American Thought Leaders - How Classical Arts Training Helps Kids Unlock Their Full Potential | Sherry Zhang

Episode Date: June 19, 2026

Leonardo da Vinci once wrote that the key to developing a “complete mind” was to “study the science of art. Study the art of science. Learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else.”In 2009, Sherry Zhang and a group of dedicated California parents who were disillusioned with the schools in their area decided to co-found an academic institution that would put this philosophy into practice.A former Silicon Valley entrepreneur and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory postdoctoral chemist, Zhang shares her unexpected journey from working in a garage tech start up to being a founding member of a classical academy.In this episode, Zhang discusses the core philosophy behind classical education—built upon three tenets: truth, goodness, and beauty. She reveals how intensive training in classical Chinese dance, ballet, visual arts, and music causes students to develop habits of perseverance, focus, and attentiveness that transfer to academics.In an age dominated by instant gratification and digital distraction, Zhang explains how the structure of classical arts provides order that children long for.One student, Hugo, came to the San Francisco High School of the Arts unable to focus and with failing grades. After one year at the school, he began to prosper academically, and his mother was stunned. His story is just one among many, Zhang says.Views expressed in this video are opinions of the host and the guest, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

Creativity doesn't come from random, actually come from structure. You need all the tools before you can create. Today I sit down with the co-founder of the San Francisco High School of the Arts, Sherry Zhang. Classical education, there are many elements. Seeking truth, goodness is the other part of it, and another part is the beauty. When the kids learn to see beauty, they really learn to see the harmony,

and they learn to see the order. When they learn to seek beauty, they also learn to seek beauty. learn to seek the truth. This classical school uniquely integrates both fine arts and performing arts into its classical curriculum. I understand you're starting a grade school as well. Yes.

Today we're going to have a performance. All the students get to showcase what they work so hard for one semester, to let their parents see their achievements so they can see, wow, through my hard work actually can get here. That grid, that hardworking spirit is developed like that, little by little. So we have 100% graduation rate. And out of the 15 years, 95% of our students got into the top 100 university.

This is American Thought Leaders, and I'm Yanya Kelek. This is an incredibly beautiful doorway. This is actually a traditional character of the art, and we use as a logo, Yi, in Chinese. So it's a complicated character, because Chinese culture is very spiritual. So let me explain to you a little bit about it. bit about it. So this part actually is the cloud and this is actually too it's a soil signifies the soil it's the character of the soil and above it see this is actually Cao zito is the grass and flowers row above the soil

in the soil above the clouds and this part actually is the the one it's like the alchemy we're refining things so that that's actually talks about a little bit about the whole meaning of art in the traditional Chinese way, is that you grow things above the clouds and connecting the heaven and the earth with the art. And art takes up great work, a lot of work, hard work. It's like refining it and growing flowers in the soil above the cloud. So some really beautiful meaning of the art, and that's why we use it as our logo. Now let's go in.

Sherry Jong, such a pleasure to have you on American Thought Leaders. Thank you, Jan. Thank you for having me here. Tell me your view on the benefits of a classical education. Wow, there are a lot of benefits and a lot of stories to tell, but let me tell you one story, Hugo, Hugo's story. So Hugo's family came to us a few years ago, and because of work purposes, they relocating to San Francisco. So they had a really bright daughter to come into our high school. And she also has a son, Hugo.

And Hugo set aside and I said, how about your son? And the mom said, well, maybe he has to go to a specialized school. I said, why? And she told me that they went to many schools because of work purpose. They went to Mongolia. They went to Hong Kong. They went to Europe, other countries. but all the schools basically telling her at the end saying that your son needs some medication

and he need to be taking some drugs. Otherwise, he has no focus. He cannot sit still. So he cannot really learn. So I look at his transcript is mostly Ds and Fs. So the mom didn't think that he will fit in our school, but I told her that let's give him a try. So he tried out for one day, and I asked the mom, how did it go? So he went home, the mom said that he's a little bit tired, but he seemed calm.

