A vision, as you might expect, is purposefully general. It can be so broad, in fact, that it can entail a number of pathways to achieve it. This is where an organizational mission comes in. A mission is a purpose statement for how one specific organization is going to fulfill a vision.

For example, imagine you live in a town where you notice that a growing number of young people in their 20’s and 30’s report lacking purpose in life. Having passed through the modern education industrial complex, they lack the thoughtfulness and tools to think about what it would be like to craft a life built on enduring values. They have been trained to think that life is about maximizing income, not living for a higher purpose.

What’s more, these young adults in your town display a noticeable lack of creativity. They do not read, build, explore, serve, or sing for fun. They have graduated college and landed decent paying jobs, but their leisure is short-circuiting as free time is routinely consumed through tech addiction passing as “catching up on shows.”

As life’s big challenges begin to set in, these young people realize they do not know what they think about complex political issues. They are left paralyzed by the suffering that comes from the illness of a loved one. They are not sure whether God is actually good and really involved in their day to day lives. 

Upon noticing such a problem in your town looking out, you further observe looking in that a version of yourself shares some of these deficiencies. Meanwhile, an aspirational picture begins to emerge in your mind of a young person who lives and looks decidedly different. “What if I drove down the street and saw a young man or woman living like…this?” you ask yourself. “How would this happen?” 

Thus begins your journey toward Christian, classical education and perhaps even starting a school toward this end.

In this article, I will explore how schools can strengthen their mission statements and then align their communities with this overarching purpose. The goal is that through achieving strong organizational clarity, schools in the Christian classical education renewal movement can better deliver on what they have set out to achieve and then be faithful to this work for the longterm.

Many Missions, One Vision

There are hundreds of Christian, classical schools in the United States. I recently heard that there were 140 of such schools in 2010 and now there are over 700. This is amazing progress for the movement in just 13 years. For each one of these schools, there is a distinct mission or purpose, stating why it exists. Consider this small sampling, which exemplifies the variety:

• We exist to glorify God by cultivating students of wisdom and virtue through a Christ-centered, academically robust classical education.
• We exist to assist parents in their duty of biblically training their children by offering distinctly Christ-centered and Classical academic instruction.
• We exist to glorify God by equipping students with the tools necessary to pursue a lifetime of learning so that they may discern, reason and defend truth in service to our Lord, Jesus Christ.
• We exist to inspire students with an education founded on a Christian worldview, informed by the classical tradition, and approached with diligence and joy. 
• We exist to support families and churches by providing an academically excellent classical Christian education that cultivates knowledge, wisdom, eloquence, and godly character and equips students with the tools of learning that will last a lifetime.

What you may notice above is that each of these missions emphasizes a different aspect of the Christian, classical education renewal movement. Some underscore the importance of partnership between church, family, and school. Others emphasize that bringing glory to God ought to be the “why” of the mission no matter what kind of Christian organization. But what all these schools have in common if we were to press them is a shared vision about the sort of alumni they seek to develop through their programs.

The Eight-Word Mission Statement

Interestingly, in the organizational development world, there is growing interest in what has been called the “eight-word mission statement.” (or even seven words). It is exactly what it sounds like: a brief concise purpose statement that captures the “why” of an organization with stunning simplicity.

Here’s the formula: A verb, a target population, and an outcome that implies something to measure. As Kevin Starr, a though leader in social entrepreneurship, puts it,

Save kids’ lives in Uganda. Rehabilitate coral reefs in the Western Pacific. Prevent maternal-child transmission of HIV in Africa. Get Zambian farmers out of poverty. These statements tell us exactly what the organization has set out to accomplish. Once we’ve got it, we know whether they are working on something that fits our own mission, and we have a useful starting point for any subsequent conversations.

Stanford Social Innovation Review (https://ssir.org/articles/entry/the_eight_word_mission_statement#)

Starr identifies two specific strengths of this approach to crafting mission statements. First, it focuses on concrete results, thereby avoiding vague language. Second, it spotlights the “what,” not the “how.”

