Margarita Mooney Clayton, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor of Practical Theology at Princeton Theological Seminary and a Visiting Research Fellow at Blackfriars Hall, Oxford University. She earned a Bachelor’s in Psychology from Yale University and a Masters and Ph.D. in Sociology from Princeton University. She has authored the books Faith Makes Us Live: Surviving and Thriving in the Haitian Diaspora, The Love of Learning: Seven Dialogues on the Liberal Arts and The Wounds of Beauty: Seven Dialogues on Art and Education. With her husband David Clayton, an iconographer, author and educator, she leads the Scala Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to restoring American culture through beauty, liberal arts education, and worship. Scala engages in deep work with students at Princeton and Oxford to bring together artists, students, teachers, and scholars. Scala also produces publications (books, blogs, articles, interviews), and hosts public events like conferences, webinars and campus lectures open to the public. Through conferences, books, blogs, and webinars featuring scholars and artists, Scala shapes public awareness about art, education, and the common good. She has lectured on beauty, education, culture and faith at venues such as the University of Notre Dame, Hillsdale College, The Consortium for Christian Studies Centers, The Acton Institute, and the Society for Catholic Liturgy. Her writing has appeared in journals such as Comment Magazine, Real Clear Policy, Scientific American, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Hedgehog Review, Public Discourse, and Church Life Journal. She has led workshops on the vocation to teach and on beauty in education at a variety of K-12 classical and/or Christian schools. She has been interviewed numerous times about her work on education, including Eric Metaxas’s Socrates in the City show, Ken Myers of Mars Hill Audio, and the Classical Learning Test Podcast.
