2010-2011 Edition of the Dunn School Academy Opens Tomorrow

Ralph Lowe '70 has taught at Dunn for more than two decades and has been running the Academy for a good part of that time.  Below is his introduction to this year's edition:

This marks what I believe is the fifteenth year that the Dunn Upper School as convened as a cabal of academics intent on pushing back the specter of dementia, intellectual torpor, complacency or all three of those scourges. It has been a tumultuous ride and I, for one, hope it continues as such.

The Academy is named after the olive farmer Academus who rented his olive grove not far from the Agora in the village of Athens. His first tenant was a man named Plato and he had a student named Aristotle among others who met in the grove to jumpstart history and name the world. Their symposia (drinking parties) were famous, their midnight ramblings, Diogenes led, all set out from the grove of a farmer was immortalized for his prudence or taste or courage as a landlord much like John Harvard two and one half thousand years later.

We call it the Academy because we meet to ask the “impertinent questions” that fuel debate and stock the shelves of the marketplace of ideas. There are very few rules. We all vote on what we will read. We eat lunch and argue or make jokes. Every edition of the Academy is as different as the members each year. The only expectation is that you try your best to attend and once there try your best to be interesting.

We will meet in Ralph’s classroom (the Conference Room is our usual venue) Friday. Bring your lunch. We can begin work on the architecture of this year’s edition.