Classical Education News & Articles | October 2022
In addition to reviewing books, ClassicalEd Review provides our readers with a monthly compendium of recent articles and news stories related to classical education and the liberal arts.
Why the Canon Wars Still Matter
by Daniel Buck
Like an overlong proxy war, the “canon” skirmishes of the 1980s and ’90s no longer feature in the media, though the conflict persists. As in a battle over this or that town, the ongoing war might manifest as a fight over particular books, but the real disagreement exists between competing visions for humanity and society.
How Classical Education Can Liberate Black America
by Louis Markos
Two African American professors, Angel Adams Parham and Anika Prather, have written a well-conceived and timely book, The Black Intellectual Tradition: Reading Freedom in Classical Literature. Parham and Prather argue that a classical Christian education grounded in the great books of the Western intellectual tradition, far from being racist, elitist, or oppressive, has the power to liberate the minds of black Americans from every socioeconomic class.
Are the Liberal Arts Useful?
by Micah Mattix
There’s nothing new in John Agresto’s book on the liberal arts, The Death of Learning, but there is plenty of good sense. In fact, it is one of the best defenses of a liberal-arts education I have read in a long time, avoiding both the tub-thumping and the overworked prose that one usually encounters in such works. Agresto is the former president of the liberal-arts institution St. John’s College, and he offers a defense of the liberal arts that is both realistic (there are no pie-in-the-sky promises that the liberal arts will make us nicer, for example) and nonpartisan.
Defending the Permanent Things
by Cicero Bruce
As the subtitle of his book acknowledges, Tracy Lee Simmons is not the first to defend the classics. In the principal address on the 215th anniversary of the founding of Harvard University, James Russell Lowell reminded his audience that, although the ancient languages may be “dead,” the literature they enshrine “is rammed with life as perhaps no other writing, except Shakespeare’s, ever was or will be.” He maintained that the Greco-Roman languages speak to us as much as they spoke to the contemporaries of Homer or Virgil, for these languages appeal “not to the man of then or now, but to the entire round of human nature itself.”
Fitness for Virtue
by Rachel Lu
I was in my senior year of high school, preparing to head off to Notre Dame, when my guidance counselor noticed a problem. I needed five more gym credits to graduate. This was hard to manage with my schedule already packed with musical groups, the debate team, and the school newspaper. In the end, the counselor could only offer me one option. She managed to get me into a weight training course, which existed mainly to allow athletes to train with the football coach during school hours. It was a comical situation.
What are the Liberal Arts?
by Scott Jaschik
What does it mean to study the liberal arts, either at a liberal arts college or within a larger university?
Keeping the Liberal Arts and Humanities Alive
by Rynnas Azlan
“It is critical in a technological civilisation that the humanities be protected if society is going to retain its soul. I do not want to be living in a country where my leaders are educated wholly in technology or business. If they were, they would lack certain qualities necessary in a democracy,” wrote Leland Miles, then president of the University of Bridgeport.
Fueled by Pandemic, Homeschool ‘Hybrids’ Gain Traction with Middle-Class Parents
by Greg Toppo
Rosario Reilly didn’t set out to be an educational publisher — she just wanted to give her kids a classical education that respected their Catholic faith.
The Classics are Back: St. Patrick School Switches to Classical Curriculum Model
by Daniel Meloy
St. Patrick’s switch to a classical curriculum — which emphasizes the “great books and thinkers” such as Tolkien, Aristotle, Thomas Jefferson, and St. Thomas Aquinas — has been in the works for a few years now.
Facing a Dishonest Opposition, Hillsdale Fights to Spread Classical Education across the U.S.
by Caroline Downey
At Treasure Coast Classical Academy in Stuart, Fla., students are immersed in the historical, literary, and scientific traditions of the United States and Western civilization. They’re taught phonics, grammar, Latin, the Socratic method, Singapore math, foreign languages, and other practical and philosophical disciplines so that they might become competent, enlightened, and good citizens.
Arizona Shows the Nation What Education Freedom Looks Like
by Jonathan Butcher and Jason Bedrick
In July, Gov. Doug Ducey signed legislation expanding access to ESAs to all students, making Arizona the gold standard for education choice. Now every family can get about $7,000 to spend on private school tuition, tutoring, textbooks, curricular materials, online courses, educational therapy, and more.