The National Classical Etymology Exam tests command of the Latin and Greek roots that underlie a significant portion of the English lexicon — the vocabulary of medicine, law, science, philosophy, and formal writing that a well-educated person encounters throughout life and is expected, without assistance, to navigate. More than 3,600 students in the United States and abroad sat the examination this year. Eleven Emerson Latin students placed. Nine of them earned Gold Medals.
- Charles Cho
- Jaye Cho
- Jia Chun
- Jimin Chun
- Emily Hwang
- Gio Hyung
- Hunjae Lee
- Rachel Lee
- Jenny Park
- Suhjung Kim
- Jehyeong Suh
There is something worth remarking about what etymology actually measures. A student who has worked through Latin and Greek does not encounter words like perspicacious, malevolent, or circumlocution as opaque units to be memorized; they see the parts. Per, through. Specere, to look. Acus, sharp. The meaning is in the structure, and the structure is legible to anyone who has spent time with the languages from which it comes. The NCEE, in this sense, is less an examination of vocabulary than a measure of how far that legibility has developed — whether the classical formation has seeped into the student’s ordinary relationship with language.
Nine Gold Medals from a single academy, in a field of more than 3,600, suggests it has gone quite far. We congratulate all eleven placing students, and we are glad the formation shows.