Behind the Scenes of CLT | 2024 CLT Interns

On this episode of Anchored, Soren welcomes five of CLT’s summer interns: Ammon Corpron, Charlotte Crowell, Grace Ann Roth, Blake Schaper, and Gracey Washa to talk about their experiences interning for CLT this summer. Join the group as they discuss the skills they acquired and the projects they worked on the college partnerships, homeschool partnerships, policy and finance, customer service, and test development departments. The interns talk about some of the highlights and successes as well as a few stories about what goes on behind the scenes. 

Transcript

Soren Schwab - CLT (00:05.282)
Welcome back to the Anchored Podcast, the official podcast of the Classic Learning Test. My name is Soren Schwab, VP of Partnerships here at CLT. And today we have a special episode in store for you. I am joined today by five young men and women who make up the 2024 CLT internship class. And this is something we've been doing for a little while now. We have this grand vision of, well, we're pretty awesome company, right? And we attract

Amazing talent as full -time employees and we thought well, how do we get a pipeline? To continue hiring amazing people. Well, we could start by hiring amazing interns. And so this is something we've started a little while ago and we've really Made improvements to the way we processed applications and interviews and all that So these five young men and women that are joined by us today are really an elite elite group of students just to give you a few ideas to even be considered to

It's not an Oakland application. You have to be invited to apply to be a CLT intern. You have to have 105 out of 120 on the CLT 10 or CLT. So I would not even be invited to apply. So I'm really glad I got a job before we started the internship program. You'll have to write a few essays about CLT's mission, classical education, internship goals. I think there's two rounds of application reviews. We had hundreds upon hundreds of applications.

And then several interviews later, we had a total of seven interns and five of those are joining us today. So you're really in for a treat. We're joined today by Ammon Corpran, Gracie Washa, Blake Schopper, Grace Ann Roth, and Charlotte Crowell.

We're going to ask them to talk to us a little bit about their educational background as we always do in the Anchored Podcast. so Grace, and we're going to start with you. First of all, welcome to the Anchored Podcast. Talk to us a little bit about your own educational background.

Grace Ann Roth (02:04.212)
Thank you. So currently I'm a sophomore biomedical engineering major and I study at Texas A University. But before going to college last fall, I had a classical homeschool education for my entire life. And I really believe that having this classical education is what prepared me to succeed both in my studies at university and outside the classroom and definitely in this internship at CLT this summer.

Soren Schwab - CLT (02:28.098)
Chris, and I love hearing that. And it's already defying the stereotypes of a classical education, right? Well, if you get a classical education, you can be like a philosophy major, maybe an English major, but that's about it. So you're already defying that by pursuing a field in STEM while also receiving a classical education. So thank you. You've been an amazing intern. We really love getting to know you. Blake, what about you?

Blake Schaper (02:54.088)
yes, thank you for having me. So yes, I just finished 10 years of homeschooling with my brother this year and I'm hoping to take some online general courses through Patrick County College this year. I'm hoping to be on campus in 2025. So I've been taking homeschool courses like Classical Conversations for my whole time. And additionally, I've been taking college classes at our local community college since I was 12. During this time I learned to love math, economics, law and language.

I don't have a major I've chosen yet, but I hope to take business analytics and political science along with studying French and Spanish on the

Soren Schwab - CLT (03:30.454)
Wow, wow, that is fantastic. And for those who are listening to the podcast, not seeing a video, there are a lot of books behind Blake. And so the setting is just absolutely perfect from what you just described. And so really a pursuit of truth and knowledge, it certainly seems to be what you're doing. Amin, you're coming from the West Coast. We're recording this in the morning. And so it's really early for you and I appreciate you're getting up. I think you're in Oregon, is that right?

Ammon Corpron (03:58.465)
I am, I'm in Portland, Oregon.

Soren Schwab - CLT (04:00.608)
Awesome. Talk to us a little bit about your educational background.

