A 17-year-old Lander homeschooler who beat out 8,000 other students in what was billed as the “Ultimate Civics Showdown” stood beside President Donald Trump in the Oval Office on national TV on Tuesday. Miriam Washut won a $150,000 scholarship in the effort.
July 01, 2026
Lander Homeschooler Wins ‘Ultimate Civics Showdown,’ $150,000 Scholarship
Cowboy State Daily • Dale Killingbeck
A Wyoming homeschooler’s national civics victory is more than a feel-good story; it points to the kind of formation that takes history, citizenship, and inherited wisdom seriously. Miriam Washut, daughter of Kyle Washut, president of Wyoming Catholic College, comes from a family closely tied to classical liberal education, and her deep study of America’s founding documents offers a hopeful glimpse of what young people can do when they are invited into the great questions of liberty, virtue, and self-government.
Cowboy State Daily
What if the books you read at sixteen, the habits you formed in a classroom, or the things you learned simply because they were beautiful were never meant to “pay off” only in a career? Christine Perrin talks with historian Elspeth Currie about education as lifelong formation, and about the ways learning can shape motherhood, family culture, work, and our capacity for attention and enjoyment. Drawing on Currie’s research into educated women in Renaissance England, they explore why learning matters even when its effects cannot be measured, how good books and thoughtful teachers shape us over time, and why practices like reading aloud, Sabbath rest, community, and celebration can keep us from simply drifting through family life. It is a conversation that recognizes the good work that might already be unfolding in ordinary life.
One day at a classical school changed the course of her life.
In seventh grade, Sarah spent a single day shadowing at Jackson Hole Classical Academy. She says she learned more that day than in the seven years of school before it.
What followed was an education in great books, Latin, and poetry learned by heart, including Rudyard Kipling's "If-" Years later, when Sarah arrived at West Point to train as an Army officer, she found that same poem on the walls of the barracks.
Today, Sarah is a West Point graduate preparing to lead a platoon of soldiers. Her story shows what classical education is for: forming young people who know what's right, do what's right, and give of themselves in service to others.
What if mathematics is not merely a tool for solving problems, but a way of encountering reality? In this episode of Forged, Brian Williams talks with mathematician and educator Jake Tawney about the beauty of number and shape, why wonder belongs at the heart of education, and what we risk losing when technology begins doing our thinking for us. From Euclid and fractals to calculators and artificial intelligence, Jake makes the case that education should begin with real things worth knowing and loving. Their conversation ultimately turns toward a larger question: What habits, practices, and encounters help us become more fully human? Jake and Brian explore why mathematics has so often been reduced to computation, how teachers can invite students into genuine wonder, and why AI raises deeper questions than efficiency alone. Jake also reflects on the practices that have shaped his own life as a husband and father, including prayer, cooking, wine, reading aloud, and the conviction that our first calling is to give ourselves for the good of others. Books & Resources Mentioned Another Sort of Mathematics: Selected Proofs Necessary to Acquire a True Education in Mathematics by Jake Tawney Euclid’s Elements A Mathematician’s Lament by Paul Lockhart The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis Gaudium et Spes (Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World), especially paragraphs 22 and 24