Most college students and parents want higher education to marry two lifelong goals: pursuit of what one loves and financial security. They know the subtext: college is an investment, and the higher the education level one achieves, the higher one's potential income for life. So what about the education of artists? Most art departments and colleges educate for careers in the so-called "applied arts." The majority are in design-based fields, and their graduates do, in fact, find financially rewarding careers. There is only one accredited art college in New England, however, that is "fine arts only." In fact, there are only three nationally accredited fine-arts-only art colleges in the United States: the San Francisco Art Institute, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and the Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts in Old Lyme, Connecticut. Of those three, the Lyme Academy--with only two B.F.A. programs, one in painting and the other in sculpture--is uniquely dedicated to classical, Renaissance traditions in drawing, printmaking, painting and sculpture. The Lyme Academy asserts the primacy of "the hand of the artist" in a culture that is becoming electronic and digital. It is, instead, committed to the foundational disciplines that led to creation of the images by which Western civilization defines itself, from Michelangelo to Picasso.