Regular readers and subscribers to the Journal of Research in Character Education will notice a slight but not subtle change as of this issue. Our name has changed to the Journal of Character Education. This name change is intended to represent an important shift in the focus of the journal, and has several implications. Although it will continue to be our intention to provide up-to-date research and other scholarship on the latest developments and programs in character education, we will no longer be limited to the publication of only this type of creative work undertaken to increase knowledge of our field.
Instead, beginning with this issue, the Journal of Character Education (JCE) will broaden its focus also to include editorials and conceptual articles by the best minds in our field, reviews of latest books, ideas and examples of the integration with character education of socioemotional learning and other relevant strategies, manuscripts by educators that describe best practices in teaching and learning related to character education, and Character Education Partnership (CEP) updates and association news. And, of course, we will continue to provide the latest research in our field.
This change was prompted by the maturation of our field. We now have almost 20 years of examples of Promising Practices and Schools of Character award-winning ideas and programs, and we have a growing number of State Schools of Character initiatives supporting state-of-the-art methods. High quality ideas and practices from these programs need to be shared and emulated and we hope the Journal of Character Education will be the recognized venue for such dissemination. We hope you will continue your support of these efforts through your subscription to our JCE, as well as through your membership in CEP. As has long been the case, membership in CEP brings with it a discount in the subscription price to the JCE.
Future issues of the JCE will include manuscripts describing research-based interventions and results, conceptual/theoretical/philosophical analyses, thoughtful program descriptions, international perspectives, exemplary practices from the field, and book reviews. We hope you will consider submitting manuscripts related to any of these directions. Together we will grow the field in impactful ways.
The Inaugural Issue of the Journal of Character Education
This issue of the Journal of Character Education considers new understandings from both the sociological and psychological realms and their implications for character education. We have asked two prominent researchers to provide context in each of these domains and then solicited responses from eight notable character educators. In this way, we hope to provide a thoughtful guide for the conceptualization of future directions of our field for the next few decades.
Dr. Charles Murray is the W.H. Brady Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. His 2012 book, Coming Apart, provides perspectives for the first article in this issue and is his adaptation of material from that book for this special issue. Murray describes American civic culture from the point of view of the founders and identifies several essential qualities that historically have defined America’s citizens. These include industriousness, honesty, marriage and religion. He calls these the founding virtues and describes their state at the beginning of the 21st century, a propitious time that because of the demise of these virtues threatens to unravel our historic civic culture. Drawing on the extensive research in his 2012 book, Murray documents how the rise of two new social classes in America are encroaching the middle class and thereby threaten to redefine and replace America’s core virtues.
Dr. Daniel Lapsley is chair of the Department of Psychology at Notre Dame University where he researches adolescent sociocognitive and personality development. In the second foundational manuscript in this issue, Lapsley describes research on two significant adolescent transition periods—the transition to adolescence in the early teenage years and the transition to responsible adulthood. He advises that even by their mid-20s, adult status is not necessarily in reach for many of our young people. He describes a conceptual framework for making sense of these developmental challenges and for guiding positive educational interventions for youth, and provides observations about how best to match developmental needs and educational experiences that may lead to the attainment of responsible adulthood. The road ahead for our youth is riddled with both promise and peril. Positive youth development is contextualized by individual psychological needs and school organization; by student motivation and teacher practices; by trait dispositions and contextual interactions; and, by the impact and interaction of neighborhoods, schools, peers, and government.
Both Murray and Lapsley call on character educators to become more self-confident and more vocal in their advocacy for practices and policies that lead to positive futures for our youth. Eight prominent character educators then respond to these two articles from their varied perspectives. We hope this dialogue represents a rich and engaging way to consider the important issues under scrutiny.
Drawing from both the Murray and Lapsley essays, Thomas Lickona highlights and describes three categories of evidence that he believes require greater attention in the years ahead if schools are seriously to develop citizens of character for the 21st century. These categories include the changing character indicators of emerging adults, the impact of the family on children’s well being, and the transformation in youth sexual norms and behaviors over the past 50 years. To redirect the negative trajectories for these trends, Lickona outlines strategies and implications for character education.
Clark Power argues for the important role of character education in providing for our children’s future. But, he notes, the inequalities of wealth in our country greatly impact student opportunity and eventual life outcomes. Children who lack the enriching experiences of their more advantaged peers are further behind in school from the start and continue to fall further behind. One concrete solution is a national “recommitment to the moral ideal of democracy.” His essay concludes with such an example, and a cautionary note.
Maurice Elias advocates a closer linkage between socioemotional learning and character education. While character education helps students understand how to behave well, socioemotional learning assists students in using skills to enact desired behaviors effectively. Elias calls for a broadening of character education to include a combination of explicit and implicit strategies under the broader umbrella of socioemotional character development. He calls for a character education for our youth that embraces diversity, stands for defined principles, and provides needed socio-emotional competencies.
Jonathan Cohen reasons that if we are to understand the role of the school as an institution that prepares engaged citizen participants in a democratic society, a set of essential skills and dispositions must permeate the process. Such preparation leads to improved school climate and strengthened learning environments. Cohen then defines an effective school climate improvement initiative, one that is research based and comprised of seven goals and processes that he describes.
Karen Bohlin describes her conception of moral education as virtue education, “an education directed to becoming one’s best possible self.” Education for virtue defines what Bohlin calls schooling for desire; that is, an education motivated by reflection, challenge, discipline, diligence, and good judgment. To get there, young people need inspiration and exemplars. Bohlin’s article offers examples and suggestions from her own exemplary high school.
Kathy Beland portrays the trauma for many ninth graders of the transition to high school. A seasoned curriculum specialist and developer, she identifies research-based strategies designed to ease that transition and she provides a series of real-world examples from high schools—including effective models for a freshman transition course, student advisory, and academic integration—that effectively support students, if done thoughtfully, through that difficult transition.
Russ Sojourner of the CEP argues that despite myriad fiscal problems, and because of notable social issues, comprehensive school-based character education demands more attention and greater inclusion. Such education should address positive school climate and caring relationships. He cites particularly CEP’s 11 Principles of Effective Character Education as a basis for providing positive relationship-centered school environments whose ripple effects can impact all phases of school life. He reminds us that a broad range of professional educators daily touch the lives of children. Working together, with a more focused vision, he challenges us to build a better future and a better world.
Matthew Davidson has spent a decades-long career researching character education and creating assessments to measure its progress. His perspective is particularly fitting to close this inaugural issue of the JCE. In his manuscript, Davidson identifies five emphases, with recommendations, for the future study of character. He states that the field has matured to the point where behaviors associated with character now must be given attention equal to the attitude changes it historically has impacted. Character competencies can be identified and measured and should be.
It is our hope that the manuscripts published in this inaugural issue of the Journal of Character Education will be read and considered to initiate and to deepen understandings of character education in democratic societies and democratic schools. The field is too important to be ignored or left to whim by educational leaders.
