HeightsCast: Forming Men Fully Alive

As more families scrutinize their post-high school options for virtue and value, the field has perhaps never been wider. Choosing a path carefully, with the right balance of priorities, should be the goal for every high school graduate. Before serving as our headmaster, Mr. Alvaro de Vicente was the Heights college counselor. Over the last few decades, he's witnessed an exciting shift in the way students and their parents can evaluate, prioritize, and choose a path after graduation that serves the whole person well. And while colleges are responding more and more to these good demands, Mr. de Vicente also explores how high schools and employers could keep pace with the changes. Chapters: 2:32 Am I on the education treadmill? 4:16 Purposes of college: personal growth, financial growth 8:32 Keeping the two purposes in proper proportion 12:20 The wider field of alternatives 15:42 How high schools must respond 19:35 Peer groups on the alternative path 24:22 If virtue and value aren't in balance 27:33 The future graduate's options 29:54 The future of hiring Also on the Forum: A Short Guide to the Purposeful College Decision by Alvaro de Vicente 4/25 Advice for the College Launch featuring Alvaro de Vicente 8/24 Considerations for College-Bound Students featuring Dr. Peter Kilpatrick 5/24 The College Experience featuring Dr. Jonathan Sanford Rethinking College: Why Go? How? When? featuring Arthur Brooks 7/2021 Featured opportunities: Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025) Convivium for Teaching Men at The Heights School (November 13-15, 2025)

Human reason: what is it? How does it cooperate with faith and the will? How can we distinguish between authentic reason and its counterfeits—particularly in an age of relativism, pluralism, scientism, and artificial intelligence? Here to unpack a heavy topic is Fr. Gregory Pine, a Dominican friar, instructor at Dominican House of Studies in Washington, DC. You may recognize his voice as a frequent contributor to podcasts like Godsplaining and Pints with Aquinas. Following a talk with our juniors, Fr. Pine graciously joined us in the studio to offer a wealth of ideas on this natural capacity and inclination to understand God's world. Chapters: 00:05:19 Defining human reason 00:08:23 Modern preference for practical reason 00:12:17 Modern preference for relativism 00:17:18 Faith, reason, and the will assist each other 00:24:05 Teaching apologetics today 00:28:26 Finding truth in a pluralist world 00:34:59 AI: a counterfeit of intellect 00:41:30 AI: an anthropology 00:44:36 Closing thoughts from Arthur Brooks, Thomas Aquinas, and Aristotle Links: Prudence: Choose Confidently, Live Boldly by Fr. Gregory Pine The Dominican House of Studies, home of the Pontifical Faculty and The Thomistic Institute Godsplaining Podcast hosted by the Dominican friars of the Dominican House of Studies Beauty for Truth's Sake by Stratford Caldecott "Why You Should Go with Your Gut" by Arthur Brooks Featured opportunities: Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025) Convivium for Teaching Men at The Heights School (November 13-15, 2025)

Prayer is not prescriptive. So how could we hope to teach our children a practice that St. Thérèse called "a surge of the heart"? Lower school head Colin Gleason suggests that it's about creating opportunities and options, so that our sons can naturally make a life of prayer their own. In his talk from our Parenting Conference in April, Mr. Gleason lays out ten very practical ways to sow the seeds of prayer into our family's daily routines—in formal and spontaneous ways. He ends by reminding us that prayer is not a program. It is an orientation. And whatever we parents approach with consistency and sincerity, "the house will be filled with the fragrance of it" (cf. John 12:3). Chapters: 00:05:28 Prayer as a relationship 00:09:53 A family plan for daily prayer 00:12:30 Introducing them to mental prayer 00:15:00 The Psalms: a handbook 00:20:37 Making opportunities and options 00:24:20 Asking them to pray for us 00:26:57 Stories for the prayer imagination 00:29:52 Prayer journals 00:31:07 Discussing prayer 00:32:46 Prayer in our daily activities 00:35:27 Making a prayer spot 00:37:32 Clearing obstacles, preparing the ground Featured opportunities: Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025) Convivium for Teaching Men at The Heights School (November 13-15, 2025) Also on the Forum: Forming Men of Faith by Alvaro de Vicente Forming Families, Forming Saints featuring Fr. Carter Griffin