I suspect that one reason mission statements at Christian, classical schools can arguably be too long, such as in the examples above, is that proponents of this type of education cannot help themselves but include the “how.” Notice how many of the mission statements above include the specifics of the education they offer. They are drifting into the way they will accomplish their mission, rather than focusing on the central purpose.

If we take Starr’s advice, here might be a compelling alternative: “Cultivate students of wisdom and virtue.” Now, this may feel overly general. After all, it fails to to say anything about classical or Christian education. Is this a problem? Not necessarily. If you are committed to keeping your school’s mission focused solely on the “what,” then you must resist the temptation to detail method and instead be ultra clear on the chief purpose, which for our schools is about the formation of a particular kind of student.

Readers may not fully buy into the idea of an eight-word mission statement. For one, it can feel at times like it fuses vision and mission, future state and pathway, in a way that conflicts with the traditional distinction described above. Regardless of where you land, the point is that, when crafting a mission statement, you want to achieve maximal clarity on why your school exists. The more clarity you gain, the more you can align your school community with this core focus.

Creating Missional Alignment

Once a school has its core focus articulated via a mission statement, it can be to think about how this mission is to serve as the aligning rails for all activity within the organization. In Wisdom and Eloquence (Crossway, 2006), Robert LittleJohn and Chuck Evans define alignment as “like-mindedness about the essential qualities of the school and a common understanding that everything that happens under the school’s banner is informed or required by its core mission. We often use the term ‘vertical alignment,’ or the insistence that every activity, every decision, flows figuratively downhill from the school’s mission.” (203).

Admittedly, I have been puzzled by this concept at times. It has not always been clear to me how all the various activities of the school are “informed” or “required” by its core mission. For some activities, of course, it is obvious. Logic class, for example, flows downhill from a classical mission in that logic, or dialectic, is one of the three language arts of the classical trivium. A Shakespeare performance is informed by the mission insofar as Shakespearean drama holds a major place in the annals of western literature.

But what about curriculum nights? School picnics? Admissions welcome packets? Capital campaigns? Employee benefits packages? It is not obvious that these flow downhill from a distinctively Christian classical mission. After all, these activities exist in other schools. So what is the difference?

The Aligned Community

Here it is important to underscore the distinction between “required” and “informed.” To “require” is to need for a particular purpose while to “inform” is to give shape to. Every activity at a school must either be necessary to the school’s core mission or be shaped by it. Let us consider a few examples for each of these categories.

I can think of a number of necessities, required ingredients, for a classical school to achieve its mission. The school must have a wide and varied curriculum of classical literature, art, music, and history. Additionally, it must focus its instruction on training students in the liberal arts, the complex skills of reading, thinking, speaking, calculating, and creating. And it must include in its objectives an emphasis on the character formation of its students rather than solely going for more head knowledge. These examples, we might say, exist in the center core of the mission. Take away one of these qualities and you risk achieving the purpose you have set out to accomplish.

Then there are the activities of the school that are not required by the school’s mission, but must at the very least be significantly shaped by it. Take a capital campaign, for example. Schools cost money to operate, and strategic decisions to take the school to the next level often require significant funds. To raise this capital, one must share with potential donors a compelling vision for how their gifts will advance the school’s mission. What will make up the content of this vision? Whatever is decided, the explicit connection must be made to the school’s mission of cultivating students of wisdom and virtue. Otherwise you are raising money for something else.

Let us look at another example and drill a little deeper: the girls volleyball team. How can we align this program with the school’s core mission? We begin by putting the mission in front of us: cultivating students of wisdom and virtue. We then begin thinking about what wisdom and virtue look like for student athletes in the volleyball program. Wisdom may have to do with their approach to competition on the court as followers of Christ. Or it could connect to how students interact with one another during practice. A focus on virtue could influence how much effort students put into practice each day or deciding as a team they will never give up no matter the odds.

By evaluating each program or activity in your school against the rubric of your school’s mission, you can align your entire community to this core focus. This keeps all constituents on the same page and rowing in the same direction. As LittleJohn and Evans sum it up nicely: “A vertically aligned school can be confident that each member of the community understands the school’s mission and his or her role in helping to achieve that mission” (203).

