About the Authors

The Classical Writing team consists of four homeschool moms of a total of sixteen students, who at the present time (spring 2008) range from the early twenties down to grade school age.

We live in four different states across the United States, and not all of us have met face to face yet.

Lene Jaqua has four children ages 11 to 18 (as of 2008). She is a native of Denmark, who moved to the U.S. for college, which is when she married her husband Mike, a  native of Texas. She has a Ph.D. in theoretical nuclear physics but chose to homeschool classically instead of pursuing a full time professional career. Lene’s youngest son Benjamin was born with Down Syndrome and multiple health issues including heart defect and cleft lip and palate. This has resulted in many surgeries and hospitalizations for Ben. Homeschooling and special needs parent-to-parent support are passions of Lene’s. She also quilts, knits socks, cooks Indian food, sings in an acapella choir, and writes novels for hobbies. Her novel writing includes a book sold as a benefit for Down Syndrome research. It may be viewed at www.lulu.com/ljaqua.

Tracy Gustilo has four children, two of whom have graduated from homeschooling. She grew up in the Midwest and attended public schools. In college and graduate school she studied philosophy and biology, earning her doctorate in 1995. Tracy’s enthusiasm for classical education grew after meeting many accomplished homeschoolers online—including Lene, Kathy, and Carolyn—and she founded the Classical Co-op website to promote cooperation between Christian parents and teachers. Her work on Classical Writing springs from her interest in persuasive writing (rhetoric) and in the classical world, especially the Church Fathers. She is known for asking and re-asking the question, "What IS a classical education, anyway?" Tracy, her husband Nick, and their children currently reside in Kansas.

Kathy Weitz and her husband Rick live in Virginia with their six children, ranging in age from twenty down to eight. She has educated her children at home since 1994, and has graduated her oldest two sons, Joshua and Caleb. Ethan (15), Grace (12), Daniel (10), and Connor (8) remain at home, and are the primary testers for the Classical Writing workbooks. Kathy, who has a B.S. in Home Economics from Virginia Tech, stays busy pursuing a classical education for herself as well as her children, and has developed a passion for Latin and the classics. The Weitz family enjoys practicing hospitality, reading aloud together, watching old movies, and long (and often loud!) discussions around the dinner table.

Carolyn Vance homeschools her two children, Abigail (10) and Patrick (9), in Minnesota with her husband Dan. She has always been drawn to languages, and enjoyed them so much in college that her major changed from Computer Engineering to Russian. In 2003, she had the privilege of editing a portion of Classical Writing—Poetry, and has been editing and proofing for Classical Writing since then. Her favorite leisure activity is curling up on the couch under a homemade quilt with her knitting, a book, and a cup of cocoa.

History

The Classical Writing series has its beginnings in 2002, when Tracy Davis Gustilo and Lene Mahler Jaqua wrote the first Classical Writing book, entitled Aesop. Their aim was to help other parents and teachers following classical educations methods to teach students the first exercise in the progymnasmata series.

Our second book was Poetry for Beginners, was written in 2003. It is a supplementary enrichment text for teaching writing, specifically with analysis and imitation of poetry in mind. Both of these books were field tested prior to publication by several home educating parents from the Trivium-at-Home group. At this point Carolyn Vance joined us as editor-in-chief.

2004 saw the publication of Homer, the second book in the main series. About this same time, Kathy Weitz, a homeschool mom and fan of our books, was beginning to make up her own workbooks to ease the preparation work for teaching her students using the Classical Writing series. Kathy showed us her workbooks, we were totally impressed. In 2005, she joined our team, and with blazing speed had Student Workbooks and Instructor’s Guides with answer keys ready. In addition, she put together long asked-for workbooks for Harvey’s Elementary Grammar.

In 2005, Tracy decided that it was necessary to step back from writing and developing Classical Writing books due to family committments, but she remains an integral part of the team as Lene’s consultant and first field tester.

Since then, Diogenes Maxim and Intermediate Poetry, our first books for middle school and up, along with their accompanying Student Guides, have been published. Diogenes Maxim includes beginning writing of standard five paragraph essays. The second book in the Intermediate level, Diogenes Chreia, is currently in beta testing.

For the high school level, production is well along on the first books, Herodotus and Advanced Poetry. Lene has begun writing Plutarch as well. The final books in the Classical Writing series, Shakespeare and Demosthenes, are on the horizon.