We often speak of a pedagogical friendship between teacher and student: the earnest desire for the student's good, the collaborative adventure through difficult material, and the trust built thereby. But we shouldn't oversimplify this friendship: it's not merely to be liked by our students. From rookie teachers to decades-long veterans, we can all feel that pull to be the "favorite teacher." But what kind of frameworks should we keep in mind as we serve our students well? This week, Heights Headmaster Alvaro de Vicente unpacks the very human desire to be liked, the perils of seeking popularity, and what our students really need from us. Chapters: 00:03:16 The student is not for your gain 00:05:18 Including social-emotional gains 00:11:10 Practical pitfalls of seeking popularity 00:15:31 Why we want to be liked 00:19:21 Give the respect you want 00:21:46 Like your students 00:26:03 Where to find stable satisfaction Featured opportunities: Parents Conference: Fostering Our Sons' Faith at The Heights School (April 12, 2025) Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025) Also on the Forum: Respectful Dominion: On Discipline featuring Colin Gleason Order and Surprise: On Beauty and the Western Tradition featuring Lionel Yaceczko

"Offer it up!" Do we receive that invitation with a wince or a nod? Heights Assistant Headmaster Tom Royals invites us to examine our approach to Lent and "offering it up"—with an emphasis on offering. Mr. Royals reflects on the "happy obligation" that is the habit of sacrifice, and he considers the liturgical seasons of Lent, Passiontide, Eastertide, and ordinary time as gifts from the Church. Chapters: 4:21 "Offer it up" 8:37 Look to the cross 10:59 Offering it up as a pattern and practice 12:47 Keeping the Lord company 16:22 Our reactions to setbacks 20:57 History of Lent: an ecclesial framework 23:22 Our Lent so far 25:44 Lent in the family culture 28:24 Easter: the feast of feasts 32:02 These next ten days Links: Holy Rosary (with images) by Josemaria Escriva Featured opportunities: Parents Conference: Fostering Our Sons' Faith at The Heights School (April 12, 2025) Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025) Convivium for Teaching Men at The Heights School (November 13-15, 2025) Also on the Forum: Learn to Turn featuring Tom Royals

As a Valley veteran, Tom Steenson has seen patterns emerge from his two decades of parent-teacher conferences. He invites us to sit down for a not-so-hypothetical conference featuring the recurring advice he offers to the parents of his lower school students. In short, Mr. Steenson hopes to encourage parents in their parental authority and to help them identify (or sometimes even invent) opportunities for growth in their young men. Chapters: 3:25 Encourage parental instincts 7:03 Trust in the long game 9:02 "Better late than early"TM 11:38 Exercise his accountability 20:05 Let him help others 22:48 Don't eliminate friction 24:05 Beware the schedule 26:36 Help him want to read Featured opportunities: Parents Conference: Fostering Our Sons' Faith at The Heights School (April 12, 2025) Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025) Also on the Forum: A Guide to Parent-Teacher Conferences by Kyle Blackmer Partnering with Parents by Michael Moynihan Communicating with Parents by Kyle Blackmer Dumb Phones, Feature Phones, and the New Tech Landscape featuring Alvaro de Vicente

