The School as Moral Instructor: Deliberate Efforts and Unintentional Consequences

The moral dimension of education, its contribution to personal qualities like character and virtue, commands far more attention these days than it has for quite some time. Part of the reason for this change lies within our society at large. Crime, corruption, and a host of other moral ills have become such recurrent features of everyday life that we can scarcely pick up our daily paper or turn on the television set without holding our breath in anticipation of more bad news. Hardly a day goes by, it seems, it seems, that we do not witness yet another of our cultural heroes biting the dust. Yesterday a sports figure, today a high public official, tomorrow goodness knows who--each a sorry spectacle whose well-publicized downfall makes us wonder what is happening to our country.