BMCR 2007.01.07

Response: Cocrane on van Hooff on John Bulwer, Classics Teaching in Europe

Response to 2006.12.12

Response by

Salvete omnes!

I just wanted to inform you that Classics (mainly Latin) is alive and surviving in Australia. In high schools the most widely used course is The Cambridge Latin Course and, for Greek, Athenaze with Wilding. At universities lecturers usually write their own Latin courses for beginners and for Greek they use the JACT Reading Greek courses. At a higher level there is a mixture of literature and prose composition. Unfortunately, however, the federal government is cutting back university funding, causing universities to pare back Classics courses to the bare minimum. At the high school level enrolments are stable, and classics courses are taken by students who want to get higher marks at our university entrance examinations (the International Baccalaureate is gaining popularity). At universities adults are flocking back to Classics because they could not study them at school or need them for various history or medieval studies courses.