‘On the Shoulders of Giants’: This Alberta Charter School Provides Classical Education With an Emphasis on Virtue

Students at the Alberta Classical Academy in an undated photo. Alberta Classical Academy

CALGARY—When Caylan Ford entered one of the classrooms of the Alberta Classical Academy at its Currie campus in Calgary one afternoon, the students were just finishing up a Latin exam. One of them came up with the idea of reciting Latin verb conjugations for her, and everyone joined in, eager to show the school founder what they had learned during their rigorous language lessons.

Students begin to learn Latin at the school in Grade 5. The academy offers the only public, non-sectarian classical program in Canada, with a curriculum guided by the wish to preserve the wisdom of past generations, drawing on the insights of influential thinkers from the Eastern and Western traditions.

“We want our students to understand that our ancestors were no less intelligent, ingenious, empathetic, kind, courageous than we are, and in fact, they may have virtues that we lack, and so we can learn from them,” Ford told The Epoch Times. “We want them to understand that we are standing on the shoulders of giants.”

At the core of the academy’s philosophy is the belief that education should not merely prepare students for future careers, but more importantly, cultivate individuals who live according to virtue and wisdom, Ford says.

Caylan Ford, founder of the Alberta Classical Academy, next to a replica of the painting “The Death of Socrates” at the academy’s Currie campus in Calgary on June 6, 2025. Carolina Avendano/The Epoch Times

“I don’t know how you could run a school without emphasizing virtue—it’s everything that we’re trying to cultivate [here]. We want students to acquire intellectual virtues [such as] the ability to be diligent, to be teachable, to be humble, which is a prerequisite to the acquisition of knowledge or wisdom,” she said.

“And then the moral virtues of courage, magnanimity or greatness of soul, honesty, forthrightness, fortitude, the ability to persevere and endure hardships with grace—this is what we are doing.”

The Alberta Classical Academy opened in 2022 and has since expanded to three locations, two in Calgary and one in Edmonton. Its first Calgary campus enrolled just under 300 students in its first year, and the school has grown steadily, says Ford, with approximately 1,300 students enrolled across all three campuses this year and a waitlist of about 3,000 students last year.

They are classified as public charter schools, which are non-profit public institutions that follow the provincial curriculum but offer programs shaped by distinct philosophical or teaching approaches. While publicly funded, they operate with more independence than traditional public schools, as they are not overseen by district school boards.

A Sense of Beauty

Strolling through the school’s hallways is like stepping into a classical art gallery.

Reproductions of renowned works such as Michelangelo’s “The Creation of Adam,” Botticelli’s “Primavera,” Jacques-Louis David’s “The Death of Socrates,” and Shen Zhou’s “Lofty Mount Lu” line the walls, offering students daily exposure to the masterpieces of both Eastern and Western art.

Students at the Alberta Classical Academy look at a replica of a work by Italian Renaissance artist and architect Giulio Romano. Alberta Classical Academy

As part of its liberal arts education, the academy makes exposure to classical paintings key to developing a sense for what it calls “eternal goods” such as truth and beauty. “[We are] trying to educate their aesthetic emotions, their sense of what is beautiful,” Ford said.

That aesthetic sense is also nurtured through exposure to beautiful language in the form of classic poetry, she says. Students regularly recite poems, which she notes benefits them beyond memory development.

“We want them to have beautifully furnished inner worlds to which they can retire and feel revived and refreshed when they are faced with the tumult of the workaday life,” Ford said.

“When you memorize poetry when you are young, I think it imprints itself in you, on your mind, on your soul and your character, and it’s something you can always turn to as a source of consolation, of wisdom, of inspiration.”

Liam Hertzsprung, associate principal at the Calgary Currie campus and a former public school board teacher, says he chose to work at the academy because its approach to education “rang true” for him.

“We talk about the true, the good, and the beautiful,” he told The Epoch Times. “We know innately that we should be teaching the best of what has been thought and said, and some of the great works of art and literature.”

Similar standards of beauty guide the academy’s library book selections, Ford says. Books are chosen based on their “literary, aesthetic, and moral” value, with many older, enduring works added to the collection through the efforts of the library team.

