One Teacher, One Method
I teach every course at Emerson Latin myself, from a ten-year-old's first Latin sentence, through the AP Latin examination, to a graduating senior's advanced literature seminar, under one method: systematic, comprehensive, accelerated, and rigorous, whichever pedagogical tradition a given course happens to draw on. There is no second instructor, no rotating staff: I am the one teaching it, live, over Zoom, in English.
Hundreds of Emerson Latin students have earned top prizes in international Latin and classical humanities contests since 2015: gold, silver, and bronze medals, and several perfect papers. See the Results →
"It is better to teach the child Latin grammar than rhetoric or moral philosophy, because it requires exactitude of performance." Ralph Waldo Emerson, Education
When Your Child's School Offers No Latin
This describes most schools. Latin is one of the rarest subjects a student can study, and the AP Latin examination one of the rarest a student can sit for. That makes the absence of a school course the ordinary starting condition here, not an obstacle.
Most Emerson Latin students begin with no Latin background at all, many from international schools that do not offer the language, let alone the AP course. They stay with me for the whole path: from a first Latin sentence, through Latin literature, to the AP Latin examination itself, which they sit independently at an approved testing center, since their own school was never the one offering it. Along the way, most take part in nearly every major international Latin and classical humanities contest open to them and earn real prizes, building the kind of academic record that top universities notice.
The Case for Latin
Latin trains a mind to do one specific thing: read a sentence and refuse to guess at it. That habit, once built, carries into everything a student does afterward. The rest, the AP score, the contest medal, the university that notices, follows from that, not the other way around.
The Curriculum
Every stage is built on the Emerson Method: systematic, comprehensive, accelerated, and rigorous. The curriculum is arranged in the order the logic of the language itself demands, not the order a textbook happens to follow.
Beginning Fall 2026, Humane Letters (five courses in English reading and writing) joins the path alongside Latin. Learn More →
Open This Term
A course opens once four students are ready to begin. The following are enrolling now for Fall Term, September 12 – November 20, 2026.
Stage I · Upper Elementary
Natural Latin
Latin acquired the way a first language is: through story and repetition, at an unhurried pace.
Stage I · Middle School
Oxford Latin
Grammar first, then real Latin prose and poetry, across six terms to completion.
Stage I · High School
Grammar Latin
The direct grammar-translation route, in four terms: the shortest path to literature and the AP exam.
Stage II
Latin Literature
Caesar, Catullus, Cicero, Ovid, and Vergil, read in the original.
Stage III
AP Latin: Prose & Poetry
Pliny and Vergil, prepared together from fall through the May exam.
Stage IV
Advanced Latin Literature
For those who have completed the AP exam and wish to continue, at a deeper and more demanding pace.
New This Fall
Humane Letters
A Great Books reading and writing program in English, alongside preparation for international writing contests.
Not seeing your child's course this term? New sections open throughout the year as enrollment fills. Get in Touch →
The International Competitions
Separately from the regular curriculum, I run short contest-preparation courses (typically five sessions, in the weeks before a competition's deadline) for students who want to take part. The Latin curriculum itself is the real foundation for the Latin contests: there is no substitute for the grammar and reading ability these competitions actually test. The wider classical humanities contests are a different case. Some require Latin directly. For the rest, a student who knows the language still tends to have an edge over one who does not.
Not every student takes part, for good reasons: some are focused on finishing the core curriculum as efficiently as possible, some are not yet eligible, some simply are not interested. Most, in my experience, are.
I have watched this pattern hold since founding Emerson Latin in 2015: students who reach the top tier of these contests and stay there tend to be admitted to the universities of their choice.
News
The Magister writes on Latin, classical education, and their bearing on the present. The results are recorded here as they come in.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Course Openings & Schedule
New and forthcoming courses, term dates, and schedule changes as they happen.
COMMENDATIONS
Contest Results
Contest results, medals, and honors from international Latin and classical humanities competitions.
LAURELS
Student Milestones
Individual accomplishments: an admission, a piece of writing, a milestone in the formation itself.
ESSAYS
On Latin & Classical Education
Reflections published weekly, on the classical tradition and its bearing on the present.