Pearson Airport to Havergal College

How does a boarder get from Pearson to Havergal College?

The alternatives for an unaccompanied girl of thirteen are the airline's unaccompanied-minor service, which hands her to a named adult at the arrivals door and no further; the school's arranged transport on the busiest days, which the school coordinates and which this service is often part of; and nothing else a parent would book. The chauffeur is the named adult, the car that ends at the boarding house, and the two texts that tell the parents in Hong Kong that it worked. The pickup page explains the meeting points and the family and accessible page the unaccompanied-minor procedure.

The school, the boarding house and the door

Havergal College's campus is on the west side of Avenue Road between Lawrence Avenue and the Lawrence Park neighbourhood, a set of stone buildings around a quadrangle with the boarding house on the campus's north side and the junior school on the south. The main gate is on Avenue Road; the chauffeur enters there, follows the drive to the boarding house, brings the bags to the door and waits until a member of the boarding staff has taken the boarder in. Avenue Road itself is a no-stopping frontage at most hours and is never the drop point. On term-start days the boarding staff meet arrivals at the house; on other days the reception at the main building directs the chauffeur. Day girls living in Lawrence Park, Forest Hill and the Bridle Path who fly in with their families are an ordinary Toronto address at the same fare.

The unaccompanied minor: how the handover works

An airline's unaccompanied-minor service escorts a girl through the arrival, immigration and the baggage hall and hands her at the arrivals door to the adult named on the form, who must show identification. The chauffeur is that adult: the parents put the chauffeur's name on the airline form (we send it the day before), the chauffeur — a female chauffeur when the parents ask for one, which many do — is inside the hall with a name board and identification when the escort brings her through, and the handover is signed. From that moment she is with a named, licensed, vetted chauffeur the school and the parents know, in a car with the door-to-door confirmation, and the chauffeur does not leave until the boarding staff have taken her in at the house. For a girl over the age the airline requires an escort for, the same meet and greet does the same job without the form.

The boarding calendar and the trips it makes

A Havergal boarding year is a calendar of airport trips: the arrival in the first week of September, Thanksgiving in October, the closed weekends when the house empties, the December departure in the week before Christmas and the January return, the March break, Easter, and the June departure with a year's belongings. Each is a fixed fare with the flight tracked, booked by the parents from the confirmation of the last; the December and June departures carry the trunk and the vehicle is sized for it; and the school's calendar of departure days is the one the chauffeur plans around. A boarder whose family is in Nassau or Mexico City flies more often than one whose family is in Beijing, and the profile holds the pattern. The departures page explains the earlier check-in cut-offs for an unaccompanied minor.

Parents' weekends, graduation and the visit

Parents fly in for the October parents' weekend, the December concerts, the spring events and the June graduation, and the hotels for a Havergal visit are the Yorkville and Avenue Road hotels fifteen minutes south — the Park Hyatt, the Four Seasons, the Hazelton — or the Novotel and the Holiday Inn at Yonge and Sheppard ten minutes east. The Friday arrival from Pearson and the Sunday departure are two fixed fares on one confirmation; the weekend is a chauffeured block with the boarder collected at the house: the school's events, a day at the ROM and the AGO, a dinner in Yorkville, or Niagara Falls for a family that has flown from overseas to see their daughter and the country at once. Graduation in June is the largest version — grandparents, the trunk, the flight home the same evening — and the family car waits on the campus drive.

Sport, tournaments and the school's traffic

Havergal's teams and programmes travel — the hockey, basketball and rowing tournaments, the debating trips, the exchange programmes with schools in Britain, Australia and South Africa whose visiting pupils arrive at Pearson as a group — and a visiting group of twenty arrives on the same flight, is met at the group meeting point inside the terminal and driven in the Sprinter on one manifest to the school, invoiced to the school on a corporate account. The school's visiting speakers, the admissions families touring from overseas and the alumnae events bring the adult traffic on the same fare.

From the school: siblings, the city and the province

Havergal is ten minutes from Upper Canada College on Avenue Road and fifteen from Branksome Hall in Rosedale, and a family with children at two schools books both drops on one confirmation. The chauffeur is also the connection to the province on a long weekend: the Muskoka lakes two hours north, Blue Mountain for a March-break ski weekend, the Stratford Festival in summer. Within the city, the Avenue Road campus is fifteen minutes from Yorkville and twenty from the waterfront by car.

What the fare includes

The fare from Pearson to Havergal College is fixed by vehicle class for the Avenue Road address and includes the chauffeur, the vehicle, fuel, tolls, taxes, curbside pickup at the pre-arranged area for a boarder travelling with a parent, and the included waiting with the flight tracked. Meet and greet inside the arrivals hall with a name board is the one paid add-on, and for an unaccompanied minor it is the service; gratuity is never added; a cancellation before dispatch is free; the parents receive the confirmation, the chauffeur's name and vehicle the day before, and the two texts on the day.

The guardian's house and the closed-weekend pattern

Havergal's boarding house closes for the long weekends and the closed weekends, and a girl whose family is in Beijing or Lagos does not fly home for them — she goes to her guardian, the Canadian family or the guardian service that the study permit's custodianship arrangement names. The guardian's home in Lawrence Park, North Toronto or Thornhill is the third address on the family's profile alongside the boarding house and the airport, and the Friday-afternoon trip from the house to the guardian and the Sunday-evening return are short fixed fares booked from the same confirmation, often as a standing order for the year. The house signs her out for a chauffeured departure against the parents' written authorisation, which the school holds, and we send the chauffeur's name, photograph and vehicle to the house the day before; the school's CAIS accreditation sets the standard the sign-out follows.

Winter: the January return to Avenue Road

The January return is the trip that earns the arrangement: a girl who left Hong Kong the previous evening lands at Pearson in the first week of January into a snow squall, in the dark, with the airport running on winter delays. The chauffeur has read Ontario 511 before leaving, the car is warm at the pre-arranged area, and the thirty-five minutes down the 401 and Avenue Road are driven on winter tyres by a chauffeur who has driven them every January. A flight diverted by weather to Montréal or Ottawa is rebooked by the airline for the next day; the chauffeur is re-timed to the new flight at no charge, and the boarding house and the parents are both told. The chauffeur meets the new flight with the same name board.

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