And so it seemed like he's doing well. He was doing well, so we let him continue for a week. And at the end of the week, the mom said, hmm, he seemed to be changed a little bit more. He seemed to be a little bit able to focus a little bit. So he'll keep going for a month. And every day, he's actually taking the classical Chinese dance, the routines, their routines.

So he practiced stretching, routines, and then tumbling. After at the end of the month, so we invited the mom to come in to watch him dance. The mom said, wow, he's a really changed person because he's very focused when he listens to the instruction, and he remembers the routines, and his academics also is picking up. Academics in class, initially he was a little bit distracted, he couldn't really focus, but the teacher actually gave him a lot of individualized attention because we have small class. So at the end of the month, his test scores actually start to climb up. He's learning.

At the end of the year, he actually, his transcript becomes full of B's and some A's. So actually it's a really big improvement. The mom, at the end of the year, she said that everyone talk about the education, but you guys really did it. I saw actually many stories like that. I witnessed them. and Hugo was one of them that really completely changed through this kind of education. So classical education, there are many elements. Truth, seeking truth.

So and by teaching the academics have rigorous standards, have high standards. Goodness is the other part of it. And that's really learned how to be kind, how to be good and respectful for others. And another part is the beauty. So all of this is part of the classical education that our school really is, this is our model. So this is how we teach our kids. And the beauty, I suppose that's enacted in the way the Chinese dance has done, or is that explained to me a little more how that fits into education,

because I don't know if everybody thinks about that when they think about education necessarily. The classical education doesn't matter whether it's Western, or Chinese, doesn't matter as ancient Greeks or the European academies, the great academies, or the Chinese traditional educations. Actually, they all teach, they all talk about the beauty. The beauty is a big part of the education because when the kids learn to see beauty, they really learn to see the harmony and they learn to see the order. They also learn to see the truth. So we teach ballet, we teach classical Chinese dance, we teach the visual arts of drawing and paintings, we also teach music.

All of these disciplines actually training them to really see the beauty and really learn to be persevered. And they really see that, wow, after I learned this, there's much more I can learn, and I can see the progress I'm making through hard work. That's what the part of the training is. Well, something that struck me about Hugo's example is something like he needed a certain kind of structure clearly,

like you need a lot of structure. And I guess you figured out how to provide that for him. Can you tell me a little bit more about that and how that fits into classical education? Yes, our training, our teaching actually is very structure here, especially in the art like the classical Chinese dance or ballet. There's always a fundamental class. So it's always routines. They practice every day.

But our teachers learn to actually have the skill, not just make it structure, but also you have to make it fun. Otherwise, kids are not going to do it, right? know, especially nowadays, students, a lot of children, they just do this all the time, right? Everything is instant. When they want something, they want it instantly, and when they want something, they get it instantly. So the classical art actually invite them to slow down. Slow down everything they do, they will actually see that I need to pay attention to details. And there is a structure when teacher teaches, there's also structure.

and teach you the principal first, and you practice, and you imitate first, and then because you need all the tools before you can create. So they actually, creativity doesn't come from random, actually come from structure. So once they get the basics down, that's when they really can create. So I happen to know that you were once

a Silicon Valley entrepreneur, you know, a tech head, I don't know what to call it. How is it that you ended up changing tracks and ending up, you know, running a classical education school. My background's in chemistry. I have a math degree, but my PhD in chemistry. I was doing my postdoc at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. I was helping the three big car companies and Department of Energy

to develop the electric vehicles, hybrid electric vehicles. And the crucial part is the chemistry part. It's a core in that chemistry, battery chemistry. So I was working on that very happily. And then later on, I also attempt to, I work in the synchrotron in Berkeley. So to study a lot of chemicals. I love the research. At the meantime, when late and I am there by myself, but I start to think, do I want to live my life this way?

I love people. So I wanted to really to maybe do something that I can interact with people, not just chemicals. So it happens to be that at that time, the US is switching from analog to digital TV. And so I saw the opportunity. I saw the opportunity to develop my own converter that convert analog to digital. Actually, it was starting from a garage.