Ammon Corpron (04:04.229)
Yeah, so I graduated from a private classical Christian school, Paideia Classical Christian, and I loved the classical model of education that I got to experience in high school. So I decided to enroll at Patrick Henry College, kind of as well as Blake, a couple years ahead, which is a Christian liberal arts college. Patrick Henry has a two year liberal arts core curriculum, which was one of the reasons I really

loved Patrick Henry and chose to study there. Right now I'm studying American politics and policy and I'm planning on going on to become an attorney after Patrick Henry. So going through law school and then passing the bar.

Soren Schwab - CLT (04:48.214)
That is incredible. We've hired several, both interns before and full -time employees from Patrick Henry. And it's a small school, right? Do know roughly what the enrollment is? How many students are there? It's like under thousand, right? Yeah, yeah. But I heard something along the lines of that they have one of the highest percentages of Supreme Court clerks in the nation. So I guess pursuing law at Patrick Henry is something that is quite prestigious.

Ammon Corpron (05:00.199)
It's about 400. Yeah.

Ammon Corpron (05:11.087)
So I guess pursuing a lot.

Ammon Corpron (05:18.075)
Yeah, Patrick Henry has a fantastic pre -law program. We actually have the highest LSAT scores of any school in the nation, even beating out Harvard and Yale's undergrads. And that's largely due to our specific pre -law prep program that you can actually take for credit, which is unique out of any college or university in the nation. So, highly recommended. It's a fantastic program.

Soren Schwab - CLT (05:43.03)
Fantastic, wonderful, wonderful. Well, Gracie, welcome. Talk to us a little bit about your educational background.

Gracey Washa (05:50.276)
Yeah, thank you. Like most of the other people here, I also grew up being homeschooled, but then in middle school, I started attending an online classical Christian school called Veritas Scholars Academy. I graduated from there and I also loved the classical education that I received because I feel like it shaped me into the person that I am now. But I'm currently going into my senior year at Oklahoma Baptist University. My major is elementary education. And the reason I picked that is because I'm thankful for the high

quality education that I had and I really am hoping to pass on the same love of learning to my future students.

Soren Schwab - CLT (06:27.402)
Grace, that is so awesome. And I've had the pleasure of visiting Oklahoma Baptist a couple of years ago. And it is absolutely beautiful. I live on the East Coast and didn't know whole lot about Oklahoma. And I thought, okay, I'm going to Oklahoma for a visit. It's an absolutely stunning campus. And I remember I got a campus tour on a golf cart, which was so neat. And then at the end, and I still own it, I got

a lovely hoodie from the university in green because I think is the mascot, it a bice? Are you the biceps? Great, that makes sense. So for St. Patrick's Day, I'm always set. And so I really, really think highly of Oklahoma Baptist and I'm glad you're having such a good experience there. Charlotte, last but not least, talk to us a little bit about your educational background.

Gracey Washa (06:59.854)
Yes, it's a bison and the colors are green and gold so that makes sense.

Charlotte Crowell (07:18.032)
Yeah, of course. So I actually, I started out in the public school system, but then I was homeschooled by my mother from the third grade onwards all the way until graduation. And she was an excellent teacher, really, really focused on that sort of classical style of education, like everyone else here. And I owe her so much for where I am today. And then after graduation, I was blessed with the opportunity to attend the University of Alabama on a full academic scholarship, which I

Very, very happy to accept. So I am currently heading into my sophomore year at the University of Alabama, and I'm a computer science major with a minor in mathematics. And I'm also in a specialized honors program called the Blunt Scholars Program, which is a liberal arts program that's focused on essay writing and reading and discussion of lots and lots of classical texts. And I'll be getting a liberal arts minor through that as

Soren Schwab - CLT (08:15.458)
That is amazing. you're at, mean, obviously you're at a large, large, large, large university, but you feel like your, your, your classical background is, is, is, prepared to really well. And you're able to, find ways to still apply that in your, in your public university setting.

Charlotte Crowell (08:31.132)
I feel like it has, yes, and I really like Blunt for that reason because even though Alabama is such a huge school, it's kind of a smaller cohort. There's only a couple hundred of us. And so it still kind of gives me the opportunity to have that small discussion based education, which I'm very grateful for.

Soren Schwab - CLT (08:46.914)
That is awesome. As much as I love that you're there, I'm really glad that my Michigan Wolverines won the national championship last year. I had to rub that in just a little bit.

