project on moral education

The Journal of Moral Education

AME membership includes a free subscription to the Journal of Moral Education. For students, this subscription is provided online.

Aims and scope

The Journal of Moral Education  (a Charitable Company Limited by Guarantee) provides a unique interdisciplinary forum for the discussion and analysis of moral education and development throughout the lifespan. The journal encourages submissions across the human sciences and humanities that use a range of methodological approaches and address aspects of moral reasoning, moral emotions, motivation and moral action in various contexts (e.g., cultural, gender, family, schooling, community, leisure, work) and roles (e.g., parent, teacher, student, civic, professional). The journal encourages proposals for special issues that address a topic relevant to these aims and scope.

We encourage AME members to submit papers to the journal. Instructions for authors

Submissions can include but need not be exclusively related to:

Anthropology of morality; Anti-racist education; Child studies; Citizenship education; Cognitive development; Conflict studies; Critical theory; Diversity studies; Emotional development; Epistemology; Ethics;  Family, studies; Gender studies; Interculturalism; International education; Leadership studies; Moral development; Moral psychology; Multiculturalism; Peace studies; Positive youth development; Professional ethics; Religious education; Service learning; Social development; Social justice; Socioemotional development; Sociology of morality; Values education; Youth studies

Peer Review Policy:  All research articles published in this journal have undergone rigorous peer review, based on initial editor screening and anonymized refereeing by at least two anonymous referees.

THE JOURNAL OF MORAL EDUCATION TRUST The Journal of Moral Education Trust, established in 1997-8, is a Charity. According to its constitution its trustees are UK residents; they are currently: Jim Conroy (Chair), Neil Ferguson (Secretary/Treasurer), Brian Gates, Michael Reiss, Monica Taylor and Peter Tomlinson. The trustees are supported by an international advisory board of invited scholars. Its objectives are to support high quality innovative and scholarly activity and research including work in moral development, civics and citizenship education. Studies from a range of disciplinary and interdisciplinary perspectives are encouraged including (but not exhausted by) psychology, philosophy, sociology, anthropology, economics, history and literature.

The Trust’s revenue is entirely derived from income from the Journal of Moral Education (JME), which it owns. The Journal provides a unique interdisciplinary forum for the discussion and analysis of moral education and development throughout the lifespan. The Journal is administered by an Editor and team of Assistant Editors, appointed by the Trust, and supported by an international Editorial Board. Now in its 47th year, the Journal is published quarterly; one issue a year usually focuses on a special topic. The 2017 Impact Factor for the JME is 0.825.

Two international organisations – The Association for Moral Education (AME) and the Asia-Pacific Network for Moral Education (APNME) – are affiliated to the Trust. Members receive JME at a specially discounted subscription rate. There are liaison representatives between these organisations and the Trust which supports some attendance and sessions at their annual conferences. In particular, the Trust jointly sponsors the AME Grant scheme to support the attendance of junior scholars. 

Alongside the Journal, the JME trustees promote Moral Education globally in other ways as well:

Website   www.moralcapital.info  - a global portal for all aspects of moral education. Input from its users is continually welcome from any country.

Research and Development – From time to time the trustees invite applications for funding for small-scale research project proposals. The last international call was 2014-16. An annual award, joint with the British Academy, is now in its fifth year.

The Trust invites comments and suggestions for supporting future activities in moral education. Contact: Prof. Jim Conroy, [email protected] .

Moral, Civic, and Ethical Education

Stories, faculty specialties, degree offerings, and professional development programs on topics spanning ethics in education, civic education and engagement, and the purposes of education

Filter Results

How to Teach Comprehensive Black History

Four approaches to meaningfully incorporate the stories of Black Americans into curriculum — beyond February

The Movements Making Change in Public Schools

The current influence of mom groups could shape the future of education

Askwith Education Forum Tackles Polarization in Education

HGSE panel offered advice for educators in divided times

I Trust You to Do This

Children cheat less when you show you trust them

New Study Finds Children’s Honesty Encouraged by Trust 

Exhibiting faith in children nurtures integrity, say researchers

Tackling Unhealed Trauma in Communities and Schools

An exploration of healing-centered engagement, a social-emotional learning approach that promotes self-esteem and offers a holistic view of recovery for young people of color managing trauma while also creating positive conditions for academic achievement.

Childhood Health Amid a Changing Climate the Focus of Askwith Education Forum

Chelsea Clinton, researchers, and climate activists discuss the impact of a warming planet on early development

Maine Initiative Teaches High School Students How to 'Agree-to-Disagree' on Political Issues

"I’m totally sympathetic to trying to use language that will feel inclusive. I [just] hope that this kind of inclusivity is not accompanied by leaving certain concepts or conversations just off to the side and not having those because they are perceived as being politically divisive."

The Classroom Can Be an Ethical Minefield. Meira Levinson Has an Answer.

"How do we balance the needs of individual students in our classroom with the needs of the group? This is a small thing, but it has profound consequences for everyone’s learning."

We’ve Lost Our Way on Campus. Here’s How We Can Find Our Way Back.

"We have been focused so much on academic freedom and free speech that we have neglected to set standards for a culture of mutual respect. It is necessary to do both."

Teaching in the Face of Book Bans

Creative ways educators can adjust their curriculum during "treacherous" times

Navigating Book Bans

A guide for educators as efforts intensify to censor books

Civics Duty

As national history and civics scores drop, educators are finding new ways to make room in their classrooms for social studies

Book Bans and the Librarians Who Won't Be Hushed

How educators are speaking out in response to recent — and increasing — book bans

Unveiling the Invisible

Tony DelaRosa, Ed.M.'18, unpacks how educators teach Asian American Pacific Islander narratives — and how that can be transformed

The Challenge of Climate Change Messaging

Senior Lecturer Joe Blatt has assembled a cross-Harvard team to develop methods for turning climate change skeptics into green energy supporters after being awarded a Salata Institute grant

How Do You Teach About Indigenous Peoples Day and Columbus Day? Thoughtfully, Experts Say.

“Don't shy away from controversy. That's where really rich learning happens. And more importantly, I think the significant learning that we need for a really functioning democracy.”

How to Help Kids Become Skilled Citizens

An exploration of ways in which educators can instill civic identity in students

Equity at Bilingual Schools

Alum looks at the role learning more than one language can play in bettering democracy

Connecting Civics, Justice Work, and Art

An alum produces civics-minded projects centering community, artistry, and advocacy

Active citizenship requires a broad set of skills, new study finds

What Is Educational Ethics? A Teacher Turned Harvard Prof Explains

"Even though many people care about the ethical dimensions of educational policy and practice, many fewer are working directly with educators, school and district leaders, state policymakers, nonprofits, ministries of education, and the like to help them reflect upon and address the specific ethical issues they are wrestling with in their work."

Rebuilding Civic Education

Cultivating Kids Who Can Navigate Our Complex World

Education, Truth, and the Future of Democracy

Higher Ed. at Harvard Event Addresses Looming End of Affirmative Action

HBCUs, Higher Ed, and Democracy’s Future

A Critical Evaluation of Educational Ethics

Lines Have Been Drawn, A Loud Minority Has Been Heard, Now What?

Equality or Equity?

Anti-Oppressive Social Studies for Elementary School

Education and Climate Action

The Superintendency and Culture Wars

The Challenge to Ethnic Studies

The Revolution Will Be Zoomed

Exploring the Effects of Desegregation

School Culture and Bullying

Learning and Living in Polarized Times

Askwith Education Forum: Combatting Hate by Teaching the Holocaust and Other Hard Histories

Equitable Recovery: Addressing Learning Challenges after COVID

Planting Roots of Righteousness

A Critical Conversation

But None of My Friends Are Doing It!

The Need for Asian American History in Schools

How We Can Better Support Refugees in Education

The Questionable Ethics of College Students

Think Your Students Don't Care About Others?

How to Argue in Class

• Utility Menu

Thanks for a great year!

Most event recordings are now available on our Youtube channel or under the "past events" tab.

The Harvard Graduate School of Education's Civic and Moral Education Initiative (CMEI)  fosters a thriving intellectual community around the themes of civic and moral education.

• New Series Launch: Civics, Morality, & Covid-19
• Association for Moral Education: 46th Annual Conference
• Educational Ethics: A Field-Launching Conference
• Job Announcement: National Ethics Project Research Assistant
• Call for Proposals: Spring 2020 Brown Bag Lunch Series
• Job Announcement: Tisch College of Civic Life VISTA Campus Recruiter

Selected Publications

Knowledge and Development pp 21–74 Cite as

Moral Development and Moral Education

Piaget, Kohlberg, and Beyond

• Thomas Lickona 3  

475 Accesses

4 Citations

1 Altmetric

Convincing people that moral education deserves a high place on the public-school agenda was once an uphill battle, but now American advocates of moral education are surrounded by an embarrassment of supportive evidence. Fresh scandals break with such numbing regularity that the list grows almost too long to remember: Watergate, international sabotage by the CIA, domestic spying by the FBI, assorted corruption in Congress, routine bribery in big business, widespread fraud in Medicare, another rash of cheating at a military academy, reports of premed students destroying each other’s lab work, and steady increases in almost every category of crime.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution .

Buying options

• Available as PDF
• Read on any device
• Instant download
• Own it forever
• Available as EPUB and PDF
• Compact, lightweight edition
• Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
• Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Unable to display preview.  Download preview PDF.

Allen, R., 1975. But the earth abideth forever: Values in environmental education. In J. Meyer, B. Burnam, and J. Cholvat (eds.), Values education . Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, pp. 1–24.

Google Scholar  

Alston, W. P., 1971. Comments on Kohlberg’s “From is to ought”. In T. Mischel (Ed.), Cognitive development and epistemology . New York: Academic Press, pp. 269–284.

Aronfreed, J., 1976. Moral development from the standpoint of a general psychological theory. In T. Lickona (Ed.), Moral development and behavior: Theory, research, and social issues . New York: Holt, pp. 54–69.

Baldwin, J. M., 1968. Mental development in the child and the race: Methods and processes (3rd ed., rev.). New York: Augustus M. Kelley (originally published 1906).

Baumrind, D., 1971. Current Patterns of parental authority. Developmental psychology, 4 , 1–103.

Article   Google Scholar  

Beck, C., 1976. The reflective, ultimate life goals approach to values education. In J. Meyer (Ed.), Reflections on values education . Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, pp. 149–161.

Belenky, M. The moral reasoning of adult females . Research study, Goddard College, in progress.

Bennett, A. C., 1975. A cognitive-developmental orientation toward moral education: An experimental study in “developing moral judgment” through the comparable efforts of two teaching strategies . Unpublished doctoral dissertation, The Pennsylvania State University.

Bessell, H., and Ball, G. 1972. Magic circle guide for preschool and kindergarten . La Mesa, Calif.: Human Development Training Institute.

Beyer, B. K., 1976. Conducting moral discussions in the classroom. Social Education, 40 , 194–202.

Blatt, M., 1969. Studies of the effects of classroom discussion upon children’s moral development . Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Chicago.

Blatt, M., and Kohlberg, L., 1975. The effects of classroom moral discussion upon children’s level of moral judgment. Journal of Moral Education, 4 , 169–172.

Bolt, D. J., and Sullivan, E., 1977. Kohlberg’s cognitive-developmental theory in educational settings: Some possible abuses. Journal of Moral Education, 6 , 198–205.

Broughton, J. M., 1976. The cognitive-developmental approach to morality: A reply to Kurtines and Grief . Unpublished paper, Wayne State University.

Chittenden, G. E., 1942. An experimental study in measuring and modifying assertive behavior in young children. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 7 , (1, Serial No. 31).

Colby, A., 1975. Values and teaching and Values clarification (review). Harvard Educational Review, 45 , 134–143.

Colby, A., and Kohlberg, L. The relationship between moral and cognitive development. In D. Bush and S. Feldman (Eds.), Cognitive development and social development: Relationships and implications . Hillsdale, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, in press.

