golf courses and
Steinway pianos and small classes as
evidence that their $50,000 is well
spent. But the better answer is that
Hotchkiss has simply fallen into the trap
that wealthy people and wealthy