Charlotte Crowell (08:58.708)
Yeah, yeah, we weren't very happy about that, but yeah, we've had our we've had our time in the spotlight. I feel

Soren Schwab - CLT (09:02.522)
You have plenty. have plenty. Maybe next year. Exactly. Exactly right. Awesome. Wonderful. Well, I'm to talk to each of you individually a little bit about your internship and your experience. I'm going to start with Gracie because I think a lot of our listeners, when they think CLT, even though we have tests all the way down to third grade, since we started as a college entrance exam, and I think a lot of people know that we work with colleges. so, Gracie, you interned

in our college partnership department, worked with Katie, worked with Taylor and with our founder, Jeremy Tate. So talk to us a little bit about after having spent your summer interning in the college sales department, what are some of the, what did you do and what are some of the main skills you learned maybe about communication and relationships and so forth?

Gracey Washa (09:48.612)
Definitely. So a big part of my job was doing outreach campaigns, which means I receive kind of a list of specific schools in one association or in a specific state. And I reach out to them via email or by calling them, just asking if they'd be willing to partner with CLT and using specific, I guess, sales pitches, but just like things that would connect with their university of, we're missionally aligned. You should want to be a partner with us because we want to partner with you or your state

legislation to accept the CLT universally. So we would love to partner with you because so many others in your area are already partnered with us. But I think something that I learned or just was reminded of is that patience is a virtue and persistence kind of goes along with that. It feels like often you're sending give or take the same email over and over again and there's not always a lot of return but what that means is that whenever there is a success it makes it even more special. I would say also

is really good at intentional networking and one of the big core values of CLT is just being humane but like being personable and talking about I met you at this such -and -such conference and so that was modeled well for me and I was able to take that into my own communication with these colleges.

Soren Schwab - CLT (11:06.028)
Yeah, yeah, if you're, of course, I'm part of the sales team. If you don't like hearing no, sales is probably not the best job for you, right? And we celebrate when we do have that. And so people hear about all the big sales wins, but they don't hear...

you know, the hours and hours spent. And sometimes you wonder, do they read the emails? Do they even? So what are some of the things, I mean, you mentioned, you know, trying to kind of tailor, sometimes tailor your emails or your communication. What's something that really maybe resonated with people or is something you found was working very well for you?

Gracey Washa (11:41.486)
I think it depends on the person. One big thing is finding multiple people to contact rather than just one specific point of contact. So a lot of my time even before sending emails was researching on college websites who are important people who are in the correct department of the school to understand what I'm talking about and who would be able to make that partnership happen. But I think of Florida I did a couple of outreach campaigns geared towards Florida schools because just last year the state of Florida fully adopted the CLT and so all the state schools are required to

the CLT already. And so I can now reach out to private schools and say, well already like the state is giving out scholarships to students based on their CLT scores, so why would you not want to already be able to receive those students and accept them into your school based on the CLT.

Soren Schwab - CLT (12:28.864)
Yeah, it's really interesting because sometimes I and I understand right if we're reaching out to to these colleges and sometimes they say no, I think they think they're saying no to CLT. But if you think about it, they're actually saying no to you. I mean, they're saying no to the kinds of students that have taken the CLT. And I think when you put it in perspective, you sure you don't want

a student like Gracie or Charlotte on your campus, right? I think that puts it in different perspective, but I don't always know that the colleges see it as such, right? They might just hear, it's another sales pitch. I get a lot of those, right? They're to sell me. We're not trying to sell you students. We're trying to obviously sell you an assessment that connects with these amazing students. Do you have a highlight from this summer, maybe a yes, or maybe where you got through to college or university?

Gracey Washa (13:16.58)
Yeah, so there was one university that did reach out to the director of partnerships after I emailed them, but they were probably the hardest school to contact. I couldn't find a single email on their whole website. So I called them a few times and there were times when it said the waiting time on the call was an hour and a half. And so was like, well, I don't have an hour and a half to give right now. So I'd wait a few more days and then call them again. So eventually I got ahold of them and I just got one generic like admissions at the college name dot edu

but they were really excited and became a partner college through that. So I was thankful again for the lesson of patience throughout the summer.

