Launching a New Initiative

St. John’s College was started by entrepreneurs who saw a new way to design a learning community—a place that was built on the individual mind engaging the biggest ideas and writers throughout history.

Innovators at St. John’s

Center For Entrepreneurship And The Liberal Arts Workshop St Johns Annapolis 2018 — CELA Workshop, Fall 2018

Stringfellow Barr and Scott Buchanan had some innovative ideas in 1937 when they introduced the new program: Set aside lecture halls and replace them with seminar tables, move away from the hierarchy of professor-student and toward a single community where all members hold an equal place, and don’t get distracted by today’s hot topic and focus instead on what endures. Students come to St. John’s to be part of that innovation and a member of a startup community that is now nearly a century old.

The innovative spirit remains part of St. John’s College today. Johnnies select this college because it is a place where their creativity, energy and innovation can engage Aristotle, Kant, Leibniz, Tolstoy, and more. It is a place where a student can find the spark in an idea and run with it wherever it goes.

How to Join

Steven Virgil Center For Entrepreneurship and the Liberal Arts St Johns — Steven Virgil leads a CELA workshop

The Center for Entrepreneurship and the Liberal Arts (CELA) is a yearlong program that will help students step into enterprise, whether that be a for-profit, nonprofit or social enterprise. Johnnies in CELA will learn how to move a good idea forward to a viable enterprise and then connect them to a network of mentors and potential partners for the next stage.

CELA is open to current Johnnies and alumni in the greater Annapolis area and is provided by the college for a $25 registration fee. Contact Jaime Dunn for more information.