Conclusion

Schools are complex operations. They consist of many types of constituents: board members, parents, faculty and staff, students, and alumni. They are also comprised of all sorts of activities, ranging from hot lunch to curriculum development to facilities management to the actual instruction in the classroom. Consequently, keeping the school united is a crucial task and it all begins with a clear mission statement. Once this purpose statement is articulated clearly and points toward an aspirational future state, the vision, comprehensive alignment must be carried out. By taking inventory of every activity and decision at the school and determining alignment with the mission, school leaders can bring unity and direction to their communities that will spark momentum and a sense of confidence for what the future holds.

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Classical Christian education is not merely the domain of the US, but is taking root throughout the world. In this article I want to chronicle some of the exciting locations where some form of classical education and/or Charlotte Mason education is taking shape.

The first two locations happen to be in England, the place of origin of both Charlotte Mason and the classical renewal movement instigated by essays from Dorothy Sayers and C. S. Lewis. It is ironic that the former colonies would take up the mantle of educational renewal. But now we are seeing the emergence of new locales on every habitable continent. From England we will travel to the heart of Africa, the far East, South America, Central Europe and down under in Australia.

Heritage School (England)

The first location to chronicle is Heritage School in Cambridge, England. It opened its doors in the 2007-2008 school year with a handful of students and has grown ever since. The school is solidly within the Charlotte Mason tradition, with one of its founders, Fiona Macaulay-Fletcher, having attended a Charlotte Mason school in her childhood. Starting an alternative school in the UK is not altogether different than what one might expect in the US. They share on their history page:

“In early 2006, they visited schools operating intentionally along Charlotte Mason lines and a small number of PNEU schools still operating in England. During the remainder of 2006 they developed a business plan, which they began circulating in January 2007, to see if there would be sufficient interest from prospective families, and to try and raise the necessary start-up funding.

In the eight months prior to September 2007, all the necessary pieces came together: a small number of committed families, start-up funding, a small staff team, premises, a unique curriculum, registration with the Department for Education, an initial Ofsted inspection, preparation of classrooms, purchasing resources, and so on, and Heritage School was able to get started.”

“History of the School”

While Heritage is not explicitly classical, it is clearly informed by the classical tradition. They offer classical languages and utilize a great books approach to literature.

I have been a big fan of Heritage for well over a decade, and thoroughly enjoy following their Facebook feed. Having lived in Cambridge previously, I sometimes get glimpses of the campus and surrounding countryside, which warms my heart. But what I find truly inspiring is seeing the implementation of Charlotte Mason in photo after photo.

The King Alfred School (England)

Founded by Tom and Hayley Bowen, The King Alfred School was officially registered with Ofsted in July of 2021. Located near Birmingham in the West Midlands, The King Alfred School is the first member of the ACCS in Britain.

The story of their founding was reported by Jonathan Hodge at the Circe Institute blog back in August 2021. In this article you get a sense of the need for classical education as the Bowens share their heart for educational renewal. They describe the state educational system as “a factory production line, but the products were not good.” (Circe, “The First (Modern) Classical School in England”)

On their website, the Bowens casts a vision for classical Christian education in England:

“Like King Alfred in his own day we would like to see a revival of Christian education in England. We wish to serve local families by offering affordable, high quality education to prepare children to live virtuous lives.

We strive to offer a small and friendly environment where students’ talents can be nurtured. We wish to pass on to our children the rich cultural heritage of the Christian West.

We aspire to graduate students who are knowledgeable individuals with the ability to think logically and independently. Our goal is to help raise up young men and women who are well rounded and equipped to succeed in the wider world.”

The King Alfred School, “Our Vision”

Alfred reigned from 871-899 as King of the Anglo-Saxons, defending the kingdom against repeated Viking attacks. During his reign, he oversaw a number of legal, religious and educational reforms. Alfred translated the volume The Book of Pastoral Rule, written by Gregory the Great around the year 590, into (old) English. In his preface, Alfred expresses the decline in education that resulted from years of neglect due to warfare with the Vikings. “Learning had declined so thoroughly in England that there were very few men on this side of the Humber who could understand their divine services in English or even translate a single letter from Latin into English.” (Simon Keynes and Michael Lapidge, Alfred the Great, Harmondsworth: Penguin (1983), 101-102) The King Alfred School now stands in that same tradition of defending the faith against the forces that assail it through educational renewal.