Damon, W., 1975. Studying early moral development: Some techniques for interviewing young children and for analyzing the results. In J. Meyer, B. Burnham, and J. Cholvat (Eds.), Values education . Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, pp. 25–40.

Damon, W., 1977. The social world of the child . San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

DeVries, R., and Kamii, C., 1975. Why group games? A Piagetian perspective . Available from Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC), ED 110 159.

Dewey, J., and Tufts, J. H., 1932. Ethics (rev. ed.). New York: Henry Holt and Co.

Dinkmeyer, D., 1970. Developing understanding of self and others . Circle Pines, Minn.: American Guidance Services.

DiStefano, A., 1975. Teaching moral reasoning about sexual interpersonal dilemmas . Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Boston University School of Education.

Doland, D. L., and Adelberg, K., 1967. The learning of sharing behavior. Child Development, 38 , 695–700.

Article   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Duska, R., and Whelan, M., 1975. Moral development: A guide to Piaget and Kohlberg . New York: Paulist Press.

Enright, R. D., 1975. A social-cognitive developmental intervention with 6th and 1st graders . Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, September, 1975.

Erdynast, A., 1973. Relations between moral stage and reversibility of moral judgment in an original position . Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Harvard University.

Erickson, V. L., 1975. Deliberate psychological education for women: From Iphigenia to Antigone. Counselor Education and Supervision, 14 , 297–309.

Fenton, E., 1975. A developmental approach to civic education. In J. Meyer, B. Burnham, and J. Cholvat (Eds.), Values education . Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, pp. 41–50.

First things: Social reasoning (sound filmstrips). New York: Guidance Associates, 1974.

First things: Values , (sound filmstrips). New York: Guidance Associates, 1972.

Fraenkel, J. R., 1977. A response to Edwin Fenton. Social Education , January, 57–61.

Fulda, T. A., and Jantz, R. K., 1975. Moral education through diagnostic-prescriptive teaching methods. The Elementary School Journal, 8 , 513–518.

Galbraith, R. E., and Jones, T. M., 1976. Moral reasoning: A teaching handbook for adapting Kohlberg to the classroom . Anoka, Minn.: Greenhaven Press.

Gardner, H., 1976. The grasp of consciousness (review). The New York Times Book Review , August 1, pp. 1–2.

Gibbs, J. C., 1975. The Piagetian approach to moral development: An overview. In J. Meyer, B. Burnham, and J. Cholvat (Eds.), Values Education . Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, pp. 51–64.

Gibbs, J. C., 1977. Kohlberg’s stages of moral judgment: A constructive critique. Harvard Educational Review, 47 , 43–61.

Gilligan, C. V., Kohlberg, L., Lerner, J., and Belenky, M., 1971. Moral reasoning about sexual dilemmas: The development of an interview and scoring system (Technical report of the commission on obscenity and pornography, Vol. 1, No. 5256–0010). Washington, D.C.: Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office.

Ginott, Haim, 1972. Teacher and child . New York: MacMillan.

Glasser, W., 1969. Schools without failure . New York: Harper and Row.

Gordon, T., 1975. Teacher effectiveness training . New York: Peter H. Wyden.

Graham, R., Lieberman, M., and Candee, D., 1976. Moral judgment and life outcomes . Unpublished paper, Center for Moral Education, Harvard University.

Grim, P. F., Kohlberg, L., and White, S. H., 1968. Some relationships between conscience and attentional processes, journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 8 , 239–252.

Grimes, P., 1974. Teaching moral reasoning to 11-year-olds and their mothers: A means of promoting moral development . Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Boston University School of Education.

Haan, N., Smith, M. B., and Block, J., 1968. Moral reasoning of young adults: politicalsocial behavior, family background, and personality correlates, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 10 , 183–201.

Hainey, C., and Zimbardo, P. G., 1975. The blackboard penitentiary: It’s tough to tell a high school from a prison. Psychology Today , June, 26–30.

Halberstam, D., 1969. The best and the brightest . New York: Random House.

Hall, R. T., and Davis, J. U., 1975. Moral education in theory and practice . Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books.

Hamm, C. M., 1974. Can moral judgment be taught? journal of Educational Thought, 8 , 73–86.

Hamm, C. M., 1976. Dialog with Don B. Cochrane. Moral Education Forum, 1 , 3–7.

Hartshorne, H., and May, M. A., 1928. Studies in the nature of character . New York: Macmillan.

Hoffman, M., 1976. Empathy, role-taking, guilt, and the development of altruistic motives. In T. Lickona (Ed.), Moral development and behavior: Theory, research, and social issues . New York: Holt.

Hogan, R., 1973. Moral conduct and moral character: A psychological perspective. Psychological Bulletin, 79 , 217–232.

Holstein, C. B., 1972. The relation of children’s moral judgment level to that of their parents and to communication patterns in the family. In R. C. Smart and M. S. Smart (Eds.), Readings in child development and relationships . New York: Macmillan, pp. 484–494.

Holstein, C. B., 1976. Irreversible, stepwise sequence in development of moral judgment: A longitudinal study of males and females. Child development, 47 , 51–61.

Hophan, P., 1977. Beans, kids, and moral development, in J. Lickona (Ed.), Mini-book on fostering moral development in the classroom . Cortland, New York: Project Change, State University of New York.

Kant, I., 1787. The critique of pure reason. In Great books of the western world (Vol. 42). Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, 1952.

Karrby, G., 1974. The socialization process in preschool . Available from Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC), ED 104 562.

Keasey, C. B., 1975. Implicators of cognitive development for moral reasoning. In D. J. DePalma and J. M. Foley (Eds.), Moral development: Current theory and research . Hillsdale, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, pp. 39–56.

Kohlberg, L., 1958. The development of modes of moral thinking and choice in the years ten to sixteen . Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Chicago.

Kohlberg, L., 1964. Development of moral character and moral ideology. In M. L. and L. W. Hoffman (Eds.), Review of child development research (Vol. I). New York: Russell Sage Foundation, pp. 383–432.

Kohlberg, L., 1969a. The relations between moral judgment and moral actions: A developmental view . Unpublished paper, Harvard University.

Kohlberg, L., 1969b. Stage and sequence: The cognitive-developmental approach to socialization. In D. A. Goslin (Ed.), Handbook of socialization: Theory and research . Chicago: Rand McNally, pp. 347–480.

Kohlberg, L., 1970. Education for justice: A modern statement of the Platonic view. In N. F. Sizer and T. R. Sizer (Eds.), Moral education: Five lectures . Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, pp. 57–83.

Kohlberg, L., 1971. From is to ought: How to commit the naturalistic fallacy and get away with it in the study of moral development. In T. Mischel (Ed.), Cognitive development and epistemology . New York: Academic, pp. 151–235.

Kohlberg, L., 1972. A cognitive-developmental approach to moral education. The Humanist, 32 , 13–16.

Kohlberg, L., 1973a. Collected papers on moral development and moral education . Cambridge, Mass.: Center for Moral Education, Harvard University.

Kohlberg, L., 1973b. The claim to moral adequacy of a highest stage of moral judgment. Journal of Philosophy, 70 , 630–646.

Kohlberg, L., 1975. The cognitive-developmental approach to moral education. Phi Delta Kappan, 56 , 670–677.

Kohlberg, L., 1976a. The effects of democratic governance on the development of high school moral climates and student moral judgment . Unpublished proposal, Harvard University.

Kohlberg, L., 1976b. Moral stages and moralization: The cognitive-developmental approach. In T. Lickona (Ed.), Moral development and behavior: Theory, research, and social issues . New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, pp. 31–53.

Kohlberg, L., 1976c. A three-year just community school intervention project . Unpublished proposal, Harvard University.

Kohlberg, L. (Ed.), Recent research in moral development , in preparation.

Kohlberg, L., and Elfenbein, D., 1975. The development of moral judgments concerning capital punishment. American journal of Orthopsychiatry, 45 , 614–640.

Kohlberg, L., and Gilligan, CF., 1971. The adolescent as philosopher: The discovery of the self in a postconventional world. Daedalus, 100 , 1051–1086.

Kohlberg, L., and Turiel, E. Moral development and moral education. In G. S. Lesser (Ed.), Psychology and educational practice . Glenview, 111.: Scott Foresman, pp. 410–465.

Kohlberg, L., Kauffman, K., Scharf, P., and Hickey, J., 1975. The just community approach to corrections: A theory. Journal of Moral Education, 4 , 243–260.

Krahn, J. H., 1971. A comparison of Kohlberg’s and Piaget’s type I morality. Religious Education, 66 , 373–375.

Krebs, D., and Rosenwald, A., 1973. Moral reasoning and moral behavior in conventional adults . Unpublished manuscript, Harvard University.

Kuhmerker, L., 1975. Learning to care—the development of empathy. Journal of Moral Education, 5 , 25–34.

Kuhn, D., 1976. Short-term longitudinal evidence for sequentiality of Kohlberg’s early stages of moral judgment. Developmental psychology, 12 , 162–166.

Kur, J., 1977. Love is working together. In J. Lickona (Ed.), Mini-book on fostering moral development in the classroom . Cortland, New York: Project Change, State University of New York.

Kurtines, W., and Grief, E., 1974. The development of moral thought: Review and evaluation of Kohlberg’s approach. Psychological Bulletin, 81 , 453–70.

Leming, J. S., 1974. An empirical examination of key assumptions underlying the Kohlberg rational for moral education . Available from Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC), ED 093 749.

Lengel, J. G., 1974. Explanations of developmental change applied to education: Atmospheres for moral development . Available from Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC), ED 104 738.

Levine, C., 1976. Role-taking standpoint and adolescent usage of Kohlberg’s conventional stages of moral reasoning. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 34 , 41–46.

Lickona, J. (Ed.), 1977. Mini-book on fostering moral development in the classroom . Cortland, New York: Project Change, State University of New York.

Lickona, T., 1969. Piaget misunderstood: A critique of the criticisms of his theory of moral development. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly of Behavior and Development, 16 , 337–350.

Lickona, T., 1976a. The challenge of Watergate to American schools: Fostering the moral development of children . Cortland, New York: Project Change, State University of New York.

Lickona, T., 1976b. Critical issues in the study of moral development and behavior. In T. Lickona (Ed.), Moral development and behavior: Theory, research, and social issues . New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, pp. 3–27.

Lickona, T., 1976c. Research on Piaget’s theory of moral development. In T. Lickona (Ed.), Moral development and behavior: Theory, research, and social issues . New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, pp. 219–240.

Lickona, T., 1976d. Teacher approaches to moral education: An interview and observation study . Unpublished proposal, State University of New York at Cortland.

Lickona, T., 1977a. Moral education in the classroom. Learning , March, 36–43.

Lickona, T., 1977b. Creating the just community with children. Theory into Practice , Summer.

Lipman, M., 1975. Philosophy for children: Learning to be a moral individual. Ethical Perspectives , No. 6. New York: New York Society for Ethical Culture. (Monograph)

Lockwood, A., 1973. Moral reasoning — the value of life . Middletown, Conn.: Xerox Education Publications.

Lockwood, A., 1977. The effects of values clarification and moral development curricula on school-age subjects: A critical review of recent research . Unpublished paper, University of Wisconsin.

Loevinger, J., and Wessler, R., 1970. Measuring ego development: Construction and use of a sentence completion test . San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Mattox, B. A., 1975. Getting it together: Dilemmas for the classroom . San Diego, Calif.: Pennant Press.

McNamee, S., 1968. Relation of moral reasoning to experimental helping behavior . Unpublished manuscript, Case Western Reserve University.

Mead, G. H., 1934. Mind, self, and society . Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Meyer, J., 1976. Where are we and where might we go in values education? In J. Meyer (Ed.), Reflections on values education . Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, pp. 213–221.

