Friday Feature: Highlands Latin School
Public school teacher turned homeschooler turned education entrepreneur. We’re seeing this more and more these days, but it isn’t as new of a phenomenon as many might think. The late Cheryl Lowe, founder of Memoria Press and Highlands Latin School in Louisville, KY, is a perfect example.
Cheryl received her bachelor’s degree in chemistry and master’s in biology; she taught chemistry and geometry in a public high school before having children. She taught her sons to read before they started school, but she wasn’t satisfied with the well‐regarded public or private schools they eventually attended. She began researching the history of education to figure out what went wrong with education.
Cheryl became convinced of the importance of classical education in general and Latin in particular, so she began homeschooling her sons and offering a weekly Latin class for other children. Seeing the success her students were having, she compiled her materials into a course that could be used by families or schools.
Cheryl’s weekly Latin class eventually became Highlands Latin School (HLS), a private K–12 classical Christian school in Louisville that opened in 2000. And her course materials formed the basis for Memoria Press, a family‐run publishing company that produces classical Christian education materials.
This unique partnership means Highlands Latin can function as a laboratory of sorts for Memoria Press curriculum. According to Shane Saxon, Director of Trademark Schools and Wholesale Distribution at Memoria Press, “every book is tested in actual classrooms with actual students before being sent out to schools.”
The success of Highlands Latin students and the Memoria Press curriculum brought a number of accolades to Cheryl Lowe. People began asking her for help to start similar schools. That’s where the trademark program that Shane Saxon leads comes in. “Only schools that are in lockstep with Highlands Latin—using Memoria Press curriculum and sharing the pedagogical values—are allowed to use the Highlands name,” he says.
While the educational requirements are strict, school leaders have a lot of flexibility in delivery. The HLS full‐time model is four days a week. The school recommends Monday as the off day so students can catch up on homework—with the added bonus of avoiding the “Sunday blues.” There is also a cottage school model that takes a hybrid approach; students meet together one to three days a week and learn at home during the other days. Shane notes, “This model helps people marry the benefits of a traditional classroom and the benefits of homeschool.”
We’ve seen an explosion of microschools, hybrid schools, and homeschooling since COVID-19. But the seeds of this growth were planted by pioneers like Cheryl Lowe.