Reported by the Harvard Crimson…
Classics Professor Richard F. Thomas joined students, parents, and other Massachusetts professors yesterday evening at a public hearing at F.A. Day Middle School, urging the Newton Public School Committee to reconsider the implementation of a proposed budget that would eliminate Latin courses at the middle school level.
…Addressing the superintendent, committee members, and concerned parents, Thomas said that, as the father of two children, he and his family moved to Newton because of the exceptional public school system in 1987.
“It should be a source of pride that some 300 of our seventh and eighth grade students are allowed to take Latin,” he said. “We should see this as one of the real jewels of our educational system and preserving this experience should be, in my opinion, a priority.”
Richard Thomas is a classics professor at Harvard, who has published extensively on Roman culture and Latin poetry. His most recent publications include work on Vergil, Horace, and Bob Dylan (!). Take a look at his profile here. It’s always great to hear about classics professors participating actively in their communities and going to bat for middle schools and high schools. It happens, but we don’t often get to hear about it.
HT APA facebook page!