What is Thomas Jefferson Education?

I am co-facilitating a group called Leadership Education Family Builder. It's a program that will help me and the other parents implement leadership education principles in our home. We meet once a month and each month are to complete certain assignments--reading, writing, listening, applying and thinking. Last month one of our assignments was to write a paper answering 2 questions: What is Thomas Jefferson Education? and Why is leadership Education needed today? I've been struggling to be able to explain what Thomas Jefferson Education is and it was hard for me to write this paper. My goal is to be able to explain to people what I am doing in my home to educate my kids. I'm still not sure if I was able to accomplish that, but I think I am coming closer. Here is my paper:

In Ayn Rand’s book Atlas Shrugged a principle character, Dagney, asks people living in a small town why they don’t fix a road so that vehicles can get through when it rains. They respond that the road has always been that way. When she asks the grocer why she doesn’t move the produce out the sun to keep it from spoiling she answers that it is always kept there. Dagney is frustrated with the lack of motivation in the town. The town’s people were probably given an education that prepared them for a job and were taught what to think not how to think.

There are 3 types of education—conveyor belt, professional and leadership. In order for a society to function properly all three types need to be in place. A conveyor belt education prepares people for a job by teaching them what to think. Professional education creates specialist by teaching them when to think. Leadership education trains thinkers, leaders, entrepreneurs and statesmen by teaching students how to think. Oliver DeMille calls leadership education Thomas Jefferson Education.

Thomas Jefferson Education is a philosophy that uses classics and mentors, depth and breadth, quality and application. Classics give us a chance to study great men and women from history, to learn from their mistakes and look deep inside ourselves. Classics also force us to think. A mentor, together with classics, is a teacher. A mentor helps to individualize the student’s education and guide her in her learning and help her meet her goals. This is the way to teach people how to think. Classics make individualizing easy because the same book can be different for each student.

Oliver DeMille says that depth and breadth “means really paying the price to get a great education, a superb knowledge base.” It is knowing a lot about a lot of things. A leadership education also means giving quality work and applying what we learn. Discussing classics helps us to apply what we learn to real life. Oliver DeMille says “no education is complete, or even particularly valuable, unless the student uses what he or she has learned to serve the community, family, society and God.” What is the point of knowing how to think if we don’t use it to make the world a better place?

Thomas Jefferson education teaches people to be leaders by inspiring (not requiring) them to gain their own education. We need leadership education. If we don’t prepare leaders we get people leading where they have no training and people who don’t see this as a problem who will follow because they don’t know any better. In Atlas Shrugged the small town was full of people with a conveyor belt education and because of this the town hadn’t prospered. It was missing leaders. We need leaders in our society and Thomas Jefferson education nurtures them.