Rafiki Foundation (Africa)

The Rafiki Foundation is part of an initiative to establish classical Christian school across Africa. Beginning as a mission to Africa in 1929, over the past two decades the Rafiki Foundation has brought classical Christian education to numerous locations across Africa from Ethiopia in the east to Liberia in the west. In 2015 a training college was founded called the Rafiki Institute of Classical Education (RICE) with the aim of providing well-trained classical educators for schools in Africa.

One of the beautiful projects The Rafiki Foundation is undertaking is the creation of classical curriculum that is written with African village schools in view. They write, “Names, places, and stories used to teach universal truths are decidedly African by design.” (“Rafiki Foundation Curriculum”) The art curriculum for Grade Level 1, for instance, is illustrated with images of desert sands, palm fronds and zebras, all of which ground the reader within an African context.

There are many ways individuals and groups can support the efforts to provide classical Christian education in Africa. The Education Fund raises support for village schools as well as providing educational resources. There are many opportunities to serve in teaching roles as a short-term missionary.

Seoul International Christian Academy (Korea)

Located in South Korea, Seoul International Christian Academy (SICA) is a member of the ACCS, blending classical education with a Charlotte Mason educational philosophy. It is fascinating to see classical Christian education planted in the East, but this demonstrates the point that living ideas – especially our Christian faith – transcends cultural differences.

The founders describe their search for an educational methodology, choosing classical education, “which has produced historically outstanding thinkers and leaders.” Paired with Charlotte Mason pedagogy, they are forming not only great thinkers but enable children to form character through habit training. The Christian foundation at SICA is beautifully expressed as they aim “to nurture students who are wise and godly.” (“SICA Education Advantages”)

They spell out what has often been a point of contention, the way the great books tradition is embedded in Western civilization. For a school in Korea, they utilize the great books tradition, but don’t they see the differences between East and West as an insurmountable cultural divide. “The Humanities Classics Great Books are books that have had an important influence on the formation of society and culture historically.” They go on to state that great books have had “a strong ideological influence on the formation of world civilizations including the East and the West.” They also see how the great books express “great ideas that have been practiced and accumulated since ancient times.”

Trinitas Escola Cristã Clássica (Brazil)

Our next location takes us to just south of São Paulo in Brazil. Trinitas aims to provide an educational alternative in the region based on “the rediscovery of the classical method.” They follow the trivium as stages of child-development approach, incorporating tools “tools such as imitation, recitation, Socratic discussions, content integration, debates” among others.

What I like about this school is that they ground their approach in the long story of classical education. In the Q&A section of their homepage they write, “The pedagogical approach based on the classical Christian model is a way of teaching created by the Greeks, adapted by the Romans and fully developed by Christians throughout the Middle Ages.” The grounding of classical education in several historical settings gives the sense that our educational renewal movement is dynamic, able to be applied in new eras and in different locations (an idea that has inspired this exploration of locations outside North America.)

Trinitas is a multilingual school with students literate (alfabetizados) in English and Portuguese while also learning Latin. This school seeks “an inner transformation of the student, cultivating virtue in them and enabling them to train (disciplinar) their affections in all that is true, good and beautiful, so that they desire God and follow his ways.” Trinitas seems like a lovely school doing great work in South America.

Die Lerche (Linz, Austria)

A Charlotte Mason school within the Ambleside International network of schools opened in the 2018 school year and now serves elementary and middle school students. Linz, about a two-hour drive west from Vienna, is located in northern Austria. Die Lerche, or the Lark, symbolizes “the striving for a learning atmosphere that is characterized by joy, interest and appreciation.” (Die Lerche, “Was wir von der Lerche lernen”) The lark is ever climbing in flight without ever ceasing to sing.

