Thomas Jefferson: Personality, Character, and Public Life

FAIN: ES-50461-12

Boston University (Boston, MA 02215-1300)
Peter Gibbon (Project Director: March 2012 to August 2014)

A four-week institute for twenty-six school teachers on the personality, character, and public life of Thomas Jefferson.

Thomas Jefferson was a man of paradoxes: a man who craved friendship, yet was intensely private; an aristocrat who detested privilege; an urban intellectual who feared cities; a slaveholder who preached equality; a peaceful man who sanctioned violent rebellion; a dreamer and philosopher who served as a hard-nosed and cunning diplomat. In this three-week Institute, we will try to explain these paradoxes and deepen our understanding of one of the most important figures in American history, a figure who is fascinating, influential, inspiring, and embattled. The Institute will include twenty-six K-12 teachers from all over the country. They will be housed at the Buick Street Residence. The Project Director, the Resident Scholar, and the Pedagogical Specialist will lead the Institute, assisted by visiting scholars. In addition to our work in the classroom, we will take three field trips. Each will submit a final project that will be posted on the Institute’s website .