It was a garage, little garage project, and later on became very successful. I mean, this is how it is always in the Silicon Valley. isn't it? That's right. A little garage project, yes. And it became, actually, we were very lucky. Somehow, consumer report rated out our product,

one of the top product in the category. So among the big brand names. And so we got a lot of business. So we did very well. Right around that time, after we really made it, and some of my friends came to me, like, how about looking into getting a school, establishing a school, because their children are looking for schools.

And we were not happy about the schools in California. I'm a scientist. So I see that when I went into a school, I see that the students, especially high schools, they lack of energy, lack of motivation and a little bit depressive. So we are also planning on a child. So I didn't think that I want my child to go to a school like that. And I also, because I'm a scientist, I love doing research, so truth is very important. I also, through some research, I noticed a lot of California schools really deviating from the truth.

Truth is no longer part of it. So for me, that's not acceptable. Really, kids have to learn math, if one plus one equals to two, it's not, can be three. It's a lot of truth in science and math. And also we love, we want our kids to learn beauty as well. Because from my research doesn't matter really, ancient Greek or Chinese or Europeans, art is very important. It's a, you know, the nobles in Europe, they really hire teachers into their house, very expensive, right?

Art teacher into their house, teach their kids how to draw, how to paint. It's a very important part of education. So we want some schools like that that really give our kids the best. best education possible, not just mediocre or here, a little bit here, a little bit there, and it doesn't matter what the truth is. It's not something like that. We want them to grow up to be very, very smart, very educated, and can contribute positively to our society. So just for full disclosure, are you a tiger mom? That's a good question. I'm not. But I think that our kids really guidance from the parents

are very important. Kids, you cannot just say, kids center, right? Right now, a lot of say, student center. Yes, you need to take care of what they, what they, what would be the best for them. But at the meantime, you need to provide a lot of guidance, really provide them a great education because they don't know. We owe them that as parents. Okay, so, you know, you had the idea, you're, you have your six very successful business. So, so what happens? How did you actually, how did you, how did you take that step? Yeah, it's a big step. Obviously, I never done school before, even though I had a lot of schools to postdoc, PhD, postdoc, but never done school before. So we did a lot of research, and we really think that a great model would be a school that have academic, very rigorous academics, at the meantime, has art in the afternoon, really teach them pre-professional level art, not just a little bit here, a little bit there. It's really because through that, training, students really learn the grid. They really can develop the grid and work hard and really see progress and develop the confidence and work together. So we established from middle

school to all the way to high school, 6 to 12. We actually been around for 15 years. I seen a lot of progress from our students. A couple weeks ago, one of the mom just called us. And this, this girl, Joy, actually, she, in a four, fourth year in Berkeley now. Her mom calls because she's so thankful, she's so happy. She's at Joyce in Berkeley's engineering. So she just got an offer from the big tech company and product management position. So it's a high salary pay, high pay position. So the mom's very happy because the girl came into our school. She was the dancer. She's really lacking math foundation. So her math always be weak.

But now she's at Berkeley. Did really well at Berkeley. Berkeley engineering is really hard to get in, 6%, 6.something percent to get in. So, you know, I'm listening to you talk and I'm thinking to myself how much I would have probably benefited from this kind of education when I was younger

because I was one of these kids that it was, you know, I couldn't learn it, even though I had a good ear, I couldn't learn a musical instrument because it required you know, that grit, right? It was very hard because I would get distracted if I didn't see the instant gratification, right? And it sounds like you're teaching,

you're actually focusing at some level on teaching that and helping people being able to build incrementally step by step and achieve mastery of something. Am I getting that right? That's right. Actually, all classical arts are like that. In order to play an instrument, like you said,

you have to learn little by little all the time, like making progress. And our teachers are very professional artists. At the meantime, they know how to teach. They know how to encourage them, but the standards there, they're not losing their standards. And so encouraging them to get there, and like today we're going to have a performance,

a big performance, right? So all the students get to showcase what they, they work so hard for one semester. They're going to showcase, and they're so proud to let their parents see their achievements. So we constantly are doing, that. So they can see, wow, through my heart work, I actually can get here. Really, that grid, that hardworking spirit is developed like that, little by little. Tell me a little bit more

about what we're going to see. And also, as I understand it, you have a second part to your school because you actually have a part-time school program that just focuses on the arts or maybe specifically dance. I don't know me, you'll have to expand on that for me because we're going to see a lot more than just the kids that are in your school, right? That's right. Yeah. So we actually start from five-year-old. So five-year-old, you can come in to learn dance. You can learn a little bit piano, music, and then you also can learn drawing.

