About
A School Rooted in the Unity and Beauty of Truth
If you could design the best possible high school education for your child, what would it look like? St. Jerome Institute takes this question literally. We designed our curriculum, our culture, and our plan for integration with faith and community from the ground up to be uniquely tailored to this moment in the development of young men and women.
Our faculty work collegially across disciplines to engage students and model virtuous scholarship. We dare each other to ask the most meaningful and fundamental questions, and together unpack the bold, beautiful, and courageous answers that are our children’s birthright as intellectual heirs to the West.
Why Study at SJI
When we stand in the presence of a powerful sculpture or gaze through the eyepiece of a telescope and see a distant nebula, there is an extended moment of awe when we are transfixed with wonder. The desire to understand what we see, to know its story, prompts us to ask questions and seek answers. At SJI, we strive to recreate this moment, to ask these questions, and to know these stories in every subject we teach. From the epic tales of Odysseus and Beowulf to the quiet heroism of Walter Ciszek in Soviet Russia, from the deceptive simplicity of counting to the surprising complexity of the natural logarithm, SJI presents the inspiring beauty of our world in ways that lead students to deeper understanding and lifelong mastery.
I felt well-prepared academically coming to CUA from SJI, and I always find that things we discussed or studied at SJI come up in my college classes over and over again!
Learning Latin has been particularly informative for me. It has made me a better writer and thinker because of the underlying structure of the language. If you go back and read Cicero, you can see this incredible structure and form to the language which is inherent in its morphology. We don’t really find that in writing now and we’ve lost that versatility that people used to use language for. It gives you a sense of what you can really do with language that sometimes goes beyond conventional norms.
The way subject-matter was presented at SJI showed that what we’re learning is connected to a deeper reality. There is no end to what you learn about something, because that thing is always connected to all other subjects and ultimately to God. You realize that every subject has a meaning that goes beyond that subject.
The seminars are amazing at SJI, because we had this “flow” that I just loved so much, where you felt that you could speak freely. The seminar helped further my understanding so much more - we would come to knowledge just by discussing. We had the opportunity to figure things out on our own.
I loved how integrated SJI was. A lot of my friends in Chemistry classes had the opposite experience in High School, where each subject was super disconnected from every other… But I felt like my experience was so connected and integrated.
Learning at SJI opened me up to deeper levels of understanding and I loved the teachers so much. They were all so caring and thoughtful!
I was able to look back and realize the growth that SJI gave me. SJI forms the person and does not just give them a basic education. I can really tell how much it has impacted my life now that I am in college. SJI is unlike anything you will ever do again, because the teachers and everyone else care about you as a person and want to see you grow. They always pushed me to be better for myself.
I realized as this year started that something was missing from my life, and upon further reflection, I realized that it was lauds. Singing lauds at SJI in the morning was an experience I will never forget, because we would sing together in community with each other.
Managing to live out one’s faith comes back to the classroom. SJI provided that solid foundation for the faith I now have, even though I did not always like saying the lauds every morning, and I sometimes did not understand why each of the rules was in place. I now recognize the experiences I had at SJI allowed my faith to mature into what it now is.
An Education That Transforms
At St. Jerome Institute, we believe in a high school experience designed for flourishing—one that integrates faith, intellect, and community. We cultivate students who think deeply, embrace truth, and live virtuously, preparing them not just for college, but for a life well-lived.
St. Jerome Institute is pursuing Accreditation as a member of the Cognia Network (formerly AdvanceEd). SJI is recognized by the Office of the State Secretary of Education (OSSE) of the District of Columbia as an independent high school.