As an Ambleside school, there is a rigorous curriculum approached with attention and joy that contains instruction in religion, math, science, German, English, music, the visual arts, and technical skills (pre-vocational). In the middle school they add Spanish and follow the biology, chemistry, physics sequence in science. One of the ways Ambleside schools resonate with classical education is that they emphasize the great books. Die Lerche expresses how they implement interdisciplinary teaching (Fächerübergreifender Unterricht), which is similar to what we might call integrated humanities. (Die Lerche, “Lehrplan und Stundentafeln”)

Coram Deo Micro-Schools (Perth, Australia)

Classical Christian education is on the rise in Australia. Last April, Circe Institute sponsored the Classical Renewal Conference simulcast in Australia and the US. The recently established Australian Classical Education Society placed a marker down as to the wellspring of interest in classical education down under.

One location that classical education is taking root is in Western Australia where a group of micro schools in the Perth area are providing an educational alternative. The Coram Deo Micro-School have three locations around Perth, partnering with area churches “to provide an alternative academic outlet for parents looking for quality Christian education in Perth.” (“About Us”)

Despite launching during Covid, the Coram Deo schools are gaining traction and having an impact. With several parent testimonials pointing out the warm and caring environment they are creating at their schools, I can imagine a growing number of families in Western Australia being blessed by the visionary team guiding these schools.

Educational Renewal, A Global Movement

It is instructive to observe the extent to which our educational renewal movement spans the globe. Far from being an American enterprise, we see how an authentic liberal arts tradition finds its home in any language and in any culture. Great ideas are by nature transcendent, so we should not be surprised to see shared educational values bridging East and West, North and South. The seven locations enumerated here are only a fraction of the schools furthering the cause. With our shared vision and purpose, hopefully we can find ways to support and promote one another on a global scale to see a rich educational heritage renewed in even more diverse locations.

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The second event came later that year on September 18^th. Booker T. Washington gave a speech at the Atlanta Exposition. In this speech, presented before a predominantly white audience, laid out an educational plan that would aim at the advancement of blacks in vocational or industrial trades. Washington first advised “the friends of my race” to make “friends in every manly way of the people of all races by whom we are surrounded.” (Washington, “Address” 18 Sept. 1895) His was a message of reconciliation, spoken deep in the South, sounded the right note for those in attendance. The worry was that racial tensions would erupt in Atlanta, since Georgia had been adopting Jim Crow laws during the 1890s. It was only the following May that the Plessy v. Ferguson decision was made in the Supreme Court, upholding “separate but equal” segregation in the South.

What Washington meant by “making friends in every manly way” he immediately spells out in his speech:

“Our greatest danger is that in the great leap from slavery to freedom we may overlook the fact that the masses of us are to live by the productions of our hands, and fail to keep in mind that we shall prosper in proportion as we learn to dignify and glorify common labour, and put brains and skill into the common occupations of life; shall prosper in proportion as we learn to draw the line between the superficial and the substantial, the ornamental gewgaws of life and the useful. No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem. It is at the bottom of life we must begin, and not at the top. Nor should we permit our grievances to overshadow our opportunities.”

Booker T. Washington, “Address by Booker T. Washington“

(For teachers interested in investigating primary sources, you can access the manuscript of the speech at this Georgia Historical Society webpage and listen to an audio recording Washington made in 1908 of excerpts from his speech available at this Library of Congress webpage.)

The Atlanta Compromise

For Washington, the strategy to make black lives better is to forgo such things as campaigning for government positions or contending for positions in the ivory tower of colleges and universities. It is a strategy that makes sense. Catch the wave of the booming industrial economy in the South and ride that wave to a better future. Washington’s speech became known as the “Atlanta Compromise” in part due to the cooperative program he laid out, but also because it caught the industrial wave, but also the wave of Jim Crow laws and segregationism.

Despite the rivalry that soon emerged between Washington and W. E. B. DuBois, the Atlanta speech was at first celebrated by DuBois. In a brief letter dated 24^th September of 1895, DuBois writes:

“Let me heartily congratulate you upon your phenomenal success at Atlanta—it was a word fitly spoken.”

