A boarding school teacher teaches academics at a private school where the students live on campus, and often takes on residential life alongside the classroom: coaching, advising, and evening and weekend duty in the dorms.
NAIS says boarding school teachers often live on campus, occasionally serving as dorm parents.
In 2021–22, 246 US private schools reported membership in The Association of Boarding Schools, with 93,019 students and 13,232 teachers.
What residential faculty do
A boarding school teacher is a private school teacher whose job does not end when the last class dismisses.
Students live where they study, so the school's day runs into evenings, weekends and activities too — and residential faculty carry that work alongside their teaching.
The role has two halves.
The classroom half looks like independent school teaching anywhere: lessons, grading, advising and activities.
NAIS notes that teachers at its member schools sometimes work as advisers, club directors or coaches in addition to their classes.
The residential half is what makes the job boarding-specific.
Dorm parents supervise students before and after the academic day and on weekends — Fay School, a junior boarding school in Massachusetts, uses exactly that description for the faculty who live inside its student dorms.
The mix is not identical for everyone on campus.
Fay separates dorm parents, who live in the dorms, from campus residents, who live in apartments separate from the dorm buildings and pay a discounted rent.
A posting can put residential life at the center of the job itself.
A 2026 posting at San Domenico School in California describes an on-campus resident faculty role that must live in a dormitory housing unit as a condition of employment, with required weekend availability.
Teaching, coaching and dorm duty
Classroom teaching is still the core of the job.
NAIS describes the classes at its member schools as small enough that teachers can establish meaningful connections with each of their students.
Around the classroom sits the broader independent school load: advising, club direction and coaching.
At a boarding school that load can keep going into the evening, because the students are still on campus.
At Fay, dorm duty runs on a schedule.
Its campus residents perform residential life duties approximately one weekend in three, while its dorm parents carry the before-school, after-school and weekend supervision.
The hours can be spelled out in the posting itself: the San Domenico listing gives weeknight shifts that generally run from 3:00 to 11:30 p.m., with weekend availability required.
How the split lands on any one teacher depends on the posting: some roles are classroom-first with a duty rotation, while others are residential-first and hired for the dorm.
Living on campus
NAIS's description of independent school teaching says it directly: at boarding schools, teachers often live on campus, occasionally serving as dorm parents.
Fay School shows the scale one campus can reach: more than 40 faculty and staff and their families live there.
Dorm parents live in apartments inside the student dorms; campus residents live in apartments separate from the dorm buildings and pay discounted rent.
Housing is not automatic, and it is not identical from one year to the next.
Fay says campus housing availability varies year to year, and it expects faculty who live on campus to have experience with students aged 12–15 and to engage actively in residential life.
Living on campus can also be written into the job itself.
Cranbrook Schools in Michigan, a PK–12 school with boarding in grades 9–12, describes the opportunity for teachers to live and work on its 319-acre campus and expects an eagerness to live among students.
At San Domenico, dormitory residence is a condition of employment for on-campus resident faculty.
Families can be part of the arrangement too: Fay counts faculty and staff and their families among its on-campus residents.
The specifics — rent, apartment type, dependents — are each school's own housing policy to define.
Who boarding schools hire
Two questions run through a boarding school application: whether you can teach your subject well, and whether you can carry the residential side of the school.
On the academic side, NAIS says secondary schools more often look for candidates with higher education and expertise in specific subjects.
Independent schools, it adds, appreciate the specific experiences of people turning to teaching as a second career.
On the residential side, schools say what they want in plain terms.
Fay expects faculty who live on campus to have experience with its 12-to-15 age range and to engage actively in residential life, and Cranbrook expects an eagerness to live among students.
The student body adds another dimension.
Under SEVP rules, F-1 students may attend private SEVP-certified elementary, middle and high schools with no limit on length of attendance, while public schools are limited to grades 9–12 and to one year.
SEVP's 2024 SEVIS by the Numbers report counted 54,356 foreign-student SEVIS records for K–12 education in calendar 2024, with 26.7% from China, followed by Vietnam, South Korea, Mexico and Canada, and no K–12 school hosting more than 600 F-1/M-1 students.
For a candidate, that means the students in front of you may include international students living far from home, and the same advising and dorm expectations apply to them.
Pay, housing and meals
Compensation at a boarding school can pair a teaching salary with campus housing, and the details are set school by school.
Fay's dorm parents live in apartments inside the student dorms, while its campus residents pay discounted rent for apartments separate from the dorms.
Pay structures differ too.
A 2026 San Domenico posting lists its on-campus resident faculty role, a residential-life position that is not necessarily a classroom teaching job, as hourly and non-exempt at $33.02 per hour, with benefits including 403(b) contributions.
That is one school's posted rate for one role, not a teaching salary or an industry figure.
Tax treatment follows federal rules with conditions.
Under IRC §119(a), the value of lodging an employer furnishes is excluded from an employee's gross income only if it is for the employer's convenience and the employee is required to accept it on the employer's business premises as a condition of employment.
What a package includes — housing, meals, duty load — is defined in each school's own posting and offer letter, so ask any school you apply to spell out the full package.
Housing arrangements and taxes are school-by-school
Find boarding school jobs
One fellowship program gives a concrete hiring calendar.
At the partner schools in Penn's Independent School Teaching Residency, fellowship positions are usually posted between December and February, and candidates apply to the partner schools directly.
Residencies are one route in.
Penn's ISTR has a Boarding School Teaching Residency track alongside its day school track, with a 13-course-unit curriculum ending in an inquiry portfolio.
Penn's eligibility rule works backwards from the job: you must be hired into a fellow position at a partner school and stay employed there for both years, and Penn says the program suits people with less than 2 years of teaching experience.
Penn's boarding partners listed for 2026–27 include Emma Willard, Kent, Lawrenceville, Loomis Chaffee, Mercersburg, Milton, St. Paul's and Taft.
Outside fellowship programs, each school hires for itself, and its employment page is where the residential expectations appear alongside the teaching load.
Our boarding school teacher job listings collect boarding school openings in one place.
If you hire for a boarding school, the hiring guides explain how to post a boarding school job and run the rest of the search.
Career information, not legal or tax advice; certification rules for private schools are set state by state, so confirm them with your state education agency before you apply.