Soren Schwab - CLT (13:55.106)
That is absolutely incredible. I mean, the lasting impact that you will have had on CLT and now they're on the website forever. And you can always point back to that. that is amazing. Thank you so much, Gracie. And thanks for all you did this summer. know it's been hugely, hugely helpful for us. Blake, turn it over to you a little bit. You mentioned you are being and were homeschooled and now this summer you

Gracey Washa (14:11.888)
Thank you.

Soren Schwab - CLT (14:21.152)
with the homeschool partnership team with our wonderful Regina. Maybe start by talking about your own experience as a CLT test taker. You were a homeschool student taking the CLT. What was your experience like?

Blake Schaper (14:34.162)
Yeah, so thanks to programs such as DUTE tips, I've been taking standardized tests for as long as I can remember. For instance, I took the PSAT all the way back in sixth grade, and I think I also took the ACT -STT first time in middle school. And throughout all my experiences, I can tell you with confidence that the CLT was my favorite test to take because it was comfortable, simple, and really accessible. I loved to be able to take it from the comforts of my own home.

And I saw that the online format the CLT has was very easy and hassle -free. And I just saw the CLT overall as very welcoming. I loved going through some of the great books and literature. I remember one of my favorite experiences doing standardized testing was when I realized for like the literature portion, I was reading Chesterton and it just made it all that easier and more engaging. And compared to the other reading sections, they have them, ACT and SAT, it's definitely phenomenal.

For instance, after a while it gets very tiresome going through reading another abstract artist's work or some monotonous scientific experiment on the ACT SAT. And additionally, it's not really anchored in our Western tradition. However, the CLT takes some of the great classic works of literature.

and has you working through them on the test too. I just thought that was amazing. Yes, I would recommend taking the CLT for any homeschooler as it is the standardized test that is actively seeking to help homeschool groups and families.

Soren Schwab - CLT (16:06.178)
And I can tell you all Blake was not paid to say this. Now he was paid to do the internship, but he was not paid. But thank you for sharing that. mean, that's absolutely incredible. think, know, when Jeremy Tate founded the company and founded CLT, right? Like he's bursting with pride, right? Because that's exactly what's his intent, right? That this disconnect between what you're learning at home.

in what you're being assessed on, right? That we can remove that. And so what better way to read, trust it and answer questions. And I think the new digital SAT is essentially now that they removed all longer passages. So essentially it's you're reading a tweet and answering a question. You're reading a tweet and answering a question.

And in some ways, mean, it's almost insulting to students, right, that you get reduced to, you read and analyze a tweet? So I'm glad, Blake, because I know the CLT is not easy, right? I mean, it's a challenging test, but

You did just fine, hence you're being an intern this summer. So what were some of the projects that you're working on? And maybe tell the audience a little bit, okay, so you were part of the homeschool team, right? Homeschool partnerships, homeschool states, what does that entail and what did you work on this summer?

Blake Schaper (17:20.242)
Yeah, sure thing. So for the majority of my time this summer, I've worked on updating the homeschool sales CRM. And for those of you don't know, a CRM is like a giant address book. It's a whole directory of all major companies and contacts, like their information, like their location, and additionally, some other information, like for example, a company, I would list whether they were a classical school or not, and additionally, what their religious affiliation was. Additionally, I've worked on some competitive analysis.

So for the CLT 3 -8, so for instance, there's many other exams such as the Stanford 10 test, the California achievement test, and the Iowa assessments that the CLT 3 -8 is going to be competing with. And so I analyzed their analytics and their mission, and I showed where the CLT 3 -8 would have a competitive edge. And finally, I've been working on some email templates, especially when we looked at some new legislative template, I mean, changes, I would look at some, like the major,

ideas and programs and changes, and I would make a template notifying the people of the new ideas and changes. Additionally, I've just done some workshops with Regina too, working on some skills and whatnot for the future, and all around I thought it was just an amazing experience.