"Are you a classical school?" It's a question many parents and educators will have to answer at some point. St. Martin's Academy in Fort Scott, Kansas, likes to say they're not exactly classical—more like medieval. At St. Martin's, a boys' boarding school and working farm for grades 9-12, Adam Taylor and a team of educators seek to nurture authentic masculinity, awaken wonder, and heal the imagination. This week on HeightsCast, Mr. Taylor talks with us about the vision of St. Martin's, and gives us ideas we can take into our own understanding of boys' education. Chapters: 3:35 The medieval model 7:12 The path to "Dean of Magistri" 14:38 Nurturing authentic masculinity 19:14 Healing the imagination 25:00 Boys need reality and heroes 33:49 Soulcraft: the role of work at St. Martin's 36:54 Forms of manly friendship 40:57 Time management for teachers 45:35 Recommended reading Links: St. Martin's Academy in Fort Scott, Kansas "The Necessity of Chivalry" by C. S. Lewis The Tuft of Flowers by Robert Frost John Senior and the Restoration of Realism by Fr. Francis Bethel Poetic Knowledge: The Recovery of Education by James S. Taylor Beauty for Truth's Sake: On the Re-enchantment of Education by Stratford Caldecott Beauty in the Word: Rethinking the Foundations of Education by Stratford Caledcott Featured opportunities: Parents Conference: Fostering Our Sons' Faith at The Heights School (April 12, 2025) Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025) Also on the Forum: Breathing Narnian Air: Loving Modernity as a Medievalist featuring Jason Baxter Shaping Your Son's Moral Imagination featuring Alvaro de Vicente On Moral Imagination, Part I featuring Alvaro de Vicente

Pope St. John Paul II outlined the four pillars of formation for seminarians back in 1992 with his apostolic exhortation Pastores dabo vobis. For years, Fr. Carter Griffin has used this framework to walk with seminarians through a program of human, spiritual, intellectual, and pastoral formation at St. John Paul II Seminary in Washington, DC. With his recent book, Forming Families, Forming Saints, Fr. Griffin brings that rich framework into the context of parenting. In this episode, he provides parents with an overview of the four pillars of formation, and offers encouragement and practical wisdom about what it means for the family to be a "domestic church." Chapters: 5:43 Family: the domestic church 8:38 Similarities to seminary formation 10:45 Not just self-optimization 15:03 The four pillars of formation 18:30 Sincerity: the truth is never a problem 25:50 Parental expectations 30:29 A childlike relationship with God 33:48 What faith is 37:41 Introducing our children to prayer 43:42 Struggles with prayer 46:41 An apostolic approach for families 48:34 Comfortable with being different 52:52 Awareness of vocations: 11 and 11th 56:31 An outlook of hope Links: Forming Families, Forming Saints by Fr. Carter Griffin Optimal Work Program by Dr. Kevin Majeres Featured opportunities: Parents Conference at The Heights School (April 12, 2025) Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025) Also on the Forum: Fostering Vocations in a Digital Age featuring Fr. Carter Griffin Magnanimity and the Great-Souled Man featuring Fr. Carter Griffin

A great learning experience comes at the material using different practices—listening, reading, memorizing, interrogating, doing, speaking, and/or writing about the idea until it crystallizes in the student's mind. And a great teacher facilitates those practices in his class plan. For his talk at the 2024 Forum Teaching Conference, upper school teacher Austin Hatch borrowed the "three modes of teaching" proposed by author and educator Mortimer Adler. These are: didactic instruction, supervised practice, and active participation. Mr. Hatch explains why they are each needed in good proportion, and what each can look like in the classroom. Chapters: 00:04:25 The beginning and end is friendship 00:09:57 Didactic instruction: be brief and clear 00:12:23 Supervised practice: make the time 00:20:54 Active participation: host a seminar or performance 00:31:27 Beholding a man in performance 00:33:21 Q1: preparing students for a seminar 00:35:07 Q2: escaping the grade game Links: Paideia Program: An Educational Syllabus by Mortimer Adler De Amicitia (On Friendship) by Cicero Featured opportunities: Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025)

Mr. Tom Cox's approach to telling great stories in the classroom starts with a self-limiting 3×5 notecard. The challenge when telling any story from history is that all such stories run together, are infinitely entangled, and lack the defined clarity of exposition, crisis, climax, and denouement. Mr. Cox provides a practical framework and examples for "putting flesh on dry bones" in an effective, compelling way that students will remember. This talk was delivered at the Forum Teaching Conference in the fall of 2024. Featured opportunities: Teaching Essentials Workshop at The Heights School (June 16-20, 2025) Also on the Forum: A Better Approach to History featuring Tom Cox and Bill Dardis Keeping the Story in History by Mark Grannis 9/22 Seeing History: On Using Images in the History Classroom by Kyle Blackmer 2/22History the Way It Was by Bill Dardis