Cincinnati Classical Academy is a tuition-free charter school opening in Fall 2022 in affiliation with Hillsdale College’s Barney Charter School Initiative. There are already 25 BCSI schools throughout the country, but this will be the first in Cincinnati and only 2ndin Ohio. The school curriculum is “American Classical” with a traditional/conservative aim. There is more information about the school at www.cincyclassical.org
Our Mission
To develop the minds and nourish the hearts of young men and women through a content-rich classical curriculum in the liberal arts and sciences, with instruction in moral character and civic virtue.
Our Vision
To develop a citizenry with strong language and reasoning skills, an understanding of the natural world and our nation, and an appreciation of the Good, the True, and the Beautiful as revealed through our Western civilization inheritance.
Philosophy
The curriculum, pedagogy, and culture will be based on the following philosophic foundations:
1. Thecentrality of the Western tradition, to include a rich and recurring examination of the American literary, moral, philosophical, political, and historical traditions.
2. The acknowledgment ofobjective standardsof correctness, logic, beauty, weightiness, and truth intrinsic to the liberal arts.
3. The importance ofstory-tellingin the totality of education, and in particular to early childhood education. This includes fiction, poetry, and mythology, as well as historical narrative.
4. The teaching of dialectic (the art of investigating or discussing the truth of viewpoints) and use ofSocratic dialogue.
5. Theuse of primary sourcesin the humanities when possible, as favored over modern commentaries, interpretations, or summaries.
6. The logical ordering of linguistic studies through the trivial arts ofgrammar, logic, and rhetoric.
Following explicit phonics instruction, grammar is taught as the ordinary use of language, and then logic as the proper use of definition, reason, and argumentation. Thenceforth rhetoric, or the extraordinary and persuasive use of language.
7. Thestudy of Latin, to enhance understanding of word roots, language structure, and grammar, as well as the foundations of modern society in classical antiquity.
8. The framing of numerical studies in relation to the quadrivial arts: arithmetic, the art of pure number; geometry, the art of number in space; music, the art of number in time; and astronomy, the art of number in space and time. These subjects provide a basis for pursuit of the derivative arts of algebra, trigonometry, and calculus, which further revealthe quantities, harmonies, and logic of the natural world.
9. A careful and comprehensive study of thenatural sciences, which build upon and enhance the study of number so as to reveal the intelligible ordering, composition, and wonder of the natural world.
These include physics, chemistry, biology, and geology.
10. Study of themoral scienceswhich explore the nature of human being and human communities. These include economics, civics, and political and moral philosophy.
11. A pronounced attention tothe pleasurable or “fine” arts(music, acting, dancing, painting), as well asgymnastic and athletic endeavors, that the body might be rightly ordered and cultivated in parallel with the intellect.
12. A school culture, to include extracurricular activities, that demandsmoral virtue, decorum, respect, discipline, and studiousnessamong the students and faculty.
13. A faculty where well-educated and articulate teachers explicitly convey real knowledge to students usingtraditional teaching methodsrather than so-called “student-centered learning” methods.
Implicit is the effective use of technology without diminishing the faculty leadership that is crucial to academic achievement.
14. The inculcation of seven cardinal virtues at all levels of character education:courage, justice, wisdom, temperance, magnanimity, industry, and integrity.