Soren Schwab - CLT (18:41.43)
Yeah, I remember your competitive analysis presentation. was, was it week two or week three of your your internship and you're already giving a just a fantastic presentation to the whole to the whole sales team. And it was so helpful for us as well, right? Because when you're building, you're developing new tests like the ones for four grades three through eight, you know, you do your research and you're really trying to provide something that is simply

Right. And I think we're all agree that the content of the CLT is absolutely better than any other standardized tests, but there's so much more that goes into the testing. Graceanne, we're going to talk about customer service. Charlotte, we're going to talk about test development. What kind of tests, right? And then, Amin, does this cut it on the policy side? Right? Is this something that the states actually accept? And so for you to present on what some of the other companies are doing,

and that we actually are very competitive was just so encouraging. And so I appreciate you very much, Blake. Let's move over to Amin a little bit. I think when people think about classical education and how can I make a career out of this, well, most people probably think about teaching. Well, I'm going

get a degree in that and then I'm going to teach. And that is, I'm a former teacher. think it's the most noble profession, absolutely recommended to anyone. Gracie is smiling. I'm going to get into teaching. Absolutely. But some folks don't want to teach, but they still want to make an impact. And so it was fascinating to have you be an intern this summer. You worked on the policy side and politics and policy major.

now interning with CLT Policy and Finance Department. Talk to us about that experience implementing what you've been learning maybe in school and kind of turn it into quote unquote kind of a real world application.

Ammon Corpron (20:27.631)
Yeah. So, you know, policy has always been something that's central, I think to the, both the classical education and the homeschooling movement, you know, homeschooling used to be illegal and these sorts of things. it was policy changes that have even opened up the window of opportunity for a lot of these alternative school programs to come back. So policy, while it might not be the first thing you think of when you think of classical education,

It always has been and remains to be, I think, a very important component of kind of bringing back classical education and making it accessible for all. And personally for me, I found my writing, critical thinking, communication and policy research skills to be especially helpful in this internship. So in the policy department, I was tasked with doing research into important policy opportunities for the CLT.

in several different states and trying to essentially discover the simplest path to the greatest reward for CLT. So whether that means more students in the public education system taking CLT, whether that means more opportunities in public higher ed for students with their CLT scores, whatever is the simplest rule change that can be made to lead to the kind of greatest reward. So I had a lot of previous experience doing policy research and analysis, especially.

both through my education at Patrick Henry and in policy debate as well. And I found this to be immensely helpful. And then communication, especially in written form, was also critical in this internship. And I'm really grateful for the heavy emphasis that classical education places on writing and the instruction in that that I received both in high school and in college.

Soren Schwab - CLT (22:18.06)
Man, that is absolutely fascinating. And can tell you as a salesperson, I'm so grateful for the work that you're doing. think, you know, it's these cars, for example, right? You want to buy a car or a computer and you go out and you do your research and you find the car or the computer, the best model that fits your needs, that suits your needs, that best aligns with, you know, what you need it for. And then you purchase it, right? And maybe it's also the most affordable, whatever you're looking for there.

Well, with standardized testing, that's not always the case. And so there's probably hundreds of thousands of families and students that did their research and think CLT would be the best test to fit their needs. But then there's legislation that is in the way. There's a roadblock that's in the way, whether that's for a homeschool student, for charter school students, sometimes even private school students. So I guess a lot of it is doing research and writing.

But it must be satisfying to kind of see that you're working towards maybe removing some of these roadblocks, some of these levers that are preventing classical families from thriving.

Ammon Corpron (23:25.159)
Yeah, it is. And one context that's particularly relevant right now is the rise of education savings accounts, which is something that 13 states have created in the last several years. And every other state has at least considered in their legislature. It's essentially something where a state will give funding that would have otherwise been spent at a public school to a family to be able to educate their children. And

Being able to work CLT into that and use these education savings accounts as an opportunity for CLT to get approved to be a test that monitors progress with these funds and these sorts of things is a great area of opportunity for CLT and it's a great option for families who previously haven't had these opportunities before. And so seeing, like you said, those roadblocks being removed and people being able to choose how to educate.

their families, how is best for them and what works for them has definitely been very rewarding and hopeful.

