At the core of Trinity Academy’s mission is the creation of a community of learners. This community encompasses all aspects of our life together and includes faculty, staff, students, parents, and alumni. This essay will center on the role the faculty have in establishing the community of learners and our task to invite students to participate in it through the curriculum. This concept is essential to Trinity’s DNA, part of our life from the beginning. I thought it would be helpful to note where it comes from, what it looks like in action, and what we think it offers.
Where Did This Begin?
In the early 1980s a group of adults in the South Bend branch of the People of Praise researched various models of education in order to decide what kind of school they wanted to create. One member of this group was Dr. Kerry Koller, who would later become Trinity Schools’ first president. He also served as Meadow View’s first head of school in 1998.
As a young adult Kerry lived with Dr. Ronald McArthur, who founded Thomas Aquinas College in California. This relationship had a profound impact on Kerry’s vision of education. It was Dr. McArthur who, in 1980, recommended that Kerry visit The Trivium School in Massachusetts. Trivium was founded the previous year by John Schmitt, who had taught at Thomas Aquinas College and desired to bring that sort of education to students in grades seven through twelve. It was the example of Trivium that allowed the concept of Trinity to be realized.
From the start, the founders of Trinity were interested in a different approach to education. This included not just the curricular content, but the manner and environment in which the material was taught. Kerry described this approach in a memo for the faculty that he wrote in the 1990s:
What we need is an education which will produce thoughtful and reflective adults who can take over the leadership of this country. We do not need students who can do differential equations but not understand mathematics, or those who can recite the salient points of Dostoevski's biography but can't make heads or tails out of Crime and Punishment. Jacques Maritain, the French philosopher, once said, "Education is not animal training—it is a human awakening.”
… The human spirit is awakened by other human beings–human beings who feel, think and reflect deeply on the most substantial aspects of the human condition. …
Our schools need to be real communities of learners. Such communities are built around teachers. Only in such communities do minds come alive. Only in such communities are born the wonder and curiosity which produce science, literature and art.
Kerry often called the community of learners the “heart of the matter” for Trinity’s educational vision. To this day, we seek to be a genuine community of learners to bring about human awakening–and that begins with the faculty. A faculty whose members are committed to understanding God’s creation across the disciplines. A faculty who desires to share their enthusiasm for learning with students and awaken wonder within them. My primary job as head of school is to nurture and care for the community of learners. When I am interviewing faculty candidates, I am not just looking for teaching skills, but I am also seeing if this person would contribute to our community of learners; whether the candidate has a love for learning and a desire to share that love with others.
Shared Common Space
It starts with the fact that all faculty share a common space. Inside West Hall we have two common rooms where the faculty desks are located. I have yet to find another school where faculty members who teach a variety of topics are in a room together. I recently asked a member of Kerry Koller’s original research team, Tom Finke, whose idea it was to have a common faculty room. He could not recall exactly, but said that it was just understood from Kerry that they would all work together in a shared space.
While it is true that you do hear helpful and practical conversations in the faculty rooms between colleagues on how best to approach a text, or ideas about pacing with the material, the real magic resides in our other conversations. For example, it is not uncommon for someone to share a passage of a book aloud and ask for thoughts. We have discussions on the merits of various translations of Homer’s epics. We share articles with each other, including the latest discoveries from the Webb telescope and perspectives on the AI revolution. This intellectually rich environment has been the greatest blessing of my professional career.
Additional ways in which we foster our community of learners is through our shared life together. Four times a year, the faculty gather over a meal and hold a seminar. Last year we worked through Milton’s Paradise Lost. This year we are tackling philosopher Jacques Maritain’s Education at the Crossroads. We also have four faculty colloquia where either a faculty member shares work he or she has been doing or we bring in an outside speaker. Last year, Dr. Latar presented her research on George MacDonald and J.R.R. Tolkien and their concepts of imagination and creativity. We were also able to invite alumni to present on topics in government procedures and AI regulation.
A Way of Life
And, believe it or not, we actually spend a good deal of time together outside of school hours. We regularly host gatherings for one another. In fact, when we don’t have a faculty meeting on Fridays we often have “meetings of the faculty.” Mr. Niklason has an annual crab fest, I have been hosting an end of the year party for the last 15 years, and a variety of other gatherings spontaneously occur throughout the year. All this is to say that the faculty view the community of learners as something beyond what occurs between 8 a.m. and 3 p.m. We view it as a way of life together and that was Kerry’s original vision. It is the faculty’s shared life together which forms the backbone of Trinity’s educational vision. It is the faculty’s commitment to pursuing the true, good, and beautiful together which creates a deep affection for one another and our goal – which is to educate our students to be of service to God in the wise care and governance of his creation and the building of his kingdom.
Impact
It does sound a bit odd to hear a school say that the primary goal of the faculty is to foster the community of learners. Why place community before pedagogy or curriculum? When the dynamic amongst the faculty is flourishing, then the students truly benefit. How is that? Another component of our community of learners model is the belief that while the faculty establish and model a way of life together, we invite the students to participate in this community through our curriculum. We want students to see what it can look like spending time learning and discussing in a communal way.
The good news is that our students sense that something different is happening at Trinity. I recently asked our alumni what they think about the phrase “community of learners” and their responses were telling.
Observations From Graduates
The phrase "community of learners," familiar to all Trinity students, alumni, and faculty, signifies a collective commitment where everyone…actively engage[s] in a culture of curiosity, dialogue, and reflection. This shared pursuit fosters an atmosphere of mutual support, respect, and a passion for lifelong learning. (Meadow View alum)
This phrase embodies the unique learning environment that Trinity creates. Students at Trinity are surrounded by faculty and peers who are firmly committed to their intellectual and spiritual growth and development. Trinity has teachers who are deeply passionate about the subjects they teach, in addition to teaching itself, and are always looking to dig deeper into course content and learn more about the material. Students are expected to learn in the purest sense of the word and are discouraged from prioritizing scores and grades over real knowledge acquired. (Meadow View alum)
Education as Human Awakening
Trinity’s combination of an ambitious curriculum and the community of learners is a beautiful thing. One could imagine a school with the same reading list and courses, but without the sense of community. In that case, you might just have rigor for rigor’s sake and no shared sense of purpose. That would not lead towards our vision of education, which is to view education as human awakening. Establishing a community of learners allows the faculty to deliver a rich curriculum in a way that nourishes the students and helps them to discover the beauty of God’s creation. We seek to create an environment where the students can flourish, where they can encounter reality, and where they can participate in a free and disciplined exchange of ideas.
Clearly, when we use the phrase “community of learners” we mean a way of life together. It is different and special and deeply cherished. The faculty love teaching this material, we love teaching our students, and we love our life together teaching at Trinity.