THE INITIATIVE
The Golden Thread Initiative seeks to reinstate and reaffirm the legacy of America and the West and to instigate a counter-revolution in American education.
The Mission
Championing the truth in American education.
In recent years the legacy of Western civilization has come under renewed attack by those who seek to recast its accomplishments in a negative light.
The primary arena of this effort has been the American classroom.
To fight back, Encounter Books is publishing vital new textbooks that reassert the truth about our Western heritage.
Great civilizations require powerful origin stories that animate the citizenry to participate in and identify with that greatness.
The TextBooks
The Golden Thread: A History of the Western Tradition, by historians Allen C. Guelzo and James Hankins, will offer a truthful and fair-minded overview of the trajectory of the West—the complex system of customs, practices, and beliefs that has bound our society together—from the ancient Greeks and Romans to medieval Christendom and Europe, and finally the modern world and America.
Professor Wilfred M. McClay’s Land of Hope: An Invitation to the Great American Story is a groundbreaking approach to telling our national story to the modern audience of young Americans. Encompassing the broad arc of American history, the ultimate takeaway from this text is that America, despite occasional deviations from her founding ideals, is the crowning achievement of the Western project, and the last remaining hope for its future.
THE ACTION PLAn
To navigate the education bureaucracy, Encounter must bypass the conventional adoption regime.
- Partner with independent, charter, and religious schools to provide textbooks and support for classical and traditional curriculums.
- Work with networks of educators, advocates, and local office holders to secure approval on public school district textbook lists.
- Inaugurate pilot programs with wide distribution of free textbooks and curricular materials.
- Aggressively price books such that they are affordable and widely available for students and parents from all backgrounds.
support
“As a people who aspire to civility—to the goodness, truth, and beauty that our tradition, like a river, bears down us from the civilizations of the past—we, too, have a duty to study and cherish what we have been given by our ancestors, and to preserve it for our children.”
James Hankins & Allen C. Guelzo
get involved
We are constantly building our network of allies in the battle for truth in American education.
As part of the Initiative, Encounter Books will be hosting a wide variety of high-profile public events, conferences, and symposia that will underscore the task of academic renewal.
If you are an educator, advocate, parent, or anyone else who would like to join and support us, please get in touch with us at goldenthread@encounterbooks.com.
