02/03/2026
Great read!
In many barns today, school horses are quietly disappearing. Rising costs, time constraints, and liability concerns have made them feel impractical. Some feel it’s an outdated model in a sport increasingly driven by private ownership and full-service programs. But at Belleame Farm in Ohio, trainer Jennifer Edwards has held on to her lesson horses. And the riders who have come through her program, some of whom have gone on to compete at the highest levels, offer a compelling argument for why.
“We still want that atmosphere in the barn,” Edwards says. “We want the school horses.”
For Edwards, school horses are the foundation of how riders learn, how families enter the sport, and how long-term horsemanship is built.
Edwards and her husband, Rob, have run Belleame Farm together for more than four decades. They teach every lesson themselves. They travel with their students to horse shows. And from the beginning, they have insisted that riders start where learning is clearest and pressure is lowest.
“We never, ever push anybody to buy a horse,” Edwards says. “That’s not our program. That’s not what we want to be.”
Instead, children begin on school horses—good ones. Horses capable of going to horse shows, being competitive, and teaching riders how to ride rather than how to manage an investment. Riders are allowed to progress at their own pace, to decide whether the sport truly speaks to them before families are asked to make major financial commitments.
📎 Continue reading this article at https://www.theplaidhorse.com/2026/02/03/why-school-horses-matter-even-at-the-highest-levels-of-the-sport/