Soren Schwab - CLT (24:31.276)
That's incredible. And of course, for families to be able to purchase their CLTs with those ESA dollars. mean, that's our marketing team is having a hoot right now. We're going to be able to say, here's what you're and you can actually use those dollars that you've received to purchase the the test. Absolute wins. So thank you so much for all you've done this summer so far. Grace Ann.

you interned on the operations side and operations department in customer service. And so I'm really curious to kind of see what has been your kind of general test taking experience with CLT, what difference did you notice? And of course, now in particular, that you were also kind of on the other side of that.

Grace Ann Roth (25:19.912)
Yeah, definitely. So live test day support was most certainly the most stressful, but also the most rewarding job that I've done as an intern this summer. So as a previous CLT test taker, I can understand the pressure of wanting to do well and the frustration that comes in when your technology fails or glitches during the exam. So having this experience of my own really helped me to understand what the students were going through and to have more patience and compassion for their situation.

going off of what Gracie said, I also definitely learned that patience is a virtue. When you're balancing five live chats and a phone call, several waiting voicemails, and you have thousand tabs open on your computer, it's pretty overwhelming and it's easy to slip into using a frustrated or annoyed tone. But whenever I was tempted to be short with a frantic student who was chatting in or a stressed out parent who was on the phone, it was really helpful to remember that

I was in their position once when I took the CLT. And I learned that part of my job in customer support was not just to fix the problem at hand, but also to help the customer feel calm and understood and ask myself, how would I have wanted to be treated when I was taking the CLT? So yeah, it was definitely helpful having that experience of my own going into customer support as an intern.

Soren Schwab - CLT (26:41.75)
Yeah, wow. So it's CLT and you all know that we have we have three core values being being passionate, being anchored, and being humane. And I assume that very last one being humane. How I guess would you apply that and you alluded to that already. how can we as a, you would say as a standardized testing company, like humane is not really the word that comes to mind when you think about, you know, answering standardized testing questions.

your role and kind of the whole team, how does the customer service team kind of apply that to their interactions?

Grace Ann Roth (27:15.196)
Yeah. So one thing that some of my supervisors are always saying is customer support is sales. So it's our job to make sure that the way we interact with customers and users of the CLT makes our company look the best and makes our company function the best for the users. So when people are having problems, it's not our job to get annoyed with them and say, well, you're using it wrong. It's our job to make sure that the customer feels understood and that we're listening to them.

and that we're putting our best foot forward to make sure that we're solving their problem and helping them have a great experience with our company so that they don't get a bad feeling for CLT and then not want to do business with us anymore.

Soren Schwab - CLT (28:00.096)
Yeah. And I mentioned you're in the STEM field at university. What would you say are kind of the things that you learned this summer, the skills that you feel like you're going to you're going to take with you, not just back to university, but maybe even for

Grace Ann Roth (28:14.002)
Yeah, so I would say one of the big things is definitely collaboration with the team. So on our customer support team, we have a lot of different people who are monitoring the inbox at different times. And so it's always, we're all taking tickets from the same place. And there's a lot of communication that needs to go on. Like who is the best person to answer this question? it has to do with financial aid and that kind of thing, it might not be the right question for me to answer, because I don't know as much

So was definitely a good learning experience for knowing when to step in and take something that you know you can do well and when to pass that along to somebody else on your team. And that is also something that's really, really important for engineering, especially when you're on a team, you're accountable for what your team produces. And it's important to know how to delegate that responsibility so that the job gets done in the best way possible.

Soren Schwab - CLT (29:09.494)
Fantastic. And just as a thank you to you, I'm on the road a lot talking to families, talking to schools. And I think that the refrain that I'm hearing is that not everything always goes exactly as planned with CLT either, right? We're a company made up of humans, right? It happens. But the feedback we're always getting is that CLT, guys care. You care about me.

And I think that's just something where sometimes it is easy to like you said be short or just another ticket, another student as we're growing in particular, right? We're serving so many more students now. And so thank you, Grace Ann, for your approach to customer service and making the families feel like they matter, right? Because they do. And so but it takes intentionality, right? In every interaction. So thank you. Charlotte.

