Academic rationalism is an orientation to the curriculum that honors the role of traditional content in the development of the rational human mind. Along with many adherents to other orientations, academic rationalists understand that, because of time constraints, not all available curriculum content can be taught in schools. To avoid an overstuffed curriculum, academic rationalists recommend a distinct criterion for answering the classic curriculum question regarding what knowledge is of most worth. For them, the most worthwhile learning centers on those enduring ideas and artifacts that have stood the test of time. The works that contain the greatest products of the human mind thus become the canon of the school curriculum.

Academic rationalists believe that human nature is unchanging and that there are eternal truths to ...