Ashbrook Academy Summer Programs

The Ashbrook Academy is offering four summer academies the week of June 16, 2024. The summer programs are designed for rising high school juniors and seniors who share a deep interest in U.S. History, Politics, and Economics. Unlike other courses or programs that tend to erode confidence and pride in our country by emphasizing its historical failures, the Ashbrook Academies invite you to consider the American experiment in self-government as a triumph, a victory for reason and the human spirit that warrants grateful celebration but also demands serious study.

• Telling America’s Story: Serious education is about pursuing great questions, and the goal of this Academy is to pursue the most important question for us as citizens: namely, “What does it mean to be an American?” To do that, the seminar will immerse you in the study of the ideas and institutions that make Americans who we are.
• Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War: This Academy, intended for more advanced students or graduates of “Telling America’s Story,” will take students on an in-depth exploration of perhaps the most difficult era in American history, the Civil War.
• The Psychology of Good and Evil: Are people consistently either good or evil? Or are our actions more variable and nuanced than that? What leads people to engage in the most selfless acts of goodwill, and what leads them to commit acts of cruelty? This new academy in Liberal Arts and Sciences explores the biological, developmental, and social factors that contribute to prosocial and antisocial behavior.
• World War II: In this Academy, you will participate in a deep study of perhaps the most consequential events of the 20th Century. By examining speeches and other primary sources from the 1930s and 1940s, you will learn about U.S. involvement in the most destructive conflict in modern history.