"When I am asked what it's like to teach at Hillsdale, I simply explain that I offer to my students what my mentors offered to me - the joy of learning to read critically and access to an academic, scholarly community in the classroom which then spreads across campus and ultimately reaches out to a larger scholarly community in the world.
We are teaching a life of the mind, yes, but also a life of the heart, a life of the soul - these things that aren't simply academic pursuits but the very stuff of which the human person is made and for which he ultimately yearns. At the end of the day, I explain, we aren't merely teaching students skills so that they can succeed in college, nor are we simply teaching them skills that will make them a valuable commodity in the marketplace; rather, we share with them this body of literature that attempts to plumb the inexhaustible mystery of the human person so that they too can continue to rub up against these ideas even after they have left Hillsdale.
Perhaps, they too can pass on to others this difficult joy found in wrestling with what it means to be human - body, soul, and mind - continuing to grapple with a conversation begun centuries, millennia ago - tradition in the best and most meaningful sense of the word."
So good. A homeschooled girl from our parish will be going to Hillsdale next year. I know she's excited and I am SO happy for her :)
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