I learned that there is a critical difference between liberty and licentiousness and that what makes a great citizen is that we pursue liberty and happiness properly understood. We understand what that means by understanding the great documents. By reading these texts, by discussing them in class, by engaging with my professors about them, by writing papers, I didn’t just learn about the words that the Founders had to say or the wisdom that they shared, I also learned to think critically.

The Ashbrook Scholar Program, especially in my line of work here in Washington, DC, is very well known. It turns as many heads as having gone to an Ivy League school would have. I had a tremendous amount of support from the Ashbrook Center through several internships that helped me come to Washington. I really could not have done it without them. Between the financial support that they were able to provide me and through their professional connections, they really helped put me in the place where I am today as a national security consultant who advises on strategic policy, nuclear deterrence, and missile defense. All of it began with the Ashbrook Scholar Program and an internship they arranged for me.

I was impressed with the late Dr. Peter Schramm (who, by the way, used the same recruiting methods the Marine Corps favors — “it’s too hard and you probably can’t do it”), but I was also intrigued and impressed by the high-profile speakers the program attracts. For prospective students, it is a fantastic opportunity to spend four years in a truly unique intellectual ecosystem with some of the best professors in the world and serious students who share a passion for history, political philosophy, and government.

Practically speaking, it was a fellow Ashbrook Scholar who helped me get my first job on Capitol Hill. More generally, during my years in the program I began to think seriously about Western Civilization and the American Experiment through a great deal of writing and many hours classroom discussions led by the excellent Ashbrook professors. This really taught me how to think (as opposed to what to think, which is so common these days in the academy), which is an invaluable life skill.

The Ashbrook Scholar Program impacted my career in three ways:

-It provided me contacts and a network of like-minded individuals who opened up career opportunities for me after I left the Marine Corps;
-It deepened my passion and appreciation for our nation and form of government (and thus the importance of protecting it);
-It deepened my knowledge of the philosophy and mechanics of our government and honed my ability to think, write, and debate clearly about these things.

It taught me how to think. It is easy to read about how the Founding Fathers established our form of government, but there are a lot of questions that arise from the Founding: Why did they give us a republic? With what other forms of government was democracy competing? Is it the best form of government? What is the importance of self-government and how is it possible to achieve? So much is lost in history when we only study facts and dates and miss the rich discussions of natural rights, the social contract, liberty, the relationship between man and its government, the influence God has on man, statesmanship, and many others. We must think through these principles just like our predecessors did; only then can we understand the importance of our Republic and hope to keep it.

Political conversations with individuals who were educated by other institutions often have a shocking lack of depth. The Constitution is almost never mentioned when discussing policies and principles, which creates what I would call “party relativism.” Colleagues debate each other and seemingly “win” by overwhelming one another with manipulated data and political correctness as opposed to actually exchanging ideas and arriving at truth. When you discuss ideas with others, there is a risk of being proven wrong or changing your mind so many avoid such conversations at all costs, but I believe that is the only way to possibly know what is best for your country, state, or the individual.

Dr. Jeff Sikkenga had the greatest impact on me academically by demanding my best instead of someone else’s best. He understood my individual potential and challenged me to reach it. He didn’t provide the answers for me; instead, he asked good questions in response to mine and got me to think through an issue on my own, assisting me along the way by guiding me in the right direction.

The Ashbrook Scholar Program is the primary and fundamental reason that I am doing what I do today. I was an aimless, uninspired 18-year-old when I first walked into the Ashbrook Center, but once I saw what was happening there, I knew that the Ashbrook Scholar Program could enable me to do great things for my country. My professors and the speakers the Center brought to campus inspired me to become a mentor and educator of the next generation of citizens in the principles of the Constitution and the Founding.

My favorite speaker was Justice Clarence Thomas. I saw him speak at a Lincoln Day dinner in Washington, DC in 1999 where he gave a rousing speech concluded by a toast to the Founders. The speech and its conclusion sent chills down my spine. (I still read that speech every so often.) Then, a brief time later, Justice Thomas came to Ashland as the Ashbrook Center’s Annual Dinner speaker and I was able to ask him a question about the Founders. I attended both of those events thanks to the Ashbrook Scholar Program and, in both, Justice Thomas was thoughtful and inspiring. He is still my favorite living American.