It is not altogether clear exactly what DuBois is congratulating here. Was he particularly impressed by the content of the speech or did he recognize the emergence of a new leader to take up the mantle of Douglass? DuBois was himself an emerging leader although he was over a decade younger than Washington. Perhaps the heart of DuBois’ message to Washington centers less on the content of what was spoken and more on DuBois’s recognition of the role Washington could play as the heir to Douglass. No matter how we read the praise DuBois sends to Washington, it did not take long for DuBois to reconsider his position on black education and to challenge the very message of the “Atlanta Compromise.”

A Study in Contrasts

Washington and DuBois could not have been more different, and perhaps that accounts for the difference in their perspectives on education. Booker T. Washington was born into slavery on a plantation in Virginia. He was nearly ten when the Emancipation Proclamation was issued, about which he writes that “some man who seemed to be a stranger (a United States officer, I presume) made a little speech and then read a rather long paper—the Emancipation Proclamation, I think. After the reading we were told that we were all free, and could go when and where we pleased.” (Up from Slavery 20-21) As a freedman, Washington worked in the coals mines while attending Hampton Institute. At the age of 25, Washington was appointed as principal to what is now called Tuskegee University in Alabama. Tuskagee was a place where Washington could put into practice his “head, hearts, and hands” approach so that students were trained “to return to the plantation districts and show the people there how to put new energy and new ideas into farming as well as into the intellectual and moral and religious life of the people.” (Up from Slavery 160).

DuBois, on the other hand, was born into a free black family in Massachusetts, attending integrated schools during his childhood. He went to Fisk University where he encountered racism and segregation for the first time. After Fisk he went on to earn another bachelor’s degree from Harvard and then completed graduate work at the University of Berlin. He returned to the States and became the first black to earn a PhD from Harvard. DuBois was offered a position at Tuskagee, which would have seen him working alongside Washington, but instead took a position at Wilberforce University in Ohio. Later he taught at Atlanta University and developed a prominent voice domestically and internationally in scientific sociology. It is no surprise, then, that, as an academic tour de force himself, DuBois would champion a very different educational vision than Washington. He focused on the liberal arts with a view to raising up leaders within the black community who would be able to take up prominent positions in politics and business to enact real change in society.

The Talented Tenth

The thesis DuBois developed took on different nuances over time. In an essay entitled “The Talented Tenth,” DuBois lays out his philosophical conviction that the object of education must be the formation of the person rather than money-making or technical skill.

“Men we shall have only as we make manhood the object of the work of schools—intelligence, broad sympathy, knowledge of the world that was and is, and of the relation of men to it—this is the curriculum of that Higher Education which must underlie true life.”

W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Talented Tenth,” 33-34.

He goes on to demonstrate that through the generations leaders rose up even during slavery to provide leadership that ultimately led to emancipation. These were exceptional people, which proves his point that the training of exceptional leaders is what will continue to lead equality of the races. DuBois lays out the program of study for students at his Atlanta University.

“Here students from the grammar grades, after a three years’ high school course, take a college course of 136 weeks. One-fourth of this time is given to Latin and Greek; one-fifth, to English and modern languages; one-sixth, to history and social science; one-seventh, to natural science; one-eighth to mathematics, and one-eighth to philosophy and pedagogy.”

W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Talented Tenth,” 49.

This sounds very much like the liberal arts education we have promoted in the classical Christian educational renewal movement. From DuBois’ perspective, it is the liberal arts that will train up the next generation of black leaders who will transform society.