Let's go over to you. And I mentioned that already with, with Emin a little bit about, you know, classical education and, and, and then policy, well, classical education and technology, right. IT, well actually CLT has that cover too. And so, so you intern in the test development team. so talk to us a little bit about how, you know, the problem solving that you did, this summer with some of your, with some of your project, what did those entail?

Charlotte Crowell (30:32.422)
Yeah, yeah, of course. So computer science really is just problem solving. That's basically all it is. And you you see, you watch movies and you see these hackers and these computer scientists and they're just on their computers banging out line after line of code and their fingers are just flying across the keyboard and it's crazy. And that is not at all how it works. I've learned it's more like you write one line of code or maybe two lines of code. And then you realize you

know what to write next, you don't know the syntax for what you want to write next, or you run the code and there's an error and you're like, that's not good. And then you go over to Google and you poke around for a while and figure out the issue and then you come back and you try again. And so I did a lot of that working on my projects with the test development team. So most of what I did was honestly watch YouTube videos and poke around various articles.

whenever I didn't understand a statistical concept or my code was raising some sort of error. And that's really just how computer science works in the real world. That's just part of the process. And that doesn't really go away even as you get more experience. And so I would say working on these projects really improves my troubleshooting skills and my research skills. And I know that will be really, really valuable later

Soren Schwab - CLT (31:50.858)
And that's something that we say about students that have received a classical education, right? Is that to put it in a kind of craster, they just seem different.

Well, how do they seem different? Well, you can throw just anything at them and they kind of figure it out. And I feel like what you just explained is a perfect example of that. And so you were essentially presented with problems, but not necessarily with, and here's how you find the solutions. You had to kind of sift through that and find ways to solve those problems. What would you say kind of in your educational background, what are some things that you feel like really prepared you for that?

Charlotte Crowell (32:31.504)
Definitely. Yeah. So being homeschooling, being classically educated, a lot of that entails teaching yourself honestly, like you don't have a rigid curriculum like you might see in public education. It's a lot more free form. It's a lot of doing your own research. And I think that is a way in which classical education does kind of transfer over more to STEM and

technical careers in a way you might not expect is it really does prepare you for the amount of problem solving that you'll have to do in your career and in your everyday life, really.

Soren Schwab - CLT (33:07.7)
I guess, you know, when you took CLT and maybe for our listeners that have maybe been exposed to CLT, did you ever think, you know, when you kind of, when you're on the other side of it, kind of, you know, opening the kind of the curtain and looking, you know, under the hood, was there something that surprised you? Was there something that you now feel like, my God, yeah, when I took CLT, I didn't think of all these different nuances, all these complexities.

Charlotte Crowell (33:33.064)
Definitely, definitely. So I took a lot of standardized tests in high school, CLT 10 included, and also the SAT and PSAT. And I guess I never realized how methodical, like how much work just goes into making these tests. Like, I don't know, for some reason, I always just figured it was kind of like, well, we like this question, so we'll just use that. And that's not at all how it works. It's a lot of data gathering and a

of review and just a ton of work that goes into making sure that these questions are good questions and that they do the job they're supposed to do, which is actually test these students and evaluate their reasoning skills. And so it's really given me a lot of respect for what CLT and other companies do to provide these tests, honestly.

Soren Schwab - CLT (34:23.458)
Well, I appreciate you and it's certainly the field of psychometrics. I didn't even know existed until I joined CLT. There's a whole science between the writing, the developing of tests. But especially, Amin, as you mentioned on the policy side, these states want to make sure that our test is valid, that it is reliable. And the work that obviously you've been doing, Charlotte, is helping us with that. So thank you so, much. This has been delightful. My goodness.

can't believe it's already the last week of your internship. I wish we could just keep you for a little longer. But I do have one more question for you. And we're running a little bit out of time. So keep it a little shorter. I know we're going to talk about books and texts. So it's easy to go on and on. self -restraint a little bit there. But I do want to ask the question that I ask any of our guests on the Anchor podcast, which most of them struggle with the most. And that is, is there one book or one text that you can point to that you've read?

that has been most impactful to you in your life and why I'm gonna start with Gracie.

