At a distance, the architecture of an Upper School tour at a Great Hearts Texas academy can look linear: check-in, name tags, introductions, an overview of the classical model, classroom visits, and often, the beginning of a new application.
In 2026, however, few prospective parents arrive at the door of a middle and high school ready to hear a pitch on curriculum. Parents of teenagers are burdened by practical concerns about school safety, college and career preparation, and whether their child will be ready for adult life in an economy changing faster than any school program can match.
Is it safe here?
Will my child be prepared for the future?
The work of a strong campus tour leader now resembles the work of a strong humanities teacher.
Families arrive with a notepad full of questions. The task is not only to answer them, but to guide the conversation toward the deeper questions at the heart of the matter.
These questions cannot be settled by any marketing slogan. But they can be addressed, in part, by glimpses into the lives of our high school scholars.
This past January, students in grades 9 through 12 at Great Hearts Western Hills gathered in classrooms across campus, drawing desks together into large circles. In their seats, with annotated copies of Robert Bolt’s A Man for All Seasons in hand, they waited as a teacher opened discussion and prompted scholars to turn to a page.
There is nothing particularly novel about a Great Hearts high school student sharing insights and drawing questions out of peers over a “great book.” This is the same format as any given Humane Letters class, a two-hour block of literature, philosophy, civics, and history.
But once a year, all the scholars, from 9th through 12th grade, gather for a Socratic discussion around a singular text and are joined by a guest speaker who offers clarity and challenges their perspectives at the annual High School Symposium.
For this year’s High School Symposium, Great Hearts Western Hills welcomed longtime Great Hearts leader Dr. Robert L. Jackson. As a founder of the Great Hearts Institute, Dr. Jackson has long supported classical educators and school leaders through programming, publications, and scholarship. On this day, his role was to help bring to life the story of a man under pressure, Sir Thomas More.
“Bolt, the playwright of A Man for All Seasons, wanted to use this life, this Thomas More moment, to obtain for his audience the imaginative possibility of a good soul,” Dr. Jackson told the crowd of San Antonio high schoolers.
Before the curtain closed on this year’s High School Symposium, Dr. Jackson’s keynote gave way to a readers’ theater performance in full Elizabethan costume, staged by faculty and upperclassmen using selections from A Man for All Seasons. As students leaned forward in their seats, the text’s intellectual demands gave way to the play’s humor and wit, and for a moment, the play’s ideas became something the scholars could inhabit.
“In classical schools, it’s pretty common for us to talk about Truth or Goodness or Beauty. But those transcendentals are kind of abstract. They’re a little hard to get your hands on,” Dr. Jackson remarked after the event.
“But when you read a great story like A Man for All Seasons, suddenly you can see virtue in action.”
Ask any Humane Letters teacher, Headmaster, or symposium speaker about the core hope he or she has for scholars after they graduate from a Great Hearts high school, and you will likely hear a similar response: that they carry with them two questions at the heart of our classical tradition.
“That’s a question that students seem to be approaching as a result of this year’s symposium,” Dr. Jackson added. “I hope that one stays with them for a good long time.”
Through sustained encounters with great texts and discussions with their peers, Great Hearts Texas scholars form the judgment and character the 21st century will demand. Qualities no machine can replace. And while the rigor of high school at Great Hearts prepares them for college and career, there is an essential question we hope our scholars continue in all their successes and challenges: What kind of person am I becoming, and what life do I want to lead?
Considering a tour at a Great Hearts Texas academy? Find one in your area by following this link.
Great Hearts Western Hills | Now Enrolling Grades K-12 Grade
8702 Ingram Rd, San Antonio, TX 78251