Milgram, S., 1974. Obedience to authority . New York: Harper and Row.

Mischel, T. (Ed.), 1971. Cognitive development and epistemology . New York: Academic Press.

Mischel, W., and Mischel, H., 1976. A cognitive social-learning approach to morality and self-regulation. In T. Lickona (Ed.), Moral development and behavior: Theory, research, and social issues . New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, pp. 54–69.

Morals instruction favored in schools by 79% in survey. The New York Times , April 18, 1976.

Mosher, R., and Sprinthall, N. A., 1971. Psychological education: A means to promote personal development during adolescence. The Counseling Psychologist , 2, 3–83.

Mosher, R., and Sullivan, P. R., 1976. A curriculum in moral education for adolescents. Journal of Moral Education , 5, 159–172.

Mueller, E., 1972. The maintenance of verbal exchanges between young children. Child Development, 43 , 930–938.

Murphy, L., 1937. Social behavior and child personality . New York: Columbia University Press.

Nader, R., 1972. Public citizen report , No. 2.

Newmann, F. M., 1975. Education for citizen action: Challenge for secondary curriculum . Berkeley, Calif.: McCutchan.

Orr, J. B., 1974. Cognitive-developmental approaches to moral education: A social-ethical analysis. Educational Theory, 24 , 365–373.

Paolitto, D., 1975. Role-taking opportunities for early adolescents: A program in moral education . Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Boston University School of Education.

Parham, J., 1976. Personal communication.

Peters, R. S., 1970. Concrete principles and the rational passions. In N. F. Sizer and T. R. Sizer (Eds.), Moral education: Five lectures . Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Peters, R. S., 1971. Moral development: A plea for pluralism. In T. Mischel (Ed.), Cognitive development and epistemology . New York: Academic Press.

Peters, R. S., 1975. Why doesn’t Lawrence Kohlberg do his homework? Phi Delta Kappan, 56 , 678.

Peterson, C., 1977. Developing empathy in preschoolers. In J. Lickona (Ed.), Mini-book on fostering moral development in the classroom . Cortland, New York: Project Change, State University of New York.

Peterson, J., 1976. Personal communication.

Peterson, J., and McNamee, S., 1976. Role-taking and moral reasoning about distributive justice in preschool children . Paper presented at a Conference on Moral Development in Young Children, Case Western Reserve University.

Peterson, M. D., 1970. Thomas Jefferson and the new nation . New York: Oxford University Press.

Piaget, J., 1932. The moral judgment of the child . New York: The Free Press, 1965. (Originally published, 1932.)

Piaget, J., 1967. Six psychological studies . New York: Random House.

Piaget, J., 1970. Piaget’s theory. In P. H. Mussen (Ed.), Carmichael’s manual of child psychology (3rd ed., Vol. 1). New York: Wiley and Sons.

Piaget, J., 1971a. Biology and knowledge: An essay on the relations between organic regulations and cognitive processes . Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Piaget, J., 1971b. Psychology and epistemology: Toward a theory of knowledge . New York: Viking Press.

Piaget, J., 1975. To understand is to invent . New York: Grossman.

Raths, L., Harmin, M., and Simon, S. B., 1966. Values and teaching: Working with values in the classroom . Columbus, Ohio: Charles E. Merrill.

Rawls, J., 1971. A theory of justice . Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Rest, J., 1974. Developmental psychology as a guide to value education: A review of “Kohlbergian” programs. Review of Educational Research, 44 , 241–258.

Rest, J., 1976. New approaches in the assessment of moral judgment. In T. Lickona (Ed.), Moral development and behavior: Theory, research, and social issues . New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, pp. 198–218.

Rest, J. R., Turiel, E., and Kohlberg, L., 1969. Level of moral development as a determinant of preference and comprehension of moral judgments made by others. Journal of Personality, 37 , 225–252.

Rosenhan, D., 1969. Some origins of concern for others. In P. Mussen, J. Langer, and M. Covington (Eds.), Trends and issues in developmental psychology . New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

Scaplehorn, C., 1974. Piaget’s cognitive-developmental approach to morality. In S. Modgil (Ed.), Piagetian research: A handbook of recent studies . NFER Publishing Co., Ltd., pp. 352–368.

Schaeffer, P., 1974. Moral judgment: A cognitive-developmental project . Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Minnesota.

Scharf, P., and Hickey, J., 1976. The prison and the inmate’s conception of legal justice: An experiment in democratic education. Criminal justice and Behavior , 3, 107–122.

School violence, vandalism a national crisis. Today’s Child , June-September, 1975, 23, 8.

Selman, R., 1975. A developmental approach to interpersonal and moral awareness in young children. In J. Meyer, B. Burnham, and J. Cholvat (Eds.), Values education . Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, pp. 127–140.

Selman, R., 1976. Social-cognitive understanding: A guide to educational and clinical practice. In T. Lickona (Ed.), Moral development and behavior: Theory, research, and social issues . New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, pp. 299–316.

Selman, R., and Lieberman, M., 1974. The evaluation of a values curriculum for primary grade children based on a cognitive-developmental approach . Paper presented to the American Educational Research Association, Chicago, April, 1974.

Shelton, W., 1975. Social development in young children . Available from Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC), ED 110 166.

Sichel, B. A., 1976. Can Kohlberg respond to his critics? Paper presented to the annual meeting of the Jean Piaget Society, Philadelphia (June).

Simon, S., Howe, L. W., and Kirschenbaum A, 1972. Values clarification . New York: Hart.

Simpson, E. L., 1974. Moral development research: A case of scientific cultural bias. Human Development, 17 , 81–106.

Simpson, E. L., 1976. A holistic approach to moral development and behavior. In T. Lickona (Ed.)., Moral development and behavior: Theory, research, and social issues . New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, pp. 159–170.

Stanley, S. F., 1976. A curriculum to affect the moral atmosphere of the family and the moral development of adolescents . Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Boston University School of Education.

Staub, E., 1975. To rear a prosocial child: Reasoning, learning by doing, and learning by teaching others. In D. J. DePalma and J. M. Foley (Eds.), Moral development: Current theory and research . New York: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Stewart, J. S. 1975. The school as a just community: A transactional-developmental approach to moral education . Unpublished paper; portions presented to the Philosophy of Education Society, Kansas City (March).

Sullivan, E., 1975. Moral learning: Findings, issues, and question . New York: Paulist Press.

Sullivan, E., 1977. A study of Kohlberg’s structural theory of moral development: A critique of liberal social science ideology . Toronto: Ontario Institute for Studies in Education.

Sullivan, P., 1975. A curriculum for stimulating moral reasoning and ego development in adolescence . Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Boston University School of Education.

Sullivan, P., 1976. Personal communication.

Superka, D., and Johnson, P. L., with Ahrens, C., 1976. Values education sourcebook . Boulder, Colo.: Social Science Education Consortium.

Today’s students are impossible (name withheld). Today’s Education , March-April, 1975, p. 26.

Tomlinson-Keasey, C., and Keasey, C. B., 1974. The mediating role of cognitive development in moral judgment. Child Development, 45 , 291–298.

Turiel, E., 1969. Developmental processes in the child’s moral thinking. In P. Mussen, J. Langer, and M. Covington (Eds.), Trends and issues in developmental psychology . New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, pp. 92–133.

Turiel, E., 1974. A comparative analysis of moral knowledge and moral judgment in males and females . Unpublished paper, University of California at Santa Cruz.

Wasserman, E. R., 1976. Implementing Kohlberg’s “just community concept” in an alternative high school. Social Education, 40 , 203–207.

Weinreich, H., 1975. Kohlberg and Piaget: Aspects of their relationship in the field of moral development. Journal of Moral Education, 4 , 201–214.

Whitely, J. M., 1976. The Sierra Project . Unpublished paper, University of California at Irvine.

Wilcox, D., 1977. “Miss Wilcox, this the bad class of the school.” In J. Lickona (Ed.), Mini-book on fostering moral development in the classroom . Cortland, New York: Project Change, SUNY at Cortland (Spring).

Wilson, R. W., 1976. Some comments on stage theories of moral development. Journal of Moral Education, 5 , 241–248.

Wolfe, L. C., 1975. Children’s literature and the development of empathy in young children. Journal of Moral Education, 5 , 45–50.

Yarrow, M. R., Scott, P. M., and Waxier, C. Z., 1973. Learning concern for others. Developmental Psychology, 8 , 240–260.

Download references

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Department of Education, State University of New York, Cortland, New York, USA

Thomas Lickona

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Editor information

Editors and affiliations.

Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Jeanette McCarthy Gallagher

University of Illinois, Urbana, Illinois, USA

J. A. Easley Jr.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 1978 Plenum Press, New York

About this chapter

Cite this chapter.

Lickona, T. (1978). Moral Development and Moral Education. In: Gallagher, J.M., Easley, J.A. (eds) Knowledge and Development. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-3402-6_2

Download citation

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-3402-6_2

Publisher Name : Springer, Boston, MA

Print ISBN : 978-1-4684-3404-0

Online ISBN : 978-1-4684-3402-6

eBook Packages : Springer Book Archive

Share this chapter

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Publish with us

Policies and ethics

• Find a journal
• Track your research

Home / Learning / Child Education / Four Pillars Of Moral Education To Elevate Your Character

Four Pillars Of Moral Education To Elevate Your Character

The Four Pillars of Moral Education, encompassing integrity, responsibility, respect, and empathy. In this insightful post, we delve into the significance of these core values in shaping character and fostering ethical development. Discover practical strategies and real-life examples to instill these pillars in individuals, equipping them with the tools to navigate complex moral dilemmas and contribute positively to society.

Embarking on a journey of moral education opens the gateway to a profound exploration of virtue. In this article, we delve into the essence of character development, focusing on the Four Pillars of Moral Education : integrity, responsibility, respect, and empathy.

These pillars are beacons guiding individuals toward a higher plane of ethical consciousness. By nurturing these virtues, we lay the foundation for a society that thrives on principles, fostering a culture of empathy and mutual respect.

In the following discourse, we navigate the intricate landscape of moral education , unraveling the significance of each pillar and understanding how they collectively shape individuals.

Join us in this intellectual odyssey as we unravel the intricate tapestry of virtue, seeking to comprehend the timeless principles that underpin a life well-lived.

What Is Moral Education?

Moral education intentionally cultivates values, principles, and ethical behavior in individuals. It goes beyond the acquisition of knowledge and skills, aiming to instill virtues that guide one’s conduct in personal, social, and professional realms.

Rooted in principles such as integrity, responsibility, respect, and empathy, moral education equips individuals with a moral compass, enabling them to navigate complex ethical dilemmas and contribute positively to society.

It emphasizes character development , fostering a sense of accountability and empathy, ultimately shaping individuals into conscientious and morally upright community members.

Importance Of Moral Education In Society

Moral education holds paramount importance in society as it serves as the cornerstone for fostering a harmonious and ethical community.

It cultivates a shared understanding of values, contributing to the fabric of a just and compassionate society.

By instilling virtues such as integrity, responsibility, respect, and empathy, moral education shapes individuals into conscientious citizens who prioritize ethical considerations in their actions.

In a world of diverse challenges, moral education is a guiding force, equipping individuals with the tools to navigate complex ethical dilemmas.

It plays a pivotal role in preventing social discord by promoting understanding, tolerance, and mutual respect.

Additionally, a society grounded in moral education is more likely to witness enhanced cooperation, empathy, and a collective commitment to upholding ethical standards.

Ultimately, moral education catalyzes positive social change, contributing to creating a community that values integrity, compassion, and the well-being of all its members.

• Ethical Decision-Making: Equips individuals with the ability to navigate complex ethical dilemmas.
• Social Harmony: Prevents discord by promoting understanding, tolerance, and mutual respect.
• Cooperation and Empathy: Enhances societal cooperation and empathy.
• Positive Social Change: Acts as a catalyst for positive change by upholding ethical standards.
• Collective Commitment: Encourages a collective commitment to the well-being of all community members.

