Message from the President

There is no academic institution that does not need the support of all those who believe in it, the values it promotes, and the training it offers. This is particularly true for institutions that exercise a greater freedom from market imperatives, conformity, or political and economic factions. Our Academy has retained this freedom at enormous cost to those who have founded and currently direct it. Until now, we have been able to pursue what we believe to be the best path in educating young people, using the most effective methods taught by those who feel their job to be a true mission, as was done in the great humanistic schools preceding us. The contribution of those who appreciate our work and its results is decisive in ensuring that our institution retains its fundamental tenets and continues to progress into the future.
In this age of sordid individualism, prevailing egoism, and suffocating pragmatism, our Academy remains totally dedicated to a worldly education geared toward the achievement of personal dignity and freedom, attained through critical dialogue with our ancestors and meditation on the great works that they have handed down to us: a path that forms the heart, the mind, and the spirit, but that does not neglect - in the ideal of a mens sana in corpore sano - a proper physical education. The independence of our institution can be maintained only through the collective effort and earnest zeal of all those who believe in it. While the establishment of language courses can provide a source of income, we are convinced that an education in the orbis doctrinarum, which nourishes the mind and body, and leads to personal transformation, must not be in any way subject to the market. We therefore favor students who are unable to finance their studies on their own, as we believe that, in a family like ours, offering knowledge for sale would be an act of simony.
Those who live together, talk together, and share every part of their daily lives together, leading to the attainment of truth, beauty, and goodness, as much as is possible for man, cannot offer for sale their perpetual co-existence and shared research. This is why all students at our Academy are supported through a system of scholarships and grants that cover all expenses for room, board, tuition, etc. The contribution of donors will allow hundreds of young people to continue to enjoy this unique experience, which will bring new life to our age, currently oppressed by violence, greed, and an overall deterioration of morality. The Humanistic vision of free inquiry, rational thought, and unparalleled excellence in erudition, renewed in schools and universities through the formation of new generations of educators, is a real hope of cultural rebirth that can be nourished by the support of many.
Today the Academy is launching an international campaign, called “Nourish the seed.” We intend to collect €3,000,000 by 2012 in order to continue our mission to promote excellence and support brilliant minds who have no material means of achieving their potential, and to cultivate critical thinking about the world around us, conquer conformity, and nurture freedom and independence of thought.
We've only just begun. But we can reach the goal with your help, whatever it is.

Luigi Miraglia
President