Not So Different

Now the delineation of these two educational programs has thus far been expressed in stark terms. Washington’s “Atlanta Compromise” emphasizes industrial training while DuBois insists on a liberal arts education for the “Talented Tenth.” It is all too easy to draw lines between these pedagogical models in hindsight. Yet there are many ways in which we may see overlap between these two. Yes, the divide between DuBois and Washington was exacerbated by the essay DuBois wrote in The Souls of Black Folk entitled “Of Mr. Booker T. Washington and Others” in which he was critical of Washington’s autobiography Up from Slavery. However, DuBois later gave perspective to exactly what was at the heart of their disagreement. It was not the educational program, per se, but the trust that dutiful, diligent work would lead to acceptance of a black work ethic among whites in the South. He writes:

“I realized the need for what Washington was doing. Yet it seemed to me he was giving up essential ground that would be hard to win back. I don’t think Washington saw this until the last years of his life. He kept hoping. But before he died he must have known that he and his hopes had been rejected and that he had, without so intending, helped make stronger — and more fiercely defended — a separation and rejection that made a mockery of all he had hoped and dreamed.”

“W.E.B. DuBois,” The Atlantic Monthly, Nov. 1965

The hopes and dreams of Washington were dashed not because of a blind faith in his educational program, but in his faith that respectable work would be universally praised by a watching world. If we were solely to look at the educational results in the lives of the individual students, a different perspective emerges. Creating educational programs with the aim of making radical changes in society misplace the actual educational aim. Developing human beings as whole persons is a more fundamental aim, and we are probably safe in saying the programs developed by both Washington and DuBois met this aim.

Moral Formation

My claim that Washington and DuBois are not so different rests not in the details of their program of study, but in the importance both men placed in the moral formation of students. Washington’s technical education placed emphasis on the moral and religious aspects of educations.

“We wanted to give them such an education as would fit a large proportion of them to be teachers, and at the same time cause them to return to the plantation districts and show the people there how to put new energy and new ideas into farming, as well as into the intellectual and moral and religious life of the people.”

Up from Slavery 160

We get a similar hint at moral and spiritual development in The Souls of Black Folk. For instance, DuBois writes, “sometime, somewhere, men will judge men by their souls and not by their skin.” (The Souls of Black Folk 261) In his essay “The Talented Tenth,” he delineates two main objectives for education in a post-emancipation society:

“If then we start out to train an ignorant and unskilled people with a heritage of bad habits, our system of training must set before itself two great aims the one dealing with knowledge and character, the other part seeking to give the child the technical knowledge necessary for him to earn a living under the present circumstances.”

“Talented Tenth” 58

Although DuBois was critical of Washington’s compromise, we see here a recognition that educated people must make a living. Yet, the first of the two great aims is knowledge and character. On even a cursory reading of DuBois, one is struck by his thorough knowledge of the Western canon, or what we might call the traditional liberal arts. So by “knowledge” we are not talking about a mastery of facts and figures prominent in an industrial age, but of the long tradition of great authors and ideas. This is knowledge that DuBois sees as transcending racial divide, even though it has come to be thought of as a collection of dead white men’s thoughts. Indeed, DuBois sees this long tradition as the foundation for character and creating a moral society.

So, where we find overlap in the Washington-DuBois debate is on this concept of morality. And it is on this concept we should give serious consideration to the ideas both men propound. These two men were seeking a Renaissance in their time, and in many ways they were the architects of a flowering of black culture. I am quick to add that their reflections on education are instructive not only for a minority culture, but promote global considerations that are crucial for us to get right in our current educational renewal movement.

Ideas not Ideology

Washington and DuBois both seek to promote the great society; one in which racial lines are erased and mutual respect leads to intellectual, moral and technological advance. Both men sought to utilize great ideas as a means of train young men and women. Great ideas are not the domain of one class, sect, race or people. They challenge us and through that challenge transform us through what we might call the dialectical process. We weight different ideas, discerning and discriminating, in order to arrive at a synthesis. Great ideas generate new ideas, transforming not only our minds but also our characters.

Contrast this with ideology. An ideology is a system of ideals often accepted uncritically and unquestioningly. Our current political and social landscape is rife with conflicting ideologies. The impact of the conflict of ideologies is that camps – whether to the right or to the left – attempt to commandeer institutions, whether that be media, government or schools. No longer is our society marked by discourse, dialogue and debate. Instead, ideology forces compliance with a set of preformed beliefs. Education becomes a method of indoctrination. Now one must be careful here, because there are sets of true propositions enfolded in these ideologies. The problem is that nothing is up for debate. Questioning the ideology is the same as denial of the ideology, and one becomes excommunicated from the “group think.”

