Return to Principles: An In-Service Seminar for Catholic Schools

A Program of the Institute for Catholic Liberal Education

AUDIO CONFERENCING AVAILABLE

...Loyalty to the educational aims of the Catholic school demands constant self-criticism and return to basic principles, to the motives which inspire the Church's involvement in education. (Sacred Congregation for Education, The Catholic School, n.67)

What is a Catholic School? What makes it unique? Answers to these questions are fundamental for Catholic educators as they form curricula and environments that are adapted to the varying conditions of contemporary life. This in-service seminar will help educators to clarify the principles which guide them in their day-to-day educational efforts.

Part I – The Goals of Catholic Education

What does the Church hope to accomplish through its schools? What difficulties does the present secular climate present? Every important decision in a Catholic school should be made with its goals clearly in mind. The Church has spoken several times on the issue since Vatican II, most recently in a document entitled, The Catholic School on the Threshold of the Third Millenium. This portion of the program will present the Church’s vision of educating the whole person.

Part II – What is Classical Education?

The roots of Catholic education are found in the classical grammatical and rhetorical traditions of ancient Greece and Rome which were intended to form the eloquent and prudent citizen. Rediscovered in the Cathedral schools of the Middle Ages, developed in the philosophical contexts of the first Universities, revived in the humanist schools of the Renaissance, and finally forming the backbone of the ideal Jesuit education, this classical model was gradually rejected in favor of the technologically and nationally-ordered education of contemporary schools. This historical survey will prepare participants to understand the direction of their own schools through the recognition of other models.

Part III – Incorporating the Liberal Arts into Today’s Curriculum

The Catholic school can best achieve its goals through deepening the presence of liberal education, or the education of the free man, into its curriculum and practices. Institutional commitment to the ideals of Catholic liberal education are the starting point, but curricular developments, some general, some specific to different courses, can foster these goals significantly. How can education be integrated? What texts promote or hinder Catholic education? What practices can promote the development of independent, reasonable, loving Catholic youth?

Understanding the traditional seven liberal arts is the right beginning to answer these questions. This segment will focus on the distinction between the trivium and quadrivium, the order within each branch of the liberal arts, and their relation to relatively modern courses such as history, algebra and the sciences.

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