The University of Florida is adding a new center to its campus. The Hamilton School will become the new epicenter for classical and civil education.
Classical education involves a renewal or otherwise a return to traditional education that is based in sciences, arts, history, and more.
It appears to be on the rise in the U.S.
In fact, published enrollment figures focus on schools that self-identify as “classical” under major networks or catalogues; they may understate total classical-education uptake, because many homeschoolers and small microschools don’t appear in formal counts.
Some reports note that demand may be outpacing supply as far as the availability of classical-trained teachers.
Hughes Putman is a student at the University of Florida. He and fellow student Nicholas Randazzo explained The Hamilton School in an appearance on Fox News (shown right).
"Well, the full name is the Hamilton School for Classical and Civil Education. What that means is it's really about educating citizens. We really emphasize reading primary sources, original texts, and it's all from the western civilization, the western Canon, so everything from Aristotle to Thomas Jefferson to Edmund Burke.”
Those centuries-old texts have modern-day value.
“It’s really about having a critical discussion and debate between students, reading those original texts, and understanding them as they were written and as they apply to us today,” Putman said.
Part of this process includes a physical renovation for the historic building that will house the center.
He said it is an open design that will encourage more open dialogue between students and faculty.
"The projections for what the building will look like, it's taking a historic building and making something new out of it, and I think it serves as an excellent metaphor for the project that Hamilton's trying to accomplish,” Randazzo said.