My education as an Ashbrook Scholar was absolutely essential for my development as a professor and academic. Without a background in the writings of the American Founders, and an appreciation for their great sagacity and sacrifice to preserve the blessings of liberty for future generations, I would never have been inspired to pursue a graduate degree, and I would not be as successful an educator as I am today.

I write constantly in my job. I write talking points, speeches, press releases, issue briefs, and more. In order to be effective in my writing, I need to be able to see the bigger picture of whatever I am addressing and understand it from all sides and perspectives. When I make an argument in one of my publications, I need it to be strong and complete. The Ashbrook Scholar Program taught me to think through issues thoroughly and to anticipate criticism and questioning. That experience made me a strong writer and really impacts the way I view and talk about the public policies my agency is involved in crafting.

The most striking difference is how little they have read! I have met dozens of political science majors during my time working for the state that have never read (or ever heard of) Locke’s Second Treatise on Government. That text is the philosophic roadmap that guided our Founding Fathers through the creation of the Constitution which is why it and so many other primary texts played such a crucial role in my education as an Ashbrook Scholar. I truly believe that reading those documents is an essential part of fully understanding what it means to be an American, and I am thankful the Ashbrook Scholar Program is still teaching them.

It wasn’t easy, but in the end it was a very positive experience. Looking back, the time that I spent with my advisor writing, reviewing, editing, arguing over, and re-thinking my thesis was the best career preparation I could have asked for because it changed the way I think about my writing and how the words I put on paper are seen through the eyes of other critical thinkers.

In the past decade, we have seen very real debates between the states and Washington over federalism and powers reserved to the states. These have occurred in areas from environmental regulation to health care, and from both sides of the aisle. The Ashbrook Scholar Program’s intensive education in our Founding documents and the principles of federalism provided me a foundation to readily explain these legal issues to news reporters and the public in my role as a spokesperson for the State of Ohio.

The Ashbrook Scholar Program has many benefits, but one important aspect it how uses the platform of politics and history to help students become proficient in a variety of writing styles. The writing assignments through the academic program, including the senior Statesmanship Thesis, help students become proficient in explanation, persuasion, creative writing, and technical writing, many times all within the same assignment. Writing succinctly with clarity is essential in professional communications and has been vital in my career development.

I was a political science major with minors in journalism and electronic media production. Ashbrook helped me earn a summer internship with Fox News Channel’s Washington, DC bureau. I was a production intern for “Special Report” and did a number of research projects for the program. Seeing high-level production covering the highest levels of government helped me learn industry best practices that have been invaluable in communicating to news media on behalf of the Governor and Attorney General.

I choose a career as an officer in the Army because I wanted to continue my study of both practical and philosophical matters. I was always drawn to how political philosophy reacts when it interacts with the practical examples human beings experience. Thus, I sought a career that further considers these questions. In my eight years in the Army I have learned how the tactics of a nation’s military are often representative of the mores of that nation’s people. I have served as an investigator in cases that have profound repercussions for those involved. I have lived among people with cultures vastly different from our own. And I have come to know some of the greatest men and women our nation has to offer. In short, I have continued an education that was begun in me as an Ashbrook Scholar. I sought a career that would allow me to pursue these ideas. The Ashbrook Scholar Program directed me towards this pursuit.

I have found that perhaps the most important distinguisher of success in the military is the ability to understand ideas that are either received via writing or speaking, analyze those ideas, extrapolate a solution that both works and is “legal, moral, and ethical,” and then finally, communicate that idea in a way that others can understand and take action from. Nearly everything you do in the Ashbrook Scholar Program prepares you for one or more of these tasks. The ability to do this, more than anything else sets you apart from those who have not practiced and learned these skills.

The professors in the Ashbrook Scholar Program care about your education in a serious way. They not only help you learn the material, but they teach you to think. They take the time to guide you and shape your studies allowing you to contemplate and extrapolate answers to life’s most important questions. They don’t tell you the answers. They set the possible answers before you in the form of primary sources and help you understand how the men before you answered that question. Then they ask you to determine who is right. It is a wonderful way to learn and creates individuals who can think and answers questions in very serious ways. It is something that truly sets you apart from your peers.