Great Hearts Institute

09/17/2026

“ON Classical Education” is celebrating one year!

Over the past year, we’ve shared thoughtful essays, fresh perspectives, and informative articles exploring the ideas shaping classical education today. And we’re just getting started. Year two will bring even more collections, conversations, and insights for educators, school leaders, scholars, and anyone interested in the classical education movement. Check out the latest edition.


Link to full article in the comments.

09/08/2026

What happens when a nearly 3,000-year-old epic meets Christopher Nolan? Two Great Hearts alumni who studied Homer’s Odyssey in Humane Letters and translated portions of it in Greek take a closer look at Nolan’s cinematic retelling. Their verdict: visually stunning, undeniably compelling, but perhaps more Nolan than Homer.

Read their take on what the film preserves, what it changes, and why the original epic still matters.

Caleb Gottry & Miguel Thompson

08/18/2026

Listening is not the same as reading. In this essay for ON Classical Education, Jeannette DeCelles-Zwerneman challenges the growing reliance on audiobooks in the classroom, especially when students are meant to wrestle with serious literature.

Reading requires attention, patience, rereading, questioning, marking, puzzling, and discovery.

An audiobook can deliver the words, but it cannot replace the student’s own encounter with the page.

Read the full essay at ON Classical Education: https://classicaled.substack.com/p/the-spotify-student-reckoning-with?r=52duzv

08/11/2026

In my time as a school leader, I offered an “exhortation” at the beginning of the school year to the faculty. I wanted to remind teachers of the meaningfulness of the work we were taking on that year. Yet, as I watched each year go by, it occurred to me that teachers needed the same kind of encouraging reminder near the end of the year as well. So, whether this draws your mind to the beginning of next year or the end of this year – or, both – I hope it is helpful for considering one path for speaking to teachers about the lasting value of their labors.

READ MORE:

Brandon Crowe

08/04/2026

In an age of short texts, digital distraction, and shrinking attention spans, students need reading stamina. They need whole books. They need stories that train the imagination, form the affections, and invite them into the Great Conversation.

In this ON Classical Education essay, Jennifer Ramirez reflects on the Science of Reading, classical literature, and the shared work of helping students become master readers. https://open.substack.com/pub/classicaled/p/classical-literature-and-the-science?r=52duzv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

07/28/2026

Leadership is about formation.

In this essay for ON Classical Education, Erik Twist argues that leadership cannot be reduced to technique, strategy, systems, or professional polish. Those tools matter. But they are not the end.

True leadership hands on what is human: truth, beauty, delight, order, responsibility, and courage.

It shapes what a community notices, praises, tolerates, protects, and becomes.

Read the full essay at ON Classical Education: https://classicaled.substack.com/p/leadership-beyond-technique

07/23/2026

Are colleges preparing students only for careers, or also for citizenship?

At the 2026 Great Hearts National Symposium for Classical Education, Carol McNamara speaks with Josh Dunn about the growing effort to restore civic education on university campuses.

Their conversation explores why students need a serious understanding of American government, founding documents, and political debate. They also discuss why classical education provides such a strong foundation for civic leadership, public service, and thoughtful disagreement.

Watch the full conversation on "ON Classical Education". https://open.substack.com/pub/classicaled/p/the-natural-partnership-between-classical?r=52duzv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

07/21/2026

What does excellence in physical education look like for students with disabilities?

Not pity.
Not lowered expectations.
Not a place on the sideline.

In ON Classical Education, Patrick Whalen makes the case for a PE curriculum that treats every student as someone with a body worth training and a character worth forming.

The standard is pursuit.

Read the full essay at ON Classical Education: https://classicaled.substack.com/p/the-same-scale-excellence-and-disability

07/14/2026

Students deserve more than slogans about liberty. They deserve to read the thinkers who shaped the Founding itself.

In this essay for ON Classical Education, Jeannette DeCelles-Zwerneman revisits John Locke’s Second Treatise of Civil Government and explains why his ideas still matter for secondary students today.

Locke is not always easy reading. But his questions are alive with consequence:
• What gives government legitimate authority?
• Where do our rights come from?
• What is the difference between liberty and license?
• And why does a free society still depend on virtue?

Read the full essay at ON Classical Education: https://classicaled.substack.com/p/second-treatise-second-look-revisiting

07/09/2026

What does classical education offer to a generation searching for meaning, belonging, and hope?

In this conversation, Corinne Jacobson sits down with Dr. Angel Adams Parham, professor of sociology, coauthor of The Black Intellectual Tradition, and co-founder of classical schools, to explore how classical education gives students more than academic content.

It offers rootedness in a living tradition. It invites students into enduring questions. It places before them models of courage, especially from those who have suffered, endured, and handed something beautiful on to the next generation.

Parham shares her own journey into classical education through homeschooling, community life in New Orleans, sociology, and a growing encounter with the great books. Her story moves through questions of justice, inequality, inheritance, and the good society, showing how classical education can help students understand who they are, where they come from, and what kind of lives they are called to live.

For classical educators, this conversation is a reminder that education is an invitation into memory, responsibility, courage, and hope.

Watch the full interview in ON Classical Education. https://open.substack.com/pub/classicaled/p/rooted-in-tradition-ordered-toward?r=52duzv&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true