So we have, like our graduates this year, they started when they're five in our dance program. When they get to middle school, they come into our full day school program, middle school program and then all the way to graduate in high school. So the middle, the after-school program, basically that's our after-school program. program and they learn dance. They will learn maybe a couple hours a week. But just from that

couple hours, you're teaching them a lot how to appreciate the beauty. How do you work? You have to work hard to get to what you want to do. So they're learning all of that, building that foundation early. Tonight, you're going to see great artwork once you walk into the lobby. And in the theater, you're going to see music performance. You're going to see a lot of dances, like from five-year-old, all the way to 18, different kind of dances, and just really, really beautiful. When we're talking right now, our students already started the rehearsal

at the Herbs Theater, and they are really very busy preparing everything. When you go to the backstage, you can see students putting on makeups, they're doing the stretching, warming up, and walking on the stage. Everything is very precise. And you're, so the other thing is

you're a fairly small school at this point. I understand your ratio of teachers to students is pretty low, which is always a good thing. But explain to me how that works. And also, how many of your students that are in the after-school program are actually making it, or becoming full-end students in middle school? It's hard to say. We have certainly a much bigger after-school program than our day school program. After all, we are self-funded. Basically, we're a private school, even though we're a nonprofit, but we're a private school. So there's a big tuition. But after school is a much more affordable for everyone can come in. We love to share that beauty and with the whole community. So it's very affordable after-school program. So there are some students when they

actually, they can afford and they can afford the tuition. And they love our teaching model. They will come into our day school program. And also like tonight, you will see that we actually have fundraising and so that people that can support scholarship for the kids cannot afford the tuition to come in to learn. I'm just trying to imagine, you know, when you started, obviously, was it just after school programs? I don't know. And how, and where are we today and where does it look like it's going? When we first started, we actually rented that place at Petroar Hill. we only have 14 students. The first day we started school, we're only 14.

Now we have our own building right next to a Golden Gate Park. And overall, we have more than 200 students. In the day school, a little bit less than 60, slightly less than 60 students. So we're definitely growing steadily. Not very fast, but steadily. And our focus has been trying to build the program, just like how we teach the students, right? Everything you do, you do it well.

And the same with education. We need to make sure because the parents trusted us, bring their children in. So we've been focusing a lot on the program quality and make sure it's small class, because they have to be efficient. They're spending two, three hours a day learning art. When you have a small class size,

then the teacher actually can pay attention to each student, can individualize it. For example, I'm teaching chemistry. I love teaching chemistry. And we have debate, we have, a lot of things going on in the classroom. We do labs and things. So I only have about 10 or 11 students in my class. So I can actually know where they are and what may be, they may be stuck in which part. And I can actually address them for that. I can give them a little bit individualized

attention. And so they don't have to spend hours and hours learning on their own to really get there. So that's why we always love keeping the small class size and so that they can spend a lot of time in art, at the meantime do excellent in academics. So aside from tuition, what other sources of revenue do you have? Tuition from day school and also after school and summer is really not easy to run a school

because you have a lot of staff. We have so many teachers, but very importantly, some of the key positions like me, I don't draw a salary. And we have another teacher, actually our director, one of our director, also has background education from Cambridge

and education from Beijing University. She's a great manager, but she's also not drawing a salary because we recognize that school is not here to make profit. And we have our other means to support us, so we don't need to draw a salary from school. So the school is doing well just from tuition and fundraising. So that's what we're here for, is for the education. understand you feel like you've figured out the whole model now on how to do this education