As an educational renewal movement, there is a temptation to offer a counter set of agendas. “Okay, fine,” we might say, “the public schools are promoting the agenda of gender fluidity, then we’ll promote the alternative agenda.” I’m struck, however, that this was not the strategy of DuBois or Washington. Despite racism and segregation, they sought to train students in intellectual and moral skills that would enable them to enter into the discourse of the greater society. Classical Christian schools must avoid the allure of ideological agenda and remain true to training students in the logic and rhetoric that will prepare our graduates to take up nuances positions and speak persuasively from a place of well-developed convictions.

Hand, Head, and Heart

The classical Christian school movement might be more inclined towards the DuBois educational program. He, after all, promotes the very same liberal arts tradition we call home. However, DuBois himself saw the liability of creating an elite class that becomes self-perpetuating; enamored of its own self-importance rather than utilizing its position to raise all of society. Thus, a Washington-DuBois synthesis is well worthy of consideration.

The phrase “hand, head, and heart” comes from Washington. (Up from Slavery 85) This is a valuable triad to frame a fully embodied philosophy of education. I really like this phrasing pulled from the website of the Ecclesial Schools Initiative, “A classical education beckons learners toward goodness, truth, and beauty, wherever it may be found, integrating faith into all areas of learning, and helping students acquire the habits of heart, body, and mind that are essential for living a flourishing human life.” Kevin Clark, founder of the Ecclesial Schools Initiative, is one of the authors—along with Ravi Jain—of The Liberal Arts Tradition (reviewed here). Technical skill is recognized in this book as a “wholly legitimate pursuit.” In other words, we cannot be so singularly focused on the intellectual and moral development of our students that we leave no room for skills development. Clark and Jain write:

“The liberal arts are only intended to be the tools of learning to be used in all other studies. The three branches of philosophy and, in addition, theology, then contain the integrated tapestry of all other knowledge as represented by the innumerable particular sciences, such as biology, ethics, economics, and chemistry. Moreover, professional degrees, to be acquired later, recognize that other skills (arts) are needed for one’s vocation.”

Clark and Jain, The Liberal Arts Tradition, 7

To this might be added apprenticeship in a trade as opposed to professional degrees. More and more the collegiate landscape has become overly expensive relative to its waning value due to the ideological agendas present in higher education. Graduates from classical Christian schools might be better placed in trade apprenticeships or military service. All of this to say that the liberal arts are a necessary element in learning the knowledge and character required to live a flourishing life. That life, though, needs to be embodied in vocations that support and promote flourishing. I highly recommend reading through Jason’s article “Apprenticeship in the Arts” where he explores professions and trades in light of Chris Hall’s Common Arts Education.

Educational Renewal in Light of 1895

The momentous occasion of Washington’s “Atlanta Speech” in 1895 marks a period of reflection and debate over education, particularly between Washington and DuBois. It is striking to note that 1895 was also the year when the first professional American football match was played (Sept. 3), the first automobile race occurred (Nov. 28), and the first moving picture film was shown (Dec. 28). When we consider how much society has been transformed by the onset of these modern artifacts, we can see that a significant aspect of what Washington and DuBois were wrestling with was not just racial in nature, but also pertained to how modernism eroded conceptions of individual character and community cohesion.

The impact of modernism has left us with a society that is fractured and hurting. Hopefully by tracing the debate between Washington and DuBois, we can see lines of constructive thought that invigorate our own educational renewal movement. We have in both Washington and DuBois compatriots who are deeply concerned to cultivate virtue in students for the betterment of society. If Up from Slavery, The Souls of Black Folk or “The Talented Tenth” are not yet in your curriculum, I highly recommend their adoption. Perhaps this review of their work has inspired you to consider ways to broaden your understanding of the outcomes for classical Christian education. Perhaps our students, trained in the liberal arts, are exactly what our society needs to lead us out of our current political catastrophe. Perhaps our students, educated holistically in hand, heart and head, will embody the lives of flourishing that is the true outcome of a good education.

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