Major Props to Boethius

Even after last night’s intense soccer championship, there was no slowing down for the California High School Summer Program students, who woke up with the sun to bid farewell to the Elements and hello to Boethius.

In their morning classes, students presented their last three theorems of the Summer Program, concluding with the Book I, Proposition 32, in which Euclid demonstrates that the interior angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles — a cornerstone principle of classical geometry. After a week of studying and presenting propositions, students demonstrated with ease, now comfortable with Euclid’s clean, elegant logic.

Following Mass, conversations continued over lunch, as some students still focused on their final Euclid presentations, while others moved on to discuss the text for the afternoon, Books I–II of Boethius’s Consolation of Philosophy.

In beginning their treatment of Boethius, students considered some of the bigger questions about fortune, good and evil, and fate that had come up in their previous readings. Boethius wrote the Consolation while in prison and, rather than fall into despair, as does his book’s protagonist, contemplated some of the most difficult concepts in philosophy and theology. In the Consolation, Boethius is guided by Lady Philosophy, who starts with the premise, “God is all good and created all things,” and proceeds from there to answer Boethius’s questions through Socratic dialogue and poetic prose.

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Shifting gears, this afternoon, the students on the program who have siblings among the prefects posed for a brother-sister photo (plus one cousin and one “honorary” sibling). They even matched outfits for the occasion:

This afternoon, TAC tutor Dr. John Nieto will present students with a special talk on art and beauty in preparation for Thursday’s trip to the Getty Center in Los Angeles. Read about it and all of the evening’s activities tomorrow morning on the Summer Program Blog!