No, classical education is not a racist “dog whistle”

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Classical education has recently seen renewed interest from parents, students, and teachers seeking an alternative to the endless parade of fads and politicization in traditional public education. Like any idea that challenges the status quo, this growing interest has inevitably been accompanied by both an increase in detractors and an inability to understand exactly what the movement is.

More recently, Michael Harriot, a columnist at TheGrio, expressed his contempt for classical education during an appearance on MSNBC’s The ReidOut. Harriot asserted: Viewers should know that classical education is a dog whistle which means CRT is not taught here. He went on to state that classical education is pro-Confederation and said that George Washington was not a slave owner.

Harriots’ assessment of classical education contrasts sharply with the reality of its history and its contemporary rise in popularity.

As the tide turned in favor of progressive educational practices in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many of the most vocal proponents of classical education were black American leaders such as WEB Du Bois and Anna Julia Cooper. For Du Bois, Cooper, and other like-minded contemporaries, access to classical education was inseparable from access to suffrage and full civic equality.

More recently, Marva Collins brought a classical education to children in a poor, predominantly black American neighborhood of Chicago, teaching and running her Westside Preparatory School for nearly 30 years beginning in the 1970s. Classical educators such as Anika Prather , who described his experience in providing a classical education to black American students as living among the constellation of the cannon, and Angel Parham, founder of the Nyansa Classical Community, carry on the legacy of Du Bois and Cooper through their efforts. to draw attention to the connection between classical education and the experience of black men and women in America.

Contrary to Harriots’ assertion, parents from diverse backgrounds are not choosing a mainstream education for their children because it’s a racist whistle or to avoid confronting the many ugly truths of American history. Parents from all walks of life choose classical education for the same reasons that Du Bois, Cooper, Collins and others like them turned to it in their efforts for freedom and equality: the content and methods of Classical education prepares young people to become thoughtful, virtuous. citizens and leaders.

Classical education places a strong emphasis on phonics-focused literacy in the early grades as well as a content-rich curriculum, a component that becomes more pronounced as students progress through the grades that includes an immersion in world history, great literary and poetic works, science, art and music, and mathematics. These two practices, from which classical education has never departed, have also been the subject of renewed attention in ordinary education with the emergence of the science of reading and the proven failure of fashionable approaches to whole words and without content.

Classical education emphasizes proven methods such as direct teacher-led instruction and Socratic discussion. Teachers and students engage in reflective explorations of the content they are studying by reading together. They discuss important questions and ideas about the nature and meaning of human life and about truth, goodness and beauty. Students are expected to produce meaningful written work and oral presentations. Indeed, classical education deliberately avoids the ephemeral tendencies of the current moment. Instead, it spotlights works and ideas that have stood the test of time.

The result of classical education is young people who read, write, speak and listen well. With such skills, they are ready to enter society as complete individuals. Moreover, they are able to see beyond the burning issues of the moment because they have been educated in the things that have lasting significance. It’s a lesson that Michael Harriot, and all of us, would do well to learn.

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David Withun, Ph.D., is a classical educator and the author of Co-workers in the Kingdom of Culture: Classics and Cosmopolitanism in the Thought of WEB Du Bois (Oxford University Press, 2022).

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