Overview Of The Four Pillars Of Moral Education

The Four Pillars of Moral Education constitute a foundational framework for character development and ethical conduct. These pillars — integrity, responsibility, respect, and empathy — collectively shape individuals into morally conscious and upright members of society.

• Integrity: Upholding honesty and consistency in actions, integrity forms the bedrock of moral character, fostering trust and reliability.
• Responsibility: Instilling a sense of duty and accountability, responsibility guides individuals to fulfill obligations and contribute positively to their community.
• Respect: Cultivating an appreciation for the inherent worth and dignity of others, respect fosters harmonious relationships and a diverse, inclusive society.
• Empathy: Encouraging the ability to understand and share the feelings of others, empathy promotes compassion and a deeper connection with the human experience.

Pillar 1: Ethics

Ethics encompasses the systematic study of principles that govern human behavior and decision-making. It involves distinguishing between right and wrong and guiding individuals toward ethical conduct in various aspects of life.

Ethics provides a framework for moral reasoning, shaping the principles and values that influence individual actions and societal norms.

Understanding Ethics

• Definition and Scope: Ethics, as a pillar of moral education, involves the study of principles that govern human behavior and decision-making. It encompasses the distinction between right and wrong, guiding individuals towards ethical conduct in various aspects of life.
• Historical Perspective: Examining the historical evolution of ethics provides valuable insights into the cultural and philosophical foundations that have shaped ethical frameworks. Understanding how ethical principles have evolved over time aids in appreciating the diverse perspectives that contribute to contemporary moral values.

Teaching Ethical Values

• Role of Parents and Family: The family serves as the primary crucible for moral development. As the earliest and most influential teachers, parents mold a child’s ethical foundation through daily interactions and modeled behaviors. Open communication, setting positive examples, and fostering a nurturing environment contribute to the internalization of ethical values within the family unit.
• Importance of School and Educational Institutions: Educational institutions play a crucial role in formalizing ethical education. Beyond imparting academic knowledge, schools and institutions provide a structured environment to nurture moral values. Integrating ethical discussions into the curriculum, promoting a culture of respect and inclusivity, and encouraging critical thinking contribute to the holistic development of individuals with a strong ethical compass.
• Practical Examples and Case Studies: Effective, ethical education involves more than theoretical discussions. Practical examples and case studies offer real-world scenarios for students to analyze, discuss, and apply ethical principles. This hands-on approach enhances comprehension and equips individuals with the practical skills needed to make sound ethical decisions in the complexities of their personal and professional lives.

Pillar 2: Responsibility

Responsibility, as a pillar of moral education, is the commitment to fulfilling obligations and being accountable for one’s actions. It encompasses personal responsibility, social responsibility, and environmental responsibility .

Building a sense of duty and accountability, responsibility guides individuals to contribute positively to their community, uphold ethical standards, and cultivate a mindful approach to environmental stewardship.

Definition And Significance

• Definition: Responsibility, a pivotal component of moral education, encapsulates the capacity to fulfill commitments and be answerable for one’s actions. It entails a conscientious approach to personal, social, and environmental duties, contributing not only to individual well-being but also to the broader welfare of the community.
• Significance: The significance of responsibility transcends mere accountability; it serves as a guiding principle for ethical conduct. Embracing responsibility fosters a sense of duty, instilling traits of integrity and reliability. It forms the bedrock for constructive contributions to society and the sustainable stewardship of the environment.

Developing A Sense Of Responsibility

• Personal Responsibility: On an individual level, nurturing personal responsibility involves recognizing and meeting personal commitments. This extends beyond mere task completion to encompass self-discipline, effective time management, and an acute awareness of the repercussions of one’s actions on oneself and others.
• Social Responsibility: Social responsibility expands the scope of personal actions to consider their impact on the community. It entails active contributions to the welfare of others, advocating for social justice, and participating in initiatives that enhance the collective well-being.
• Environmental Responsibility: Environmental responsibility underscores the duty to safeguard and preserve the natural world. This involves adopting sustainable practices, engaging in conservation efforts, and adopting a mindful approach to resource consumption to ensure the long-term health of the planet.

Integrating Responsibility In Education

• Curriculum Design: The integration of responsibility into educational curricula necessitates the design of courses that emphasize not only academic achievement but also ethical decision-making, civic engagement, and the importance of fulfilling commitments. This holistic approach aims to instill a comprehensive sense of responsibility.
• Extracurricular Activities: Extracurricular activities serve as practical platforms for students to apply and enhance their sense of responsibility. Participation in clubs, community service, and leadership roles provides tangible experiences that foster a deeper understanding of the impact of responsible actions.
• Community Engagement: Actively involving students in community engagement initiatives is a potent strategy for integrating responsibility into education. Collaborative projects, partnerships with local organizations, and service-learning initiatives bridge the gap between theoretical concepts and real-world responsibilities, facilitating a holistic educational experience.

Pillar 3: Compassion

Compassion, a cornerstone of moral education, is a virtue encapsulating empathy, kindness, and genuine concern for others’ well-being. It transcends self-interest, fostering positive relationships and societal harmony.

It encourages understanding and alleviating the suffering of others, contributing to a more compassionate and empathetic world.

Compassion As A Virtue

Empathy and understanding.

Compassion involves cultivating empathy, allowing individuals to understand and share in the feelings of others. This deep connection fosters a sense of shared humanity and promotes emotional understanding.

Acts of Kindness

Practicing compassion manifests through acts of kindness. Whether small gestures or significant actions, compassionate behavior involves actively contributing to the well-being of others and creating a positive impact on individuals and communities.

Building Positive Relationships

Compassion forms a cornerstone for positive interpersonal relationships. By approaching interactions with kindness and consideration, individuals nurture a harmonious environment, fostering mutual respect and understanding.

Contributing to Social Harmony

Compassion contributes to social harmony as a societal virtue. Encouraging a collective awareness of others’ well-being helps build a compassionate and empathetic society where individuals support and uplift one another.

Fostering Compassion In Individuals

• Empathy Building: Initiating the cultivation of compassion involves prioritizing the development of empathy. By encouraging individuals to comprehend and share the feelings of others, a heightened awareness of diverse perspectives is nurtured. This, in turn, forms the bedrock for compassionate actions, fostering a profound sense of interconnectedness.
• Cultivating a Caring Environment: Establishing an environment that values compassion requires the promotion of kindness, understanding, and mutual support. By emphasizing the significance of caring for others, individuals within such an environment are more likely to develop a genuine sense of interconnectedness, fostering not only individual well-being but also social responsibility.

Implementing Compassion In Educational Settings

• Inclusive Education: Compassion finds practical expression in educational settings through implementing inclusive practices. Acknowledging and accommodating diverse learning needs creates an environment where each individual feels valued and supported. This, in turn, nurtures a sense of compassion as students recognize and appreciate their peers’ unique qualities and challenges.
• Anti-Bullying Programs: The tangible manifestation of compassion in education is evident in anti-bullying programs. These initiatives not only address negative behaviors but also instill values of respect, empathy, and understanding. By creating a culture where compassion prevails over cruelty, anti-bullying programs contribute to the development of individuals who are not only academically proficient but also emotionally intelligent and socially conscious.

Pillar 4: Integrity

Integrity, a fundamental pillar of moral education , is defined by honesty, truthfulness, and consistency in actions and values. It involves a steadfast commitment to ethical principles, aligning behavior with deeply held beliefs.

By cultivating integrity, individuals contribute to trustworthiness, accountability, and establishing a solid moral foundation in both personal and professional spheres.

Defining Integrity

• Honesty and Truthfulness: Central to the concept of integrity is an unwavering commitment to honesty and truthfulness. Individuals of integrity prioritize transparent communication and actions, establishing an environment of trust and credibility in both personal and professional relationships.
• Consistency in Actions and Values: Integrity extends beyond mere honesty; it involves aligning actions with deeply held values. Demonstrating consistency between behavior and principles characterizes individuals of integrity. This harmonious integration of beliefs and actions forms a robust moral foundation.

Building Integrity In Individuals

• Role of Role Models: The cultivation of integrity often begins through the influence of role models. Observing and emulating individuals who exemplify honesty, transparency, and principled conduct provide a powerful framework for the development of personal integrity. Role models serve as living examples, illustrating the tangible benefits of ethical behavior.
• Teaching Integrity Through Challenges: Building integrity is a dynamic process involving challenges with ethical dimensions. Confronting and overcoming moral dilemmas and ethical quandaries present valuable opportunities for individuals to reinforce their commitment to integrity. Through these experiences, individuals develop resilience and moral strength.

Incorporating Integrity In Education

• Academic Integrity: Academic integrity stands as a cornerstone within education, instilling values of honesty and originality. Upholding academic honesty, avoiding plagiarism, and acknowledging the work of others contribute to the development of individuals who carry their principles of integrity into their academic pursuits and, by extension, into various facets of life.
• Moral Dilemmas in Education: Integrating integrity into education involves purposefully addressing moral dilemmas. Presenting students with ethical challenges within educational contexts encourages critical thinking and decision-making grounded in principles. This proactive engagement with moral complexities prepares individuals to navigate similar situations in diverse aspects of their lives.

Challenges In Implementing Moral Education

Implementing moral education is not without its complexities, and addressing these challenges is crucial for the successful integration of ethical principles into educational frameworks. The hurdles can be categorized as follows:

Cultural And Religious Sensitivity

Cultural and religious sensitivity involves a nuanced approach to recognizing and respecting diverse cultural and religious perspectives.

In the context of moral education, it means acknowledging and understanding the varied ethical frameworks shaped by different cultural and religious backgrounds.

This sensitivity ensures inclusivity, fostering an environment where moral education is respectful , embracing, and culturally unbiased.

• Diverse Ethical Frameworks

Navigating the rich tapestry of cultural and religious diversity requires a nuanced approach. Different cultures and religions often possess distinct ethical frameworks, necessitating sensitivity to these variations. An inclusive strategy ensures that moral education respects and embraces diverse perspectives without imposing cultural biases.

• Inclusive Education Practices

Achieving cultural and religious sensitivity involves incorporating inclusive education practices. These practices go beyond mere acknowledgment, fostering an environment where moral values can be universally embraced.

By promoting an understanding of diverse ethical perspectives, educational initiatives can bridge cultural gaps and build a more cohesive and respectful community.

Resistance And Opposition

Resistance and opposition in the context of moral education refer to challenges and skepticism that may arise when integrating ethical principles into educational frameworks.

Overcoming resistance involves effective communication to articulate the necessity and benefits of moral education.

Addressing opposition requires showcasing the positive outcomes and emphasizing the value of character development for individuals and society.

Creating a dialogue and fostering understanding are crucial to garnering support for the integration of moral education despite potential resistance.

• Communication Strategies

Addressing resistance and opposition necessitates effective communication strategies. Articulating the necessity and appropriateness of moral education is paramount. Transparent communication about the benefits of instilling moral values in students and shaping them into responsible and ethical citizens can help overcome skepticism and opposition.

• Showcasing Positive Outcomes

Demonstrating the positive outcomes of moral education is essential. Highlighting case studies, success stories, and the tangible impact on students’ character development can sway perceptions, garnering support for integrating moral education into the educational landscape.

Balancing Moral Values With Academic Demands

Balancing moral values with academic demands involves navigating the challenge of harmonizing character development with the rigorous requirements of academic pursuits.

It requires a thoughtful curriculum design that seamlessly integrates moral education into the educational fabric without compromising academic rigor.

Recognizing the interconnectedness of moral and academic development is essential, emphasizing that fostering ethical principles enhances overall academic excellence.

Striking this balance ensures that moral values become integral to the educational journey without compromising educational standards.

