The Alexander Hamilton Institute for the Study of Western Civilization (AHI) is pleased to announce that Minding the Campus, a website sponsored by the Manhattan Institute and devoted to serious conversation and debate about the state of higher learning in the United States, published on June 5 “Lower-Tier Schools are in Big Trouble” by AHI Undergraduate Fellow Dean Ball.  Mr. Ball, a history major at Hamilton College from Falls Church, Virginia, heads the AHI’s Publius Society, a student-run organization that explores outside of the classroom important issues of the American constitutional order and how they bear on contemporary politics.   He also spoke at the Turning Stone Resort during the April 18 kick-off of the Sixth Annual Carl B. Menges Colloquium, “What Is a Civilizational Struggle: The Work of Samuel Huntington.”

AHI Undergraduate Fellow Dean Ball speaks to banquet guests. Photo Copyright 2013 Tom Loughlin Jr, Utica, N.Y.

Mr. Ball will be working this summer as an intern at the Manhattan Institute under the direction of John Leo, Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor at the Institute’s City Journal. Ball obtained his internship in a national competition.  According to the Manhattan Institute website, [i]nterns regularly attend Manhattan Institute Events, including debates, conferences, and luncheon speeches. Interns have recently attended events featuring Governor Scott Walker, Harvey Pitt, Former Chairman, Securities and Exchange Commission; and leading scholars such as John Taylor and Charles Murray.”

“Dean Ball is one of the very best undergraduate fellows the AHI has to offer,” said AHI Charter Fellow Robert Paquette.  “He is smart, courageous, and agile on his feet. He has participated notably in every one of the AHI’s reading clusters since his freshmen year.  This is a young man who has read The Federalist, Hayek’s Constitution of Liberty, Montesquieu’s Spirit of the Laws and many other classics cover-to-cover. We are very proud of him.”