Charlie Salisbury

Charlie Salisbury

Philosophy Research Program

Charlie Salisbury
Charlie is an 11th grade student from New York. He is passionate in American History and he is interested in a Philosophy research program


Charlie enjoys American history and politics. He has been taking Latin classes since 8th grade in school and he would like to get started on a research about early American political system. He would like to major in either Political Science or Philosophy with a minor in Classics in the future.


Scope of the program


Learning objectives

  • To study the classical tradition in early America and write a very good paper on the topic using college level secondary sources and primary sources from the 18th century.
  • Eight one hour meetings on Philosophy research program. Regular emails. Serious reading list with college level secondary and primary sources.


What challenges did he face?

  • As a high school student, Charlie needed help with literature research and writing. His goal was to learn more about classical studies writing, which differs from the scientific writing he was more exposed to in school.


How did our program help him?

  • Through the mentorship program, Charlie learnt to study the classical tradition in early America.
  • Charlie wrote a very good paper on the topic using college-level secondary sources and primary sources from the 18th century.


Matched Professor

The mentor is professor of history and accounting at the University of Southern California. He has been awarded numerous prestigious prizes including two NEH Fellowships, the Jacques Barzun Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and, in 2011, the MacArthur Fellowship.


Recommendation letter

Charlie is smart and interesting and constantly produced new insights. His capacity for analysis was exceptional. He was able to see real nuance in John Adams’ thought. I was impressed.

I have written recommendation letters for him. He has exception curiosity and skill in the humanities”

Mentor from University of Southern California

Excerpts of student’s work

Excerpts from Charlie’s final research paper on “John Adams and Tacitean Cynicism”

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