FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

December 7, 2020

DALE AHLQUIST RECEIVES PRESIDENTIAL APPOINTMENT FROM DONALD TRUMP

MINNEAPOLIS – On Thursday, December 3, the White House announced that President Trump will appoint Dale Ahlquist to serve on the National Board of Education Sciences. Ahlquist, President of the Society of Gilbert Keith Chesterton and co-founder of the first Chesterton Academy, also runs the Chesterton Schools Network, which includes over 30 classical Catholic high schools that use the curriculum he originally developed. On the National Board of Education Sciences, which is part of the U.S. Department of Education, he will help oversee and evaluate the current research, data and statistics of student performance and school effectiveness in American public education. He will travel to Washington DC twice a year and be part of a voting body that will make recommendations on current programs and policies.

“It’s obviously a great honor to receive this appointment, and it was very unexpected.” said Ahlquist, whose office is at Chesterton Academy in Hopkins, Minnesota, a suburb of Minneapolis. “It is a recognition not just of my own work, but of all the great work done by the teachers, students, and parents of the many Chesterton Academies around the country, and also of my colleagues in the Society of G.K. Chesterton.”

Acknowledged as one of the world’s greatest experts on English writer G.K. Chesterton, Ahlquist took what was once just a literary society and made it into a leading educational organization. Together with Tom Bengtson, he founded Chesterton Academy in 2008 in the Twin Cities. In only its fourth year of existence, it was named one of the top 50 Catholic high schools in the country. The unique, integrated classical curriculum immediately caught wide attention, and other people wanted to start schools based on the same model. In just twelve years, over 30 schools have joined the Chesterton Schools Network, with more being planned.

“I’ve been blessed to affect secondary education in a positive way,” said Ahlquist, “But I expect this new position is going to be a true challenge. I will be given a unique perspective of the state of education in this country, and I doubt I’m going to see a very good report card. I welcome the opportunity to work with other education leaders who want to improve all of our schools.”