R.J. Zitzelsberger is director of admissions and financial aid at The Linsly School in Wheeling, which is not only his alma mater but also the place he and his family call home.

WHEELING — The Linsly School’s reputation for academic excellence, character development and opportunities for lifelong learning truly resonates with R.J. Zitzelsberger, who has come full circle since graduating from the institution.

Zitzelsberger, director of admissions and financial aid at Linsly, not only found himself back on the private school’s campus in Wheeling but has also found himself traveling the globe in an effort to recruit potential students who could thrive in the culturally diverse and academically unique environment the school has to offer.

“My main responsibility is to find admissible students to fill our school, both in our day population and our boarding population,” Zitzelsberger said, fresh back from a recruiting trip to Brazil this month. “On average, my office – which is made up of two very important people, Elizabeth Stalder and Chrissy D’Aquila, who is my assistant director of admissions – we bring in over 115 students a year to Linsly.”

A Yorkville native and 2002 graduate of Linsly, Zitzelsberger is passionate about his role and about the lasting benefits a Linsly education can bring to students. But the path to where he is now was not always paved with enthusiasm.

“I came here kicking and screaming,” he said, noting that in his youth, his parents saw his potential and recognized that he needed a better opportunity to focus on achieving more, so he transferred to Linsly. “I didn’t want to come here.”

After he enrolled, however, his perspective changed. Today, his role in recruiting new students is backed by first-hand experience.

“This is my life. This isn’t a job,” he said. “People don’t realize the time and effort that we put into kids. I’ve seen it now. I’ve lived it. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for this place. What it did for me as an individual throughout my life has been invaluable.”

The road that led Zitzelsberger back to Linsly had some twists and turns, as well.

“After college, I thought I wanted to coach collegiate football,” he said. “I thought that was a passion of mine. So I coached collegiate football for two years. I coached at Washington-Jefferson College and Bethany College.”

With his fiance (now his wife) by his side at that time, Zitzelsberger earned his master’s degree along the way, and after coaching at Bethany, he moved to the admissions office there.

“Three years later, I became the director of enrollment at Bethany College … at quite a young age,” he said. “Then I was approached by a former teacher of mine here (at Linsly) asking me if I’d ever do high school admissions.”

Married with an infant child at this crossroads in life, Zitzelsberger said he always hoped to send his children to Linsly, and he saw this as a door opening to new opportunities that included that connection with his alma mater.

“So I took that job in 2013,” he said. “I’ve been at Linsly now for 13 years. It’s been a long history, but it’s been a fun journey.”

He and his family actually reside at Linsly. Two of their three children – an eighth-grader and a fifth-grader – are enrolled there. They also have a second-grader enrolled at Wheeling Country Day School.

“I live on campus, so I am a dorm parent,” he said, noting that he has taken on other roles at Linsly, as well. “I currently help coach American football, I’ve coached girls’ basketball at multiple levels, I coach middle school baseball. So I have a lot of different responsibilities on top of what I currently do.”

A co-ed institution, Linsly offers classes for students in Grades 5-12. The goal for the admissions office is not necessarily to recruit as many students as they can.

“We try to keep it at what we feel doesn’t change who we are and what we do,” Zitzelsberger explained. “I’d love to give this opportunity to 600-700 kids, but with the space that we have and the faculty that we have, we have to maintain it at a smaller number – somewhere around 425 or 450 in our entire school is really ideal.”

Linsly has space for around 115-120 boarding students in four dormitories for those in Grades 7-12.

“We’re building a brand new dormitory for 48 male students,” Zitzelsberger noted, adding that additional capital improvements are also in the works.

The “day market” for Linsly consists primarily of students from West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

“We have students from our day population who drive as far as an hour away to get here on a daily basis,” Zitzelsberger said. “When you look at the boarding department, it opens up the whole globe. We love the diversity, and our day families love it, too, so we’re going to continue to try to find diversity and bring in a diversified population.”

Currently, Linsly hosts students from 25 countries and eight additional states in the continental U.S. outside of the tri-state area. The diversified mix of students offers a unique global perspective where those on campus have an opportunity to talk to people from different cultures about daily life, holidays, traditions and other eye-opening, horizon-broadening topics.

There are a multitude of reasons that students come from afar for a Linsly education. Zitzelsberger noted that students from the Asian markets tend to be drawn to the school’s academic reputation and opportunities for preparedness to enter the best colleges and universities in the country. Students from European markets often value the centralization of being able to eat, sleep, play and learn on campus.

“They view America as the avenue to success,” Zitzelsberger said. “It is our responsibility as a school to help them achieve whatever goal they may have. It’s our job to help them get there.”

Opportunities are diverse at Linsly, as well. Although each graduating class has fewer than 100 students, the school offers a wide variety of programs in art, music, theater, athletics (with 22 sports teams) and more.

Character development and relationship building remain at the forefront of the educational process at Linsly, where teachers and staff members truly know students on a first-name basis.

“Private schools, at Linsly especially, are very good at helping students understand how to learn,” Zitzelsberger said, noting that they don’t just “teach to test,” they emphasize critical thinking, character traits and proven performance methods that result in success.

Some students are better suited for public or parochial school, Zitzelsberger noted, stressing that Ohio County is blessed with outstanding options with all of its schools. But finding the right fit for each individual student is important, he said.

“When families think of Linsly, a lot of people are always worried that ‘it’s only this type of child’ or ‘it’s only this type of kid that would succeed at Linsly,'” he noted.

In reality, Linsly is a fit for all kinds of students, from those who excel academically to those who need a more personalized approach to learning.

“The support we provide is something people don’t understand. Everything we do is individualized.” he said.

That includes ways to make it affordable and accessible to every student through financial aid, scholarships and indexed tuition.

“We just did a tuition reset,” Zitzelsberger announced. “For day markets, we’ve reduced tuition for a middle school family to $15,000, sticker price, and upper school to $17,000. We’ve had to be creative with how we can make this affordable and accessible.”

Donations from alumni and financial backing for the institution not only make Linsly more affordable but also help with ongoing improvements to facilities on campus.

“We have invested in education,” Zitzelsberger said, noting that the school has put $2.5 million into classrooms in recent years with everything from new smartboards to new desks with dry erase boards, dimmable lighting, a new weight room and other athletic facility improvements, and various and other advancements to make the campus environment much more comfortable and conducive to learning.

Policies and programs are always changing with the times, too, Zitzelsberger said.

“We’ve taken the cell phone out of students’ hands,” he said of the school’s cell phone policy. “It’s away for the day. There’s a lot more face-to-face interactions and a lot more ability to be known. We’re going to know your child.”

Instead of veering away from artificial intelligence, Linsly teaches students how AI can be an educational tool.

For Linsly students, putting on the blue blazer evokes a different mindset, Zitzelsberger said.

“It’s something we talk about a lot,” he said. “It’s an identity for us. It has a lot of meaning and pride.”

Linsly students want to be challenged, to be known and to take advantage of great opportunities, he added, encouraging prospective students – future Cadets – and their parents who are curious or interested in the school to come check it out.

“Come to an open house. Come let me tour you around campus. Let me introduce you to teachers,” he said.

Prospective students from there can come for a shadow day and follow an enrolled student for an entire day to see what it’s like. It could be a perfect fit for a student looking for a chance to find success by discovering the best version of themselves they can be, Zitzelsberger said.

“All we can do as parents is give our kids the best opportunity,” he said. “The greatest gift I can give my child is not just an education, but to surround him with people who make him a better version of himself.

“It’s a sound education that no one can take away.”