Gracey Washa (35:30.948)
me, my favorite book of all time is Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. I think I've read it at least seven times, so it's very comforting and like homey and familiar and so that's partially why I like it, but I think I've also learned about myself through it because I see myself in the Elder Sister Meg and kind of learning about my faults and my personality, but also learning about the people around me as I'm able to see elements of different characters in them. So it's very family -centered which is refreshing

and it's helped me to learn about myself.

Soren Schwab - CLT (36:03.362)
incredible. Love, love Louisa May Alcott. Blake, what about you?

Blake Schaper (36:08.678)
Yes, well, besides the Bible, think Victor Hugo's Les Miserables has had the most impact on my life. Not only does it have an amazing, engaging storyline, it deals with deep philosophical questions such as the conflict between justice and mercy, true meaning of love, human dignity and humility, forgiveness and repentance and revolution and freedom. This book Les Miserables has expanded my worldview and most assuredly impacted my walk with Christ. So I definitely recommend everyone to read it when they have some time in the summer.

Soren Schwab - CLT (36:40.46)
Wow, I read it last, re -read it last summer and it is incredible. So thanks for that recommendation. Amin, what about you?

Ammon Corpron (36:49.091)
For me, the book that's had the greatest impact on my life has been Crime and Punishment by Dostoevsky. I think it powerfully showcases the inevitability of justice and the fallen kind of contrasted with the fallen nature of man, but also beautifully showing the path there is towards redemption. So I read it and I think it's a perfect picture of the gospel and it's just written out beautifully. It's, I think, one of the greatest pieces of literature.

ever written Dostoevsky is a fantastic writer and just reading Crime and Punishment you just you feel like you are you know Raskolnikov fantastic book I have not but it's on my list for this fall

Soren Schwab - CLT (37:32.878)
Have you read Brothers Karamazov? Okay, all right. Awesome, well I'll talk to you next year and see if you're still, because people sometimes switch over to Brothers K after they read that as their favorite. So I'd be curious to hear from you. Grace Ann, what about you?

Grace Ann Roth (37:51.504)
So the book that's had the greatest impact on my life is definitely On the Bondage of the Will by Martin Luther. I read it for the first time when I was in my sophomore year of high school. I was having a lot of struggles, theologically and spiritually. And this book just affirmed how deep God's love for us really is. And he loves us so much as to enact our salvation without any works on our own part. God's power and grace can overcome the bondage of our own sinful will and set us free.

And so it's a very intense read because it's a debate, but it's also very encouraging and it has helped me overcome a lot of theological difficulties. And it just brings a lot of comfort and hope and assurance every time I reread

Soren Schwab - CLT (38:32.0)
I'm smiling. You're making this German very, very happy. So thank you for sharing that Grace. And Charlotte last, but certainly not least. about you?

Charlotte Crowell (38:42.276)
Yeah, so kind of going off a of what Grace Ann said, I'd probably have to say the Book of Concord, which is the collection of the founding documents and confessions of the Lutheran Church, written primarily by Martin Luther and Philip Malanxion. And I'm a Lutheran, but I was not I was not always Lutheran. I was raised Methodist, actually. And then my entire family converted to Lutheranism when I was kind of late elementary, early middle school age. And up to that point, I hadn't really thought much about my worldview or my religion. I don't

most kids that age really have. But it, that conversion experience really kind of got me thinking about why I believe what I believed. And it's the first time I really realized that I could be wrong about what I believed or that others could have different opinions, which I rationally knew, but I never really thought about. And so I started reading a lot of different theology books, one of the one of which was the book of concord, which has to have been my favorite. And I

That one in particular has really helped to shape my worldview and reform my worldview. And it's probably the one that informs how I view the world today the most.

Soren Schwab - CLT (39:55.606)
Well, like I said, this has been absolutely delightful. Time flew by. Thank you so much for your insight. Thank you so much for your hard work this summer. Wish you all the best this last week of internship, which by the way is culminating with a presentation to the whole CLT staff, which, you know, a few years ago we had maybe 15, 20 people, but now it is over 40. So it's going to be a crowd for you there.

on Friday, we're excited about it. And of course, best of luck and God's blessings as you go back to school in the fall. So Gracie Ann, Blake, Ammon, Gracie, Charlotte, thank you so much for joining Anchor today.