and you're ready to scale. Are you going to be able to find the teachers to do this and even maintain that small class size? Yeah, I think, well, definitely. Finding teachers always been hard because not all the teachers are necessarily so devoted, so dedicated. But we've always been looking for great teachers that has the quality because teachers are important. They have to be great role models. And the meantime, they have to be very experienced in their field and also can deliver. So it's very challenging to find good teachers. And the nice thing about it is that most of our teachers, at least half of them has been here for many, many years already. So our retention rate is very high because they love our kids. They love the education model. And teaching is more like

a calling. It's a calling. So you have to be thinking that this is something that is really worth it. So what's the plan at this point? You know, I understand you're starting a grade school as well. Yes. We started elementary because actually we initially we thought middle school, high school are really great ages to have a school. But when we know, when we accept students coming in, some of a talented, really talented pianist, for example, talented artists. For example, there's one child came into our school. We actually also just started fifth grade. And he came in as a fifth grade student, his really talented pianist.

He can play so well, but his math is horrible. So I feel like that students really lacking the proper foundations. That's why we started, we're starting next year in elementary school, that we want to make sure we teach them, give them great foundation academics and also arts. You seem to be very committed to this school. Tell me a little bit about what inspired you. Yeah, so my faith, I practice Falun Gong.

It's a very important part that why I started the classical education too, because Falun Gong's principles truth, compassion, and tolerance. The first thing is truth. So it really fits my background as a scientist too. So seeking truth and teaching kids how to seek truth is a very big part of my belief. Of course, our school is not religious, but it's important to appreciate the truth and appreciate classical education. So I started practice of Hong Kong when I was in a graduate school. Just a friend of mine come to me and say that, are you interested in this?

It's actually very interesting because when I was little, when I was little, I always thought that there's something out there that I don't know. Someone's watching over me. You know, I grew up in communist China. My parents, atheists, they didn't believe in anything. Okay? So I always was told that there's nothing out there. And I cry, cry, cry. And then the next day I woke up and I say, no, they may be wrong and I probably could find something.

So I read a lot of Taoist books or Buddhist books, and I actually one time our school field trip that we stay in a temple for overnight. And they have the nun's place. So I stayed there overnight. I thought, wow, this is so quiet, so nice. But could I be a nun? Like a Chinese nun? And I thought that, no, no, no, no. I need to take care of my parents.

How could I do that? I cannot give up everything. So when I was in graduate school, I came in contact with Fang Gong. And I thought, wow, this is something that I can do meditation. I can cultivate myself self-improvement without going to a temple. Wow, this is wonderful. And there is something out there in the universe. It's so much, so profound, because I actually, when I was doing my PhD,

I had to learn a lot of quantum physics, quantum chemistry and things. Things seem very hard, but I actually spend base, read it, and then I thought, ah, I got it. I mean, academic to me is not that hard. But Falun Gong, they're so profound. There's so much to learn about the universe. So as a scientist, I got really, really interested. So I started the practice before the persecution in China, 1996. And it's been really actually wonderful and teaching me to be more like,

thinking for others instead of thinking for yourself. When you be a kind person, actually you're getting great returns. You understand more how the universe work when you're kind to the students. When you're kind to kids to anybody, they recognize that immediately. So actually it's very powerful. So I feel like it's very beneficial in school to have to practice the kindness and to have to really have, even though we're not religious, but that power is strong.

Absolutely fascinating. Well, so you have a very high graduation rate at the San Francisco High School of the Arts. As I understand it, where do these kids go once they graduate? So we have 100% graduation rate, and out of the 15 years, 95% of our students got into the top 100 universities. And a lot of them went to art universities.

If they plan to go into any art universities, they actually, the top 15, they get in hands down. Never once got rejected by art university when they apply. And then also we have students went into ballet program, ballet companies, and then also the Chinese classical dancers. They went into some of them, very, very, nicely, they got accepted by Shen Yun performing arts. They love auditioning into Shen Yun because Shen Yun is one of the top classical Chinese dance company.

