I Can Classical... And You Can Too

I’m a classical educator, I guess. I never set out to be one. I was originally going to study and teach philosophy at the university level. Or if that didn't work out, I was going to get married and volunteer at a zoo. However, my senior year of undergrad I realized that the plan I had crafted for my future had become intolerable to me. I was a philosophy major, and while philosophy texts were fun to read when you could understand them, philosophers were no fun to talk to (you all know what I mean). I could no longer imagine spending the rest of my life trapped in conversations about the place that quantum mechanics held in the debate about the B theory of time. Also, it turned out that zoos wouldn't let you volunteer to just hang out with the animals without some kind of useful degree in biology or exotic veterinary science So, what was I to do?

A friend conveniently mentioned to me that fateful December that it was possible to teach in a classical charter school without an educational degree. I figured that could do that for a year while I reevaluated. And here I am, seven years later, still reevaluating. I fell into the world of classical education, despite never having received one myself. I’ve even been ‘converted’ to its methods and ideologies so far as I or anyone really understands them. I like teaching, and if test scores mean anything (which is debatable), I’m pretty good at it. I still feel a lot of times, however, that I’m just kind of floating aimlessly down a path I sort of fell into.

I know that classical ed. has no shortage of defenders, most of whom are far more eloquent than I am, and honestly, I’m not really interested in defending the style. For one thing, it’s hard to defend something that barely has a definition. For another thing, classical education has become something of a fad in recent years. The amount of metaphorical ink that has been spilled describing, and defining, and defending the style is literally astronomical.

So I’m left with a problem: I’m a child of the internet age and I fit the type well. I have no real skills or interesting hobbies – I’ve finished one cross-stitch project, I’ve knitted half of a scarf, and I draw badly, so I can’t really call myself a crafter. I say that my hobby is reading when asked, but by that I mean that I liked to read when I was younger and now I binge-watch Netflix, listen to podcasts while I drive, and listen to one audiobook a month on audible. I’m overeducated and have a masters in classical education, so I guess that in the world of credentialism, I’m qualified to talk about something. I don’t have Facebook, Instagram, or even TikTok - I got rid of all my social media accounts - and I’ve never been very good or consistent about journaling. So, now I’m stuck with the only philosophical question that really matters – if I don’t post my thoughts on the internet for strangers to read, does my life have any real meaning or value at all?

This post was meant to act as a sort of ethos for myself, as well as to provide a sort of vision or mission for this blog. So far I hope that I have shown that I am not really the most qualified person in the world to talk about anything with any sort of authority. I fell into this life by accident. I’ve been trying to figure out what everything is as I go, and I’d like to invite you on this journey with me as I attempt to discover answers to the perennial questions surrounding classical education.

What is a liberal art? Where can you find a quadrivium? Did Dorothy Sayers ever find her tools of learning?  Does anyone actually know what classical education is anyways? I’ve been a classical educator for a laughable seven years, but if these past years of exercising copious amounts of unearned confidence have taught me one thing, it’s that with a little bit of humility and a lot a bit of patience (and some research) I can classical… and you can too.