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St. John's new year means a dream come true for some

By EARL KELLY, Staff Writer Published August 23, Z007

With a mixture of humor and erudition, St. John's College President Christopher Nelson yesterday convened the college for its 217th session.

Mr. Nelson, a former trial lawyer, told the student body how Socrates stood trial for his life, for allegedly corrupting the youth of Athens.

Socrates was always one to question the ordinary things that others took for granted, and he showed no humility during his trial. Instead, he began his defense with "I was attached to this city by the god ... because (it) needed to be stirred by a kind of gadfly," Mr. Nelson said.

"Socrates is a defense attorney's worst nightmare and a grave diggers delight: when in a hole, he will take up the shovel and dig himself deeper," Mr. Nelson said to the audience packed into Key Auditorium. "His jury was sufficiently impressed with his defense that it sentenced him to death."

Mr. Nelson's - and Socrates' - point was clear to the roughly 500 students of St. John's: namely, that a life which doesn't question basic beliefs is not worth living.

One freshman who started at the college yesterday, Matthew Bowers of Annapolis, attended a traditional college before concluding that St. John's was for him.

“It is about critical thinking more than anything else," he said of the school's emphasis on reading the original works in Western civilization. St. John's is the kind of school where a map of the Peloponnesian War (431-404 B.C.) is a stock item in the campus bookstore.

Coming out of high school, Mr. Bowers, a 2005 graduate of the Key School, enrolled in highly acclaimed Kenyon College, in Ohio, but wasn't happy.

"It was the sort of standard liberal arts college," he said.

So he dropped out, attended Anne Arundel Community College for a year, and then "discovered" St. John's.

“The seminar setting just suits him to a T," said his mother, Rhonda Rose.

Though it took Mr. Bowers a while to find his way to St. John's, it took another freshman only a flash to know that this was the college for him.

Mathew Wetzel of Linthicum said he was considering various schools until he visited the Annapolis campus.

"Everything looked pretty good, but when I got to St. John's, it was no comparison," he said.

His mother, Kelly Wetzel, a West Point graduate, said the effect St. John's had on her son was even more pronounced than he described.

"'It was in his eyes," she said. "We were here, and within 15 minutes, he turned to me with a sparkle in his eye and said, "I have to go here."

Mr. Wetzel said it had just dawned on him yesterday what getting a classical education would entail.

"After I came out of the cafeteria, it hit me how much work I would have to do - all the languages," said. "But even though it is hard work, it will be fun."

Some students drop out of St, John's after the freshman year, but others will do virtually anything to find a way to stay in the $40,000-a-year college.

Lucy Blue, whose mother is a nurse practitioner living in Seattle and whose dad is an Episcopal priest and fisherman in Sitka, Ala., is a sophomore.

Ms. Blue, 20, should be a junior, but had to miss last year because of finances.

She has spent the last eight summers working on her dad's fishing boat, and this summer she worked on a cruise ship, mainly pulling the night shift.

"That's when you paint and do upkeep, because boats are always in the constant state of falling apart," she said.

She also stood watch, "looking out for things not to hit," and every once in a while she got a chance "to drive the boat."

Through her own hard work and S20,000 in financial assistance from the college, Ms. Blue was able to return this year.

“ I ran out of money and was unable to get a grant last year," she said, explaining why she dropped out of St. John's. "This year. I signed the check for tuition - I scrubbed that boat a lot of damned hours for that money."