Dear Professors Scaife and Rabel,
I have been informed about the Institute for Latin Studies that will be implemented at the University of Kentucky. I am impressed with the creative, innovative approach that it takes to Latin studies. There has been a growing interest in an oral component on the elementary and secondary levels, and some of this is due to the fact that more and more students want and expect their teachers to use oral Latin in the classroom
The trouble is, as so many Latin teachers have said on the internet, their training in Latin was completely passive. Many teachers have said that they rarely even read Latin aloud in their classes when they went to high school and that they had no training in oral Latin in their college years or graduate school.
Professor Terence Tunberg, through his summer Conventiculum, has made the University of Kentucky the national center for oral Latin. I have spoken or communicated with a good number of teachers who have attended the program. All without exception expressed their gratitude for the opportunity to fill this lacuna in their Classical education. They say that they can now teach with renewed confidence.
The Institute for Latin Studies will give many more the same opportunity. The program will attract excellent students to your university who, without this innovative program, might well have selected some other institution.
I congratulate both of you for your vision in meeting the educational needs of the future Latin teachers of this country.
Sincerely, John Traupman Emeritus Professor of Classics St. Joseph's University Philadelphia, PA
Created on ... March 26, 2001