We're very proud of them. We also have one student that played Erhu, beautiful Erhu player also got accepted by Shen Yun. It's a great accomplishment. We have two or three teachers, actually retired dancers from Shen Yun as a major. Tell me a bit more about the value of studying art. There are a lot of great examples and people have actually done a lot of studies, but of course it's hard to get exact data, like how much percentage you improve, right?

But in general, I think most people would agree learning arts greatly improve the performance of the students academically. And for example, like Da Vinci has a famous quote, to develop a complete mind, study the science of the art, and study the art of science. So there's actually, there's science, in the art. Proportion, light and shadow. So all of that is the science behind the art. And there's art behind science. You see that great scientists like Einstein, right? Do you know that he's actually a

very great accomplished violinist? Every time he develops some, he discovers something is through he's playing the violin. So his relativity theory is really a beautiful theory, simplicity and the harmony. So a lot of those things are really important in science. There's art in science as well. And do you know that actually the person developed, discovered the mountains in the moon is Galileo? Do you know that Galileo actually have the art background? He learned the Renaissance art, the art in Renaissance spirit and the classical art. He was observing the moon, Back then, he did not discover, he did not invent the telescope. He used the telescope to look at the moon,

and he identified those shadows are actually mountains. Because he draws, right? He was a great artist himself. He's recognizing those shadows in the moon actually looks like mountains. And he just from the telescope, he just immediately can recognize those are mountains, from his training. So that's why he's the first one to recognize that.

Even though so many people look through the telescope, they just thought that those may be clouds, there's maybe something. But he's the one that recognize those are mountains, and he was absolutely correct. So you can see that actually by studying art, you can learn that skill of observing. In fact, that there was a research group in Michigan University.

They study all the scientists that winning Nobel Prize. in science category from 1900 to 2001. They actually concluded, if you study performing arts, you have 22 times more likely you'll get a Nobel Prize than the scientists did not study performing arts. If you study other kind of arts also increase a certain percentage, so art really in many ways improve our students' ability to learn academics.

So that was an unbelievable experience. experience. Like I couldn't believe the level that some of these kids had, especially in the dance. One of the better dancers I recognized as your son. I mean, you set out back in the day you were thinking to yourself, hmm, I need to, you know, have a better school for my kid that isn't even around yet, right? Like this is what you're telling me. So how, what does it feel like to have your kid be like, I guess, I think one of the top dancers? That was what looks. It was what like to me. Yes. Yeah. My son actually in when he's 12, he got the national title for for intermediate level. So in the US. For the classical Chinese dance for the classical Chinese dance. Yes.

In this is national for an open category. I think that definitely I see a lot of results from our training. So I'm very proud of him and but from tonight's show I'm actually proud of every single child, every single student. Because you can see on their face the joy. And you can see that how hard they've been trying. And then they work, you can see a lot of progress. And from four-year-old all the way to 18, you see them. They just really enjoy it and really trying hard.

And at the end of the show, I really feel a lot of hope. My heart is filled so much with hope because that's our youth. That's our next generation. And they're working so hard. they know that hard work will produce the success. And because the beauty, they learn to really see beauty, they learn also the harmony, the order, and then also the effort, striving for excellence.

So that's what I'm really, what I was really, really proud of them. Well, quite honestly, you know, every part of the performance I saw, it just made me really happy. Yes. It was wonderful to see these young people. I feel very old, of course,

watching all this. Yeah, I watching them I really, this is my favorite time is that the kids are showing what they, their hard work have accomplished. And I really think that all the efforts are worth it. All this 15 years, all the hard work and I think it's worth it. I think what can you, what could you do better than producing a beautiful generation of the kids, work hard, love beauty, and have the goodness in them, what else can you ask for? I think that's just a great thing. Well, Sherry Zhang, it's such a pleasure to have had you on. Thank you, Jan. I'm so glad you took my invitation to come.

Thank you all for joining Sherry Zhang and me on this episode of American Thought Leaders. I'm your host, Jania Kellick.