• Thoughtful Curriculum Design

Balancing moral values with academic demands requires a thoughtful curriculum design. Integrating moral education seamlessly into the curriculum, rather than treating it as an addendum, ensures that it becomes an integral part of the educational experience.

Thoughtful planning allows for the exploration of ethical principles without compromising academic rigor.

• Recognizing Interconnectedness

Acknowledging the interconnectedness of moral and academic development is essential. Rather than viewing them as separate entities, recognizing that moral values enhance overall academic excellence creates a synergistic relationship.

Emphasizing the symbiotic nature of moral and academic growth can lead to a more holistic and effective educational approach.

Future Directions And Recommendations

As we chart the course for the future of moral education , it is imperative to consider avenues for improvement and innovation. The following recommendations outline potential strategies for advancing moral education:

Continuous Improvement Of Moral Education Programs

Periodic assessment and adaptation.

Emphasize the importance of continuous improvement in moral education programs. Periodic assessments, feedback loops, and the integration of evolving ethical considerations ensure that educational initiatives remain relevant and impactful.

Professional Development for Educators

Invest in the professional development of educators to enhance their capacity to deliver effective moral education. Providing resources, training, and opportunities for educators to stay abreast of best practices ensures the sustained quality of moral education programs.

Research and Evidence-Based Practices

Foster a culture of research within the field of moral education. Promoting studies on the efficacy of different approaches and interventions enables the identification of evidence-based practices, guiding future program development.

Collaboration Between Schools, Families, And Communities

• Family and Community Engagement Programs: Encourage collaborative efforts between schools, families, and communities. Establish programs that involve parents and community members in moral education initiatives, fostering a holistic approach to character development.
• Community Outreach and Partnerships: Actively seek partnerships with community organizations. Engaging local entities in moral education endeavors creates a supportive network, reinforcing shared values and extending the impact of these programs beyond the school environment.
• Parental Education Initiatives: Implement initiatives to educate parents about the principles and goals of moral education. Providing resources for parents to reinforce moral lessons at home strengthens the partnership between schools and families in shaping the ethical foundation of the younger generation.

Utilizing Technology For Moral Education

• Digital Learning Platforms: Harness the potential of technology for moral education through digital learning platforms. Interactive and engaging online resources can complement traditional teaching methods, catering to the preferences and learning styles of a technologically adept generation.
• Virtual Reality and Simulations: Explore the use of virtual reality and simulations to create immersive moral scenarios. This innovative approach allows students to navigate complex ethical dilemmas in a controlled virtual environment, enhancing their decision-making skills and empathy.
• Online Communities for Moral Discourse: Facilitate online communities dedicated to moral discourse. Utilizing social media or dedicated platforms encourages students to engage in meaningful discussions about moral values, broadening their perspectives through exposure to diverse viewpoints.

The journey through the landscape of moral education has been guided by the steadfast principles embedded in the Four Pillars—Integrity, Responsibility, Respect, and Compassion.

These pillars serve as the scaffolding upon which the edifice of character is constructed. Integrity, the unwavering commitment to honesty and consistency; Responsibility, the sense of duty towards self, society, and the environment; Respect, the acknowledgment of the intrinsic worth of every individual; and Compassion, the virtue that binds empathy and kindness into the fabric of human interactions.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the four pillars of moral education.

The Four Pillars—Integrity, Responsibility, Respect, and Compassion—form the foundational framework of moral education. They guide individuals in cultivating virtues such as honesty, accountability, empathy, and kindness, fostering well-rounded character development.

How Can Schools And Families Collaborate To Reinforce Moral Education?

Collaborative efforts between schools, families, and communities are essential for reinforcing moral education. Initiatives such as family engagement programs, community partnerships, and parental education can create a holistic approach to character development.

In What Ways Can Technology Be Effectively Utilized For Moral Education?

Technology can enhance moral education through digital learning platforms, virtual reality simulations, and online communities for moral discourse. These innovative approaches cater to diverse learning styles and provide interactive tools to navigate complex ethical scenarios.

What Challenges May Arise In Implementing Moral Education?

Challenges such as cultural sensitivity, resistance, and balancing moral values with academic demands may arise. Addressing these challenges requires a nuanced approach, effective communication strategies, and thoughtful curriculum design integrating moral education seamlessly.

Why Is Ongoing Research And Discourse Important?

Ongoing research ensures the continued relevance and effectiveness of moral education programs.

Discourse facilitates the exchange of ideas, fostering a dynamic field that can adapt to evolving societal needs, ultimately contributing to the continuous improvement of character development initiatives.

https://moraleducation.ae/curriculum/

https://www.edpsycinteractive.org/topics/morchr/morchr.html

https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/psychology/moral-education

https://www.hoover.org/sites/default/files/uploads/documents/0817929622_23.pdf

https://scalar.usc.edu/works/c2c-digital-magazine-springsummer-2023/media/four-pillars-for-ethics-of-educational-technology

• Recent Posts

• 47 Spirited Spring Coloring Pages For Kids & Adults (FREE DOWNLOAD) - April 10, 2024
• 47 Serene Starry Sky Coloring Pages For Kids & Adults (FREE DOWNLOAD) - April 10, 2024
• 47 Sharks Of The Deep Coloring Pages For Kids & Adults (FREE DOWNLOAD) - April 9, 2024

Leave a Comment Cancel Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

Four Pillars of Moral Education

Moral Education Program (MEP) plays a pivotal role in molding the minds of our young learners. This curriculum model focuses on a holistic approach, enhancing not just academic prowess, but also moral, ethical, social, and civic sensibilities.

Designed around four primary pillars—Character and Morality, the Individual and the Community, Civic Studies, and Cultural Studies—MEP equips students with the critical skills and understanding needed for leading a balanced and meaningful life.

The core of the Moral Education Program is to foster ethical individuals who contribute positively to their communities. The program encourages a clear understanding of the values and principles that bind us as a society, while nurturing a sense of respect for the diverse cultural heritage that enriches our global community.

The benefits of this unique and progressive program extend far beyond classroom walls. Learners develop a well-rounded persona, preparing them to overcome life’s challenges with resilience, empathy, and a strong moral compass. They emerge as responsible citizens who respect laws, uphold human rights, and prioritize the common good.

The Importance of Moral Education

Lifelong character building.

The value of moral education is immeasurable and its impact, lifelong. It is an integral part of character building. It helps students develop a moral compass, guiding them in making ethical decisions throughout their lives. From understanding the nuances of right and wrong to standing up against injustices, moral education fosters integrity and honesty in learners.

Fostering Community Harmony

Moral education plays a significant role in promoting community harmony. By instilling values like empathy, respect, and tolerance, it encourages learners to appreciate diversity and foster harmonious coexistence. Learners understand their responsibilities towards their community and are motivated to contribute positively.

Cultivating Civic Responsibility

Civic responsibility is another crucial facet of moral education. It encourages students to become active participants in societal affairs, making them aware of their rights and responsibilities as citizens. This understanding can inspire learners to engage in community service, uphold democratic values, and strive for social justice.

Pillar One: Character and Morality

Character and Morality, as the foundational pillar, form the heart of the Moral Education Program (MEP). This pillar encourages the development of moral values that are universally accepted and cherished.

Core Values in Focus

The primary focus is on core values such as honesty, integrity, respect, and responsibility. The students are encouraged to internalize these values and apply them in their daily interactions. These lessons in character and morality significantly contribute to the ethical growth of the students, preparing them to face the moral challenges and dilemmas they may encounter throughout their lives.

Classroom Applications

Learning about these values and principles comes alive in classrooms through varied activities and real-life scenarios. Activities can include role-play, where students enact different scenarios involving moral choices. Discussions on ethical dilemmas, debates on moral issues, and reflective writing exercises are other effective strategies to teach these principles. Teachers can also reinforce moral behaviors by acknowledging and rewarding acts of honesty, kindness, and responsibility shown by students.

Pillar Two: The Individual and the Community

The second pillar, the Individual and the Community, deals with social ethics and the relationship between an individual and their community. This pillar emphasizes the importance of understanding one’s role within a societal framework and contributing positively towards the community’s well-being.

Fostering Social Responsibility

Lessons under this pillar help students to appreciate the importance of coexisting harmoniously with others in their community. They learn about concepts such as social responsibility, empathy, cooperation, and mutual respect. These lessons encourage students to work collaboratively, help others, and become proactive contributors to their community.

Classroom Integration

Teachers can integrate these principles into the classroom through various community-based activities and projects. For instance, students can be encouraged to participate in a community cleanup drive, a charity event, or a neighborhood help program. These activities provide a practical demonstration of social responsibility and active participation in community life.

Pillar Three: Civic Studies

Civic Studies, the third pillar of the MEP, aims to instill a sense of civic responsibility in students. This pillar deals with teaching students about their roles, rights, and responsibilities as citizens of a democratic society.

About Governance

Under this pillar, students learn about the workings of government, the principles of democracy, the importance of laws, and the rights and responsibilities that come with citizenship. They gain a comprehensive understanding of how societies function at a civic level.

Classroom Implementation

Teachers can integrate lessons in civic studies into their teaching through various practical activities. These might include mock elections to help students understand the voting process and the importance of each vote. Discussions on current events and debates on civic issues can also be used to make students more aware of their civic environment and their role in it.

Pillar Four: Cultural Studies

The Cultural Studies pillar aims to promote a sense of respect and appreciation for diverse cultures. It focuses on making students understand and respect the different cultures that make up our global society.

Exploring Global Cultures

Under this pillar, students explore the customs, traditions, history, and values of various cultures across the world. They are taught to respect cultural diversity and understand that every culture has its unique values and practices.

Classroom Activities

Teachers can use various activities to bring cultural studies to life in the classroom. This might include studying folk tales from different cultures, exploring global festivals, and even organizing a cultural exchange program with a school in another country. Such activities can help students appreciate and respect cultural diversity.

The Power of the MEP

The Moral Education Program is a transformative force, shaping students into ethically sound, socially responsible, and culturally aware individuals. It extends its influence beyond the confines of the classroom, preparing students for the real-world challenges and dilemmas they will face in their lives.

Holistic Development

MEP promotes the holistic development of students. It works on fostering not only the cognitive but also the social and emotional growth of students. By equipping them with strong ethical principles, social skills, civic awareness, and cultural understanding, the program ensures that they emerge as well-rounded individuals ready to take on life’s challenges.

Real-world Applications

The MEP emphasizes real-world applications of the principles it teaches. Students are encouraged to apply the moral values, social ethics, civic principles, and cultural understanding they learn in the program to their daily lives. They are motivated to make morally sound decisions, contribute positively to their communities, fulfill their civic duties responsibly, and respect cultural diversity in all walks of life.

Challenges and Solutions

Implementing the MEP is not without challenges. Teachers may find it difficult to cover all aspects of the program effectively. There can also be resistance from those who perceive moral education as the responsibility of parents. However, the key lies in creating a partnership between the school and parents. Also, teacher training and curricular support can help in overcoming these challenges.

Partnership Between School and Parents

A successful MEP requires the active involvement of both teachers and parents. Schools must ensure that teachers are adequately trained to teach moral education effectively. They should provide them with suitable curricular materials and teaching resources.

Schools should also encourage parent participation by keeping them informed about the program, seeking their feedback, and involving them in school activities. Parents, on their hand, must reinforce the lessons taught at school and model moral behaviors at home.

Overcoming Resistance

Resistance to moral education can come from those who believe that it is the sole responsibility of parents. This belief, however, overlooks the fact that schools also play a significant role in a child’s moral development. Schools can address this challenge by demonstrating the value of the MEP to the parents. They can show how it contributes to the holistic development of the child, how it prepares the child to face real-world challenges, and how it aligns with the school’s mission and values.

Resource Management

Effective resource management can also help overcome some of the challenges associated with implementing the MEP. Schools should provide teachers with a well-designed curriculum, suitable teaching materials, and ongoing training opportunities to equip them with the necessary skills and knowledge. Regular evaluations and feedback can further enhance the program’s effectiveness and help in addressing any issues that may arise.

