Schooled

81QQQPa68XL
Author(s)
Age Range
10+
Release Date
August 26, 2025
ISBN
978-1534486058
Buy This Book
      
A bighearted, compulsively readable novel from acclaimed author Jamie Sumner about new schools, unexpected friendships, and overcoming loss.

Eleven-year-old Lenny Syms is about to start college—sort of. As part of a brand-new experimental school, Lenny and four other students are starting sixth grade on a university campus, where they’ll be taught by the most brilliant professors and given every resource imaginable. This new school is pretty weird, though. Instead of hunkering down behind a desk to study math, science, and history, Lenny finds himself meditating, participating in discussions where you don’t even have to raise your hand, and spying on the campus population in the name of anthropology.

But Lenny just lost his mom, and his Latin professor dad is better with dead languages than actual human beings. Lenny doesn’t want to be part of some learning experiment. He just wants to be left alone. Yet if Lenny is going to make it as a middle schooler on a college campus, he’s going to need help. Is a group of misfit sixth graders and one particularly quirky professor enough to pull him out of his sadness and back into the world?

Editor review

1 review
Grief & Hope
(Updated: April 01, 2026)
Overall rating
 
4.3
Plot
 
4.0
Characters
 
5.0
Writing Style
 
4.0
Illustrations/Photos (if applicable)
 
N/A
Schooled by Jamie Sumner is a middle-grade novel that explores themes of grief, friendship, and new beginnings.

The story centers on Lenny, a middle school-aged boy who is navigating the profound loss of his mother to cancer. His world shifts dramatically when he and his father, a Latin professor, move to a college campus. Lenny and a small group of other students, whose parents are also faculty members, become part of an experimental school. This learning environment is very different from traditional schooling; the students are encouraged to meditate, pursue passion projects, attend college lectures, and conduct research in the library. Amidst these unconventional surroundings, Lenny struggles to cope with his mother's death, his strained relationship with his father, and the challenges of adapting to a new school that is anything but traditional.


What I Liked: The unique school concept serves as an interesting backdrop for Lenny's journey of exploring his grief and working through his personal struggles. The small group of characters, despite their seemingly mismatched personalities, create bonds over their shared, unusual situation and offer unwavering support to one another. Jamie Sumner wonderfully captures the grief that both Lenny and his father experience, and how that is a bit different for each of them. It felt real and raw, and I found myself tearing up throughout the book. For me, the true highlight of the book was witnessing Lenny, despite missing his mom and resisting the move, make new connections and discover a sense of purpose as he processed his grief.

Schooled by Jamie Sumner is a wonderful addition to any middle-grade bookshelf, particularly for readers who appreciate stories about the complexities of friendship and family.
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