Books in the library of the Alberta Classical Academy at its Currie campus in Calgary on June 6, 2025. Courtesy of Caylan Ford

“We tend to have a lot of older children’s books and classic texts, things that have stood the test of time and been appreciated by multiple generations,” Ford said.

She notes that some contemporary children’s books feature illustrations that are “crude” or “cartoonish,” which she says may be influenced by the belief that children’s books should look as though they were illustrated by children.

“We don’t do that,” she said. “You could pick any random book off of our shelf, and you would find illustrations that are actually very thoughtful, very careful, and that inspire a sense of wonder and imagination.”

Assessing Virtue

One of the ways in which the Alberta Classical Academy differs from other schools is that it includes virtue assessment on student report cards. Hertzsprung says this reflects the school’s belief that character development is just as important—if not more so—than the academic skills taught in each subject.

Teachers assess students’ virtue based on their observations of how they behave. “We look at the outward acts. So how can you tell if someone is benevolent? Well, you'll see it in their actions in class or around the school,” Hertzsprung said.

“We always say [that] actions speak louder than words. So if you are courageous, if you are benevolent, if you practice fortitude, those things become evident in your actions.”

Liam Hertzsprung, associate principal of the Currie campus of the Alberta Classical Academy in Calgary on June 6, 2025. Carolina Avendano/The Epoch Times

Virtue is a central part of the curriculum, with history lessons highlighting the qualities embodied by historical figures that make them moral exemplars. Some teachers, Hertzsprung says, also identify the virtues students need in order to succeed in specific subjects, such as diligence and fortitude in learning math.

Uniforms

Students are required to wear school uniforms at the Alberta Classical Academy. In Grades 5 to 10, girls typically wear tartan kilts, cross-ties, and crested blazers, while boys wear tartan ties and blazers.

Students are expected to maintain neatly brushed or styled hair that is natural-looking and conservative in colour and cut. Girls may wear minimalist, conservative jewelry such as simple stud earrings or pendant necklaces, but no more than one of each item. Natural-looking makeup is permitted beginning in Grade 9.

One of the benefits of wearing uniforms, Ford says, is that it creates a “level playing field” for students in their outward appearance, regardless of their socioeconomic, ethnic, or religious background.

She adds that by following uniform and grooming policies, students develop habits of propriety and etiquette, learning to take care of their appearance—not out of vanity, but as a sign of respect for themselves and others.

“It also takes the emphasis off of, let’s say, trends or fads, or the use of clothing as a way of expressing yourself,” Ford said.

“So by saying, actually you are all going to wear the same thing, and you are going to show us more authentic demonstrations of your personality through the virtues that you cultivate, the talents that you acquire, the habits that you demonstrate—these are the markers of an authentic inner personality, and that is what we want to focus on.”

Timeless Skills, Languages

The academy emphasizes traditional skills such as handwriting and the ability to conduct research using reference libraries rather than the internet. It maintains a strict low-tech policy, discouraging laptop use and prohibiting smartphones on campus.

“We think our students should learn handwriting, they should learn to think for themselves, and they should learn how to research, and also not just to rely on other people’s summaries,” Ford said.

She noted that the rise of artificial intelligence has made it harder for students to develop basic skills, as reliance on the technology grows. This, she says, makes the preservation of those timeless skills even more necessary.

A student at the Alberta Classical Academy reading a book, in an undated photo. Alberta Classical Academy

The academy’s passion for preserving traditional knowledge and skills also extends to languages. Ford says there are several reasons why Latin is taught as a mandatory subject in Grades 5 to 8.

On one hand, it aids in learning languages that are directly derived from Latin, such as the Romance languages—Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian, and Romanian. It also helps expand vocabulary in other languages that contain Latin-based words. In English, for instance, an estimated 60 percent of words have Latin roots.

On the other hand, Latin is a “very ordered case-based language,” says Ford, making its acquisition a process similar to studying math, which requires discipline, attention, and trains the student to “think clearly.”

In addition, Latin can give students access to knowledge that might otherwise be out of reach.

“One of the other reasons to learn Latin is that it puts you into direct conversation with many of the most influential thinkers of the Western tradition—you can access their minds and their works without mediation from translation,” Ford said.

“We think it’s really important that students be able to link with previous generations and see themselves as just one link in a chain that binds together the past and the future.”