Importance of Moral Education

In our rapidly changing and diverse world, the need for moral education is more significant than ever. The Moral Education Program plays a vital role in shaping the character and values of the students, preparing them to navigate life’s challenges effectively.

Developing Ethical Citizens

Moral education is crucial for developing ethical citizens. It equips students with a strong moral compass, helping them differentiate right from wrong and make ethically sound decisions. This ethical grounding is essential for maintaining the moral fabric of our society.

Fostering Social Cohesion

By teaching values such as empathy, respect, and cooperation, moral education fosters social cohesion. It encourages students to work together, respect differences, and contribute positively to their communities. This leads to a more harmonious and inclusive society.

Encouraging Responsible Citizenship

Through its civic studies pillar, moral education encourages responsible citizenship. It teaches students about their rights and responsibilities as citizens and fosters a sense of civic duty. This helps in creating a more engaged and responsible citizenry.

Promoting Cultural Understanding

In our increasingly globalized world, cultural understanding is essential. Moral education, through its cultural studies pillar, promotes respect and appreciation for cultural diversity. This contributes to a more inclusive and tolerant society.

Frequently Asked Questions

How can parents support the moral education program.

Parents can support the MEP by reinforcing the values and principles taught at school at home. They can provide opportunities for their children to apply these principles in real-life situations. Parents can also model ethical behavior, respect for others, civic responsibility, and cultural understanding.

Can moral education contribute to academic success?

While moral education primarily focuses on the ethical, social, civic, and cultural development of students, it can also contribute to their academic success. By fostering skills such as critical thinking, problem-solving, cooperation, and respect for diversity, moral education can enhance the overall learning experience of students.

Is moral education a substitute for religious education?

No, moral education is not a substitute for religious education. While both teach values and ethics, moral education focuses on universal moral values that are shared across various religions and cultures. It complements religious education by reinforcing the ethical principles taught therein.

The Moral Education Program, with its four pillars, plays a significant role in shaping the character, values, and societal understanding of students. By focusing on character and morality, the individual and the community, civic studies, and cultural studies, the program ensures a comprehensive development of students.

Moral education is not just about teaching right from wrong. It’s about cultivating a generation of morally sound, socially responsible, civically engaged, and culturally aware individuals. It’s about preparing students for real-world challenges, helping them navigate their lives with integrity and wisdom.

The importance of moral education in today’s world cannot be overstated. It holds the key to developing ethical citizens, fostering social cohesion, encouraging responsible citizenship, and promoting cultural understanding. The Moral Education Program, by integrating these principles into the school curriculum, is making a significant contribution to achieving these goals.

Sherry Lane

Meet Sherry Lane, a proud holder of a PhD in Educational Psychology with a concentration in Montessori Methods. At EduEdify.com, I dive deep into Montessori Education, Teaching-Learning, and Child-Kid paradigms. My advanced studies, combined with years of research, position me to provide authoritative insights. Let's explore the many facets of education, ensuring every child receives the best instruction tailored to their needs.

Leave a Comment Cancel reply

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

Academia.edu no longer supports Internet Explorer.

To browse Academia.edu and the wider internet faster and more securely, please take a few seconds to  upgrade your browser .

Enter the email address you signed up with and we'll email you a reset link.

• We're Hiring!
• Help Center

The Moral Education Project (Year 4): Annual Report 1975-76

Related Papers

In 1976-77, the moral education project of Ontario researched curriculum and pedagogy in the fifth year of its program for the purpose of developing a systematic way of introducing values education into grades 2-13. The study helps teachers encourage students to reflect on their own values in the light of fundamental life goals. It is divided into 10 sections with the following information: a summary of the objectives; characteristics of the school, the classroom, the teacher, and the students; the role of learning materials; previous findings and a guide for future preparation of materials; a guide to using materials; specific teaching and learning activities; teaching skills needed; three different approaches to values education; and a description of the relationship between the reflective approach and six other approaches to values education. The study closes with five case studies. (Author/LD)

Jim Parsons

Geevee Ventula

Robert Selman

This paper clarifies the development of moral judgement and the means by which educators can stimulate this development. Moral teaching is defined as the process of open discussion aimed at stimulating the child to move to the next step in his development. Research evidence shows that internalized principles of moral judgement cannot be taught, but their development can be encouraged. The main conclusions are (a) the definition of "good behavior" should not be relative only to the standards or biases of the teacher; (b) the teacher's initial task is to understand, from the child's viewpoint, what is good and bad about a given behavior; (c) since the child's judgement follows a developmental sequence, some thinking can be defined as more morally mature than others; (d) it is psychologically and ethically legitimate to encourage the child to act in accordance with his highest level of judgement; and (e) insofar as discrepancies between judgement and action reflec...

John De Nobile

Joseph Zajda

ROSE MARIE T SANTOS

BRIDGING COURSE On ACCELERATED TEACHERS EDUCATION PROGRAM (ATEP)

Shailaj Kumar Shrivastava

Responsibility to promote moral values in students are not taken seriously by parents, teachers and institutions which results continuous erosion of human values and social relations. Therefore, there is urgent need to take serious action for the restoration of moral values among youths of our country. In this article attempt has been made to identify the need of moral values in today's scenario.

Thomas Nielsen

More and more sense a need for the purpose of education to be more than just knowledge acquisition. Values and morality are an integral part of our lives and should for this reason be carefully integrated into educational contexts. For values to become 'owned' by students, however, opportunities must be provided for them to actively and critically construct our so-called shared values. Imaginative teaching is a constructivist way of engaging learners emotionally in values-based education; and service learning, or a 'curriculum of giving', is a practical manifestation of sharing and caring, thus teaching students our core values through activity and doing - the most natural means of expression in children and adolescent learners.

RELATED PAPERS

Suhas Setty

Almaida Hamzah

Louis J . Kotzé

Perfiles Educativos

Juan Jose Ramirez Bonilla

Clinical and experimental rheumatology

Giuseppe Passiu

Tanja Milosevska

Gabriella Bastian

David Burin

Steffen Mueller

Dongwoo Yoo

Journal of Clinical Medicine Research

Othman Ouenes

Brenda Vargas

Ciencia e Investigación

ANTONIO JOSE OBREGON

Kultura i Społeczeństwo

Tomasz Nawrocki

Journal of Biological Chemistry

Baldomero Olivera

International journal of scientific research

Pooja Singhania

Cartography and Geographic Information Science

Jack Snoeyink

International Journal of Biological Macromolecules

shabnam sheshmani

JAWRA Journal of the American Water Resources Association

Samuel Solis

Introduction to Comparative Government and Politics

Dino Bozonelos

Silvio Dutra

British Food Journal

valentina materia

Journal of Indentureship and its Legacies

Michelle Mohabeer

知的財産法政策学研究 Intellectual Property Law and Policy Journal

Christopher Heath

RELATED TOPICS

•   We're Hiring!
•   Help Center
• Find new research papers in:
• Health Sciences
• Earth Sciences
• Cognitive Science
• Mathematics
• Computer Science
• Academia ©2024

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

• Publications
• Account settings

Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .

• Advanced Search
• Journal List
• Int J Environ Res Public Health

Environmental and Moral Education for Effective Environmentalism: An Ideological and Philosophical Approach

Abida begum.

1 College of Marxism, Shanghai Lixin University of Accounting and Finance, Shanghai 201215, China

2 Heilongjiang Province Think Tank for Ecological Civilization Construction and Green Development, Harbin 150040, China

Jingwei Liu

3 Elementary and Secondary Education Department, Peshawar 25000, Pakistan

Amr Mamdouh

4 Architectural Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Technology, Future University in Egypt, New Cairo 11835, Egypt

Associated Data

The data presented in this study are available on request from the corresponding author. The data are not publicly available due to privacy.

This article offers a critical review of the research on moral and environmental education as a basis for building environmentalism. The review’s objective is to present an ideological and philosophical theory and research on environmentalism through moral education. The bulk of this research involves empirical research that examines the correlation between moral education and environmentalism, ideologies produced by moral education, and philosophical arguments inherent in environmental education. A deductive argument is made following the review of the existing research on moral education to highlight the educational approaches that have been hailed as effective. Some of the environmental educational approaches identified as being effective include proactive environmental education, creating an environmentally conscious environment, and real-life environmental education simulations. The research also identifies moral education whose focus is the creation of a moral consciousness among learners as being critical for the development of environmental consciousness. Inculcation of religious education, creating a moral educational atmosphere, moral leadership, moral life simulations, and use of Ubuntu and Ukamu theoretical frameworks will bolster building a moral consciousness among learners. The argument presented in this article is that despite the existence of some contrary research, moral education can act as a bolster to positive attitudes, actions, and behaviors towards the environment.

1. Introduction

Effective management of the environment is a product of a deep understanding of the environment and the interdependence of the various factions that are determinants of environmental health. The world’s existence and its continuity are crafted in a delicate balance that is made of interdependent elements. The interdependent life and non-life forms can be classified into ecosystems and habitat constituents that sustain man, plants, and animals [ 1 ]. Environmental issues constitute a disruption of this balance. Climate change has been singled out as one of the most problematic issues for the global community [ 2 ]. This problem is rooted in the poor management of the environment and its resources, leading to negative consequences for people, animals, and plants now and in posterity. The environmental issue is cosmopolitan, incorporating different aspects where changes omit the living and nonliving matter. Some of the critical environmental issues include water availability, biodiversity, forest cover, carbon emissions, extraction of natural resources, food security, pollution of water and air, rainfall, and desertification, etc. [ 2 ]. Further, a lack of prudence in natural resource utility is destroying the earth through actions such as extraction, trade, and the burning of fossil fuels such as coal and oil. Global consumption has also been increasing, and this has caused a strain on natural resources [ 3 ]. The issues affecting the environment have their genesis in modernity, which is a complex nexus of political, legal, societal, capitalistic, and cultural positions [ 4 ]. This makes it difficult to have a coherent approach to environmental education owing to conflicting interests.

The current environmental issues identified pose an urgency to the global community. However, the actions being taken to mitigate the environmental issues are insufficient in comparison with the existing global environmental challenge. The problem lies in the gap that exists between measures being undertaken to maintain environmental sustainability and the devastation that the world’s environmental degradation is causing. There is a knowledge gap among global citizens regarding the actions that they should be taking, as they are often unaware of the individual actions that contribute to global environmental sustainability. A radical change is needed in education so that an individual can develop a moral consciousness that remains steadfast. According to Albulescu [ 5 ], subjective thinking and personal choices are influenced by the conscience.

1.1. Values and Reflection in Environmental and Moral Education

Developing an environmentally conscious society requires educating society on the importance of the environment and getting people to act ethically. Gamayunova and Vatin [ 6 ] stated that environmental education is meant to highlight that morality is not only domiciled within social relations but also encompasses our responsibility towards future generations, animals, and other forms of life. Institutions of learning are one of the most critical and ideal areas where environmental education and environmental ethics can be taught. They form a microenvironment and act as cradles for the enlightenment and development of future leaders. They need to be on the frontline in educating and implementing environmental sustainability.

Lapuzina et al. [ 7 ], noted that in institutions of higher education, the level of awareness and commitment to environmental ethics is low, with most students viewing it as an abstract social value. In research that was conducted at University Alpha, Castro and Jabbour [ 8 ] found that there was only a partial implementation of the Sustainability Campus Framework. A similar study was conducted by Dagiliūtė and Liobikienė [ 9 ] at Vytautas Magnus University, Lithuania, and it was found that the university was not environmentally committed to sustainability. The university’s policies on the environment were pedestrian, and its practices were inconsistent. There is also a gap in environmental education among young children in grade school. In an investigation on the understanding and the views of children on the environment, Littledykes [ 10 ] found that most children have limited knowledge and understanding. Littledykes [ 10 ], Dagiliute and Liobikiene [ 9 ], and Castro and Jabbour [ 8 ] all pointed to the discrepancies that exist in the education system from the formative stages to the university level about environmental sustainability. Some people possess the knowledge of the actions that should be taken toward sustainability, but they lack the moral consciousness to drive them toward these actions. Ivan [ 11 ] explained that moral consciousness constitutes a rule of morality, which acts as a guide in decision making. According to Geiger et al. [ 12 ], the absence of moral consciousness and behavior has led to the degradation of the environment. Jie [ 13 ] said that deficient knowledge, low commitment, and lukewarm perception towards the environment are inherent in the inefficiency of environmental and moral education partly due to the inherent passivity of moral education, which makes morals appear remote, general, and vague. This points to the glaring need for a more efficient environmental and moral education given that grade schools and institutions of higher learning are important for the acquisition of critical values and behaviors toward sustainability.

Moral education can equip individuals with intellectual principles. There is a need to create a moral environment within which moral consciousness can develop. Moral education should be accompanied by moral leadership. Institutional administrators and instructors in all subject areas should be beacons of morality to inspire the learners to emulate them [ 14 ]. Ineffective moral education is to blame for the poor moral grounding in society [ 13 ]. Effective moral education should be an agent of social change, and this should be reflected in individuals’ acquisition of moral consciousness. El-Hani and Mortimer [ 15 ] defined moral consciousness as a combination of cognitive structures and intellectual principles that helps in the deduction of what is right and what is wrong. This consciousness is driven by self-motivation and helps to redefine the relations with the self and other people. An individual needs to internalize certain standards about right and wrong to make autonomous moral decisions. An individual with a moral conscience will have a self-imposed and self-assumed mental framework for decision making after the acquired moral conscience precipitates into a psychological conscience [ 9 ]. Moral consciousness also guides personal actions in a way that they are attuned to the values, principles, and norms of a society. One of the most effective moral education techniques is the values clarification technique [ 13 ]. This moral educational technique is instrumental in eliminating inner conflicts about moral issues through the use of persona analysis. The major techniques of value clarification technique include value grid, value focus, rank order, value survey, and either-or-focused choice [ 16 ]. Through the application of these techniques, learners’ attitudes and intrinsic motivations are changed, and they become more aligned with moralistic values.

1.2. The Rationale of the Study-Environmentalism

The remedy to the environmental problems identified lies in environmentalism. Environmentalism is a conglomeration of actions and set of attitudes that are meant to safeguard the environment, restore the damaged environment, and improve the environment. Of significant interest in environmentalism are water resources, quality of air, and protecting ecosystems as well as natural habitats that are home to humans, plants, and animals. The global society exists on a planet with finite natural resources, and human existence intertwines with the sustainability of finite natural resources. This makes environmentalism critical for the long-term sustainability of the planet. Environmentalism is executed through political, economic, and social activism, which has the objective of safeguarding the environment from irresponsible utility and conduct. Such activism leads to mitigating factors that include policies and legislation, the consumption habits of individuals, and the lifestyle of people.

The basis of environmentalism is that nature has been personified and is perceived as a singular entity. Cano Pecharroman [ 17 ] argued that an entity can possess legal rights even if it cannot exercise its own will or have any interest. He further argues that these rights are not reducible in the face of opposing rights of other entities. Jasanoff [ 18 ] said that all entities that have legal rights should be recognized in the legal system, and as such, any damage done to them should be subject to consideration through the due process of the legal system. If the entities are not able to defend themselves, they should be defended by legal institutions and other watchdogs. A balance needs to be established between the organizations that will safeguard the interests of vulnerable entities and the needs of citizens. This is to avoid the overbearing burden that environmentalists may impose on society while ignoring the welfare of society. Conversely, the exploitation of the environment is a profitable venture, and some political factions work to undermine environmental regulations so that they can exploit natural resources.

Environmentalism underscores the necessity for the protection of the earth’s resources and prudence in the utility of the resources that are needed for our survival on the planet. There is a need for the preservation of natural elements and resources since the survival and continuity of humanity are tied to them [ 19 ]. Environmentalism is advanced by environmentalists, who are agents of change in their pursuit to protect and restore ecosystems and habitats. Environmentalism is emerging as a profession, where environmentalists act as advocates for the environment at a certain civic or institutional level. The environmentalists help the entities to reach their set-out goals without compromising on the environment or devising ways in which they can advance the environmental goals within their context. Environmentalism faces the conflict that emanates from professional responsibility and moral responsibility. According to Campbell [ 20 ], the moral content of every profession varies, with some professions having very low moral content. He further says that every professional has to sometimes weigh what should take preeminence: professional responsibility or moral responsibility. If a professional thinks that the moral obligation outweighs the professional responsibility, then the individual may have to violate the professional responsibility to safeguard certain moral responsibilities. Sometimes, environmentalists have to deal with immoral actions against their very own institutions that have given them their profession to safeguard environmental interests. In such a case, the environmentalists are choosing to override their professional responsibility with their moral responsibility to the environment, for which they are advocates. Environmentalists and other professions have to constantly deal with the dilemma that pits professional responsibility and moral responsibility against each other.

2. Aim of the Study

Research indicates that environmental and ethical education has the potential of developing environmentalism among people. Heeren et al. [ 21 ] said that when individuals have the right knowledge about sustainability, and this knowledge is coupled with the right attitudes, then it is likely to be translated into positive behavior towards the environment. This study aims to highlight the dominant ideologies that research states are produced by moral education and environmental education. Further, this research examines the existing causality between environmentalism and moral consciousness as presented in different research. The objective is to offer a critical appraisal of the two arguments as possible pathways to developing environmentalism in society and give recommendations on the approaches that should be taken in moral and environmental education.

3. Methodology

3.1. identification phase.

We followed established procedures for systematic reviews [ 22 , 23 ] of scholarly literature on the effectiveness of environmental and moral education for better environmentalism. Systematic reviews can incorporate findings from various study designs and aid in navigating research-implementation spaces by encouraging thought, evaluating a variety of evidence, and respecting a diversity of approaches and epistemologies [ 24 ]. An extensive search was performed using multidisciplinary databases, including Google Scholar , Scopus , Science Direct , and Web of Science . The articles were found using the keywords environmental education, ecological education, moral education or ethical education in conjunction with climate change, global warming, biodiversity, species diversity, species loss, environmentalism, pro-environmental behavior, environmental friendly behavior, ecological behavior, green behavior, green purchasing, and green activities.

3.2. Screening Phase

In this phase, we studied each paper downloaded in the previous step and decided whether the paper should be selected or not for inclusion in our study. In summary, scholarly publications were extracted using the search criteria indicated above. After studying titles and abstracts, irrelevant research was eliminated, leaving a total of 77 important studies.

3.3. Eligibility Phase

At the eligibility stage, each study was evaluated in depth. The technique extracts the influence potential and the details of each journal’s experiments, which either performed or confirmed those guidelines. Numerous data analysis techniques were implemented to maintain an orderly count during the classification and sorting phase. Online resources and EndNote software were used to store the record collected from the reviewed papers, analyze the data, and make annotations.

3.4. Inclusion Phase

At this stage, the researchers performed a descriptive overview of the results extracted to effectively categorize the development plans and organize the encrypted data to answer concerns that influenced the literature review. This analysis shows that the influence of environmental and moral education on environmentalism is an evolving field of research, demonstrating a consistent rise in the number of publications in past decades. Inclusion and exclusion criteria were used to marginalize relevant and non-related research. All studies on environmental and moral education on environmentalism were included in the sample population. Inclusion requirements were based on a focused research topic as a prime precondition. Grey writings, i.e., summaries (included at a conference), compositions, and incomplete articles were excluded from the analysis. The database lists of all the studies were reviewed systematically to conduct such work. The search was not restricted in any way. We also searched the references of previous reviews. Moreover, we did not limit our search to studies published in a certain period. Our initial set consisted of more than a thousand papers. After removing all duplicate, non-peer-reviewed articles, and non-relevant articles, we reached a final set of 77 papers.

3.5. Evaluation of the Quality of the Studies

In the last stage of the process, any conflicts between the authors were discussed and resolved. The articles were then summarized, and the process of interpreting and categorizing the papers provided us with a wealth of valuable and stunning information. Given the fact that the methods are indirectly described in the abstract and methodological sections of the articles, the authors had to review the entire content of the papers and look at more knowledge to determine the particular approach used for environmental and moral education impact on environmentalism.

3.6. Data Analysis

The studies analyzed the correlation between environmental and moral education on effective environmentalism. All selected papers’ data related to the effect of environmental and moral education on effective environmentalism were evaluated. The results of the previous studies were used to derive the current study results. Analysis was performed based on the relationships among the study variables. We presented a more holistic picture based on critical and supporting arguments, which enabled us to prepare a critical review paper on the effective integration of environmental and moral education as a basis for building environmentalism.

4. Results and Discussion

4.1. correlation between moral consciousness and environmental education with environmentalism in research, 4.1.1. correlation between environmental education and environmentalism.

Environmental education aims to help build knowledge that will foster environmental sustainability. This capacity is built through the development of cognitive knowledge and a recognition of enlightenment on the place of environmentalism in society. Olli et al. [ 25 ] recognized that environmental sustainability can only be attained if people have the necessary knowledge about the environment. Further, ecological knowledge aids in the development of the right attitude and values toward sustainability efforts.

Environmental education is related to consumer-conscious behavior. Through the attainment of the necessary knowledge of products and services and their impact on the environment, consumers develop a consumption consciousness [ 26 ]. Through environmental awareness, consumers are persuaded to purchase environmentally friendly products, purchase products that are packaged with green materials, and use products that are grown organically. Individuals are also encouraged to use bicycles and public transport to reduce the carbon emissions from private cars. At an individualized level, environmental education inspires a healthy lifestyle. A healthy lifestyle includes maintaining a low ecological footprint, using resources thriftily, recycling and reusing, better soil management, waste management, sanitation, reducing waste, and reducing the exploitation of finite natural resources. Apart from changing consumption trends, environmental education inspires individuals to take actions that are meant to restore the degraded environment. Environmental education helps learners and citizens to try and acquire values that are important for environmental conservation.

Education on the environment facilitates the exploration of the challenges that are being faced by the environment. Further, education helps in developing awareness about environmental issues, and this is the precursor to developing solutions for environmental challenges [ 27 ]. Environmental education helps to inspire activism spanning from civic political machinations on the environment to efforts to reduce wastage of resources, reduction in carbon emissions, reduction of climate change effects, greening of the environment, the perseveration of air and water resources, and use of renewable energy. Activism then leads to policymakers being made aware of environmental issues that are of public interest, which consequently leads to legislation that helps to safeguard the environment. Through environmental education, individuals will be able to recognize how environmental issues such as climate change and global warming pose an urgent challenge for the global community. Contemporary environmentalism helps to deal with environmental challenges at the communal level as well as ameliorate the state of the space the community lives in.

4.1.2. Correlation between Environmentalism and Moral Consciousness

Moral consciousness helps individuals acquire a deliberate and purposeful conscious system of determining what is right and what is wrong. Moral and behavioral consciousness regulates different factors that are instrumental in decision making, which include the environment, existing culture, economic status, and intrinsic motivations [ 28 , 29 ]. Developing moral consciousness among people is instrumental in reviewing personal actions such as the consumption of fossil fuels, which is the largest source of environmental degradation and a major contributor to global warming [ 30 , 31 ].

Moral consciousness develops self-drive for following rules and regulations that govern the society of which they are a part. Saleem et al. [ 32 ] recognized that moral consciousness also helps to overcome social pressure while in pursuit of certain ends. By overcoming social pressure, individuals are compelled to take responsibility for their actions and utterances. This includes being sensitive to issues such as the environment and sustainability. Furthermore, moral education can change an individual’s perception and consequently lead to moral action in personal and social engagements. The integration of moral and environmental education is capable of producing better environmental attitudes, behavior, and intentions.

The moral component of individuals inspires positive behavior toward the environment, which then develops into environmentalism. According to Poškus [ 33 ], behavior is a cosmopolitan aspect that is a constituent of values, attitudes, personal norms, perceived behavioral control, intentionality, and intrinsic motivations. These aspects, values, and points of view can all be acquired through moral and environmental education. Moral education should highlight the relationship of man with nature and the stewardship role that man has [ 29 , 34 , 35 ]. Consequently, this steward role can drive man towards sustainability.

Poškus [ 33 ] investigated the motivation behind sustainable efforts, which include recycling, conserving water and electricity, and use of friendly transportation, among Lithuanian university students. The research found that personal values and norms are a predictor of behavior toward sustainability efforts. This finding is consistent with research by Poortinga et al. [ 36 ], which found that social norms influence the behavior of people. Poškus [ 33 ] found that values are stable and are not subject to change based on situations. The research from Poškus [ 33 ] also found that attitudes are not a good predictor of behavior since they are subject to change based on situations.

The consequentialist ethical theoretical reasoning is also a motivation for sustainability. The consequentialist theory holds that something is right or wrong based on its consequent outcomes. Environmentalism as an eco-social construct is informed by a causal structure that informs our perception and the consequent actions that we are willing to take as remedial to the pending doom [ 19 , 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 ]. Events such as rising sea levels, melting of polar ice, extinction of species, rising global temperatures, and desertification present a justification for a call to action. The moral component of the causation is strong since moral considerations take into account the effect of environmental degradation leading to a moral justification for sustainability efforts.

Moralistic and rationalistic motivations contribute to sustainability. Frey and Stutzer [ 41 ] stated that moralistic motivations are intrinsic, while rationalistic motivations such as the economics of conservation are extrinsic. The two types of motivations should be fostered in that they act in a complementary manner to advance environmental sustainability. On the one hand, extrinsic motivations through economic incentives such as tax breaks for green energy and tradable emission rights tend to motivate people and companies towards sustainability. On the other hand, intrinsic motivation such as morals, harmony, and beauty inspires an individual’s environmental sustainability [ 41 ]. Both types of motivations are acquired in environmental education, making it the enabler of environmental virtue acquisition.

4.1.3. Correlation between Ecological Civilization and Moral Education

Ecological civilization is the possession of certain values and developmental frameworks that further the existence of natural ecology, tending towards sustainability, the natural world, and averting devastation. Magdoff [ 42 ] asserted that an ecological civilization exists in harmony with systems of nature, exhibits diversity, and has a balanced fractal organization, life cycles, subsidiary, and symbiotic relationships. According to Chen and Zhao [ 43 ], ecological civilization exists within governmental frameworks and eco-socialism while contending with transcending capitalism [ 44 ].

Blinc et al. [ 45 ] stated that it is the moral duty of man to leave the world the same as they found it or to make it better for future generations while noting that man’s moral obligation is to meet their personal needs without compromising the ability of the future generations to meet their needs as well. The international community recognizes this mandate. Their effort is reflected in The United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP), which has 17 goals that seek to address the challenges that range from climate change to rampant poverty, and they are all anchored in creating sustainable development [ 46 ]. Their 2030 agenda is to protect the planet from degradation through sustainable management of resources, production processes and consumption, and action to mitigate climate change.

The level of ecological awareness, respect for nature, restoration, and protection of the environment needs to be developed across the world [ 47 ]. The pathway toward ecological civilization will be charted through the creation of a moralistic society that understands what needs to be done to create a sustainable future. Moral education and ecological responsibility should start as soon as children are enrolled in grade school. This early instruction and molding will ensure that children develop from level 1 where they lack norms, grow through level 2 where norms are developed by their instructors, and finally become part of level 3 where norms are internalized [ 48 ]. Ecological civilization needs to be developed into an ideological education, which should be integrated into the courses learned in universities and colleges [ 49 ]. The university stage is a value-forming life stage and a personality-formation stage as well. The focus should be to enable the learners to develop values that will inspire them towards ecological contribution and activate their sense of responsibility and sustainable living. Chang, et al. [ 50 ] said that instructors should inculcate environmental education into the social life of the learners to stimulate ecological consciousness and direct their ecological conduct. Zhang [ 47 ] noted that in an increasingly digitized and technologically advanced world, there is a need to integrate technology into environmental learning to capture the essence and accrued benefits of technology in environmental education and applications.

4.2. The Importance of Moral and Environmental Education for Effective Environmentalism

4.2.1. the necessity of environmental education in nature.

Environmental education and planning are important to safeguard the future of mankind on the planet. According to Callicott [ 49 ], the integrity and the stability of human civilization are at stake. Most peculiar among Callicott’s concerns is that the world is heading to another mass extinction event. Callicott [ 49 ] stated that mankind is not likely to survive until the end of the first century of the 3000 millennia. This prediction is based on explosive population growth, the scarcity of resources, runaway global warming, and climate change. There is a need to reevaluate the place of wo/man in his daily existence and the implications of their actions on the grand existential system [ 51 ]. Attention should be given to a shared future, where the community and individuals are seen as entangled with nature in a reciprocal partnership. Significantly, Bonnett [ 51 ] argued that attention should be drawn not just to the human world but also to non-anthropocentrism as a remedy to the threats to nature. Human discussions need to be accompanied by discussions of the place they exist in, as they are intertwined, eliminating the othering of nature.

The attitude towards labor and environmental protection is bolstered by environmental education, leading learners to develop a desire to take care of the environment, participate voluntarily, and defend environmental actions autonomously [ 52 ]. Environmental education based on natural experiences, such as being in forests and bushes, help to develop non-anthropocentric perspectives [ 51 ]. Further, the experiences enlighten learners on the interconnectedness of nature and man’s existence while highlighting the flaws in anthropocentric thinking. Learners also acquire a goal-oriented and planned mental framework in their approach to the environment, where they get a chance to develop eccentric models [ 52 ].

Environmental education inspires environmentalism within society. Eichinger et al. [ 53 ] found that sustainability efforts through education lead to greater efficacy in energy use, effective use of materials, reduction in several utility costs, reduction in the carbon footprint of the campus community, reduction in the amount of waste produced within the campus, increased awareness among the campus community on sustainability, and the creation of a greener campus and image. There is low awareness of professional values that are congruent with environmental ethics. As such, there is a need for a set of principles that sets the moral boundaries to act as a guide for professional and personal responsibility [ 48 ]. Educationists, policymakers, and instructors set environmental ethics boundaries through environmental education. This aids in offsetting a professional’s psychological setting of environmental ethics as an abstract concept to professional competence and personal value [ 54 ].

Through education on environmental ethics, it is possible to safeguard environmental entities that are vulnerable including the forests, the oceans, the land, and the climate. The above elements are precursors for agricultural productivity and wealth from the seas, which are critical for human survival. Having adequate food reserves is a large component of sustainability. There is a need for recognition that the threat to nature is also a threat to humanity. Callicott [ 49 ] stated that it is only through environmental ethics that the stability, integrity, and future of the globe will be safeguarded.

Environmental education is also a tool for dealing with many world problems. Some of these problems include global warming, desertification, climate change, and the extinction of species. Baker et al. [ 14 ] recognized that environmental education changes the behavior of people and helps develop plans to bolster sustainability. Jickling and Spork [ 35 ] said that many of the problems that are being faced in the world, especially social and environmental challenges, are due to individuals not asking themselves about the ethical implications and consequences of actions being undertaken. Asking ethical questions can help to spur discussions about sustainability and conservation [ 55 ].

4.2.2. The Necessity of Moral Education in the Nature

Taneja and Gupta [ 56 ] stated that past environmental efforts have for the most past focused on sensitization on environmental issues and that there is a need to inculcate the ethical component of environmentalism to spur actions that safeguard the environment. The purpose of moral education is to craft moral behavior and moral consciousness among people since values are produced by moral education [ 57 ]. This association is based on the tenet that there is a complementary duality between cognitive faculties and behavior. Moral education is a means towards presetting the cognitive, leading to an acquisition of predispositions of what is right and wrong.

Moral education highlights one of the significant moral issues, which is environmental injustice. Many of the poor depend on environmental aspects such as rainfall and forests for subsistence. Degradation of the environment is therefore injustice and leads to a proliferation of inequality. Major industrial nations such as the USA, China, and Germany have been emitting most of the greenhouse gases. However, the larger cost of this damage is on the developing countries, as they have to try to balance economic development with environmental needs. Environmental ethics turns to industrialized nations for admonitions. The industrialized world must pay a greater share of responsibility for mitigating climate change and global warming trends [ 58 ].

Moral education is a lighthouse in creating a secure global environment and directing actions meant to develop the economy, society, and the environment. Moral education teaches interdependence, cooperation towards the attainment of certain shared goals, and living in harmony with other people and the environment in which they live. Education and moral consciousness are instrumental in the formulation of strategies to reverse the effects of runaway climate change and global warming, which is threatening food security, ecological balance, and natural habitats. Moral education also extends to trade, as identified by Ha-Brookshire et al. [ 59 ], who said that it helps to train current and future professionals so that they can build sustainable companies and supply chains that cut across the globe. Begum et al. [ 31 ] noted that pro-environmental behavior is developed as a result of moral education. Further, moral education leads to a recognition of the common future of mankind, which leads to a global partnership [ 60 ]. It is a time of ecological devastation, as identified by Narvaez [ 61 ], and the only salvation for mankind is raising a generation of people who are virtuous and connected to their world. Moralistic individuals will reverse the modern problems that have been caused by self-centeredness, aggression, alienation of man from his environment, and disconnect from the natural world. Moralistic individuals will exist in concert with the ecologies, advancing sustainability across the globe [ 61 ].

4.3. Counter Argument

Some researchers have claimed that environmental education does not translate into actions that are focused on sustainability. Heeren et al. [ 21 ] performed research in the USA among university students, and they concluded that knowledge has a weak correlation with behavior. According to him, knowledge is a weak predictor of the behavior of people. However, he did discount the presence of a combination of knowledge with social and psychological factors as an influence on behavior. Similar research was conducted by Hasiloglu and Kunduraci [ 62 ] to determine the correlation between environmental awareness and consequent behavior and practices among learners. The research found that even if learners had high scores on the Attitudes Toward the Environment Scale (ATES), these scores were not reflected in their practices and behaviors towards the environment. The absence of positive behaviors and attitudes towards the environment was interpreted as a lack of environmental awareness.

Gifford and Chen [ 63 ] investigated the reason behind poor environmental attitudes and behaviors. The research found that there were psychological barriers that prevented the conversion of environmental knowledge into consequent behaviors. Heeren et al. [ 21 ] also indicated that there is a weak correlation bivariate between behavior and knowledge according to research they conducted, concluding that knowledge cannot be a predictor of behavior. Shove [ 64 ] said that efforts to change individual behaviors are not successful in that they are focused on changing individual beliefs as the precursor to changing behavior. Many young people do understand the importance of environmentally friendly practices. However, many of them see the dangers that are posed to the environment as being the larger aspects that contribute to global pollution and not individual actions, which are local [ 65 ]. Some believe that their actions safeguard the environment of the future, according to research by Meinhold and Malkus [ 66 ]. Myers et al. [ 67 ] asserted that environmental education is an effective tool for the development of knowledge and positive attitudes toward the environment. However, they noted that this knowledge does not translate to behavioral change. The disconnect identified by the researchers did not lead them to proclaim that it is futile to conduct environmental education. This gap can be sealed by the finding of research by Heeren et al. [ 21 ]. According to Heeren et al. [ 21 ], as much as knowledge is not a predictor of behavior, if it is accompanied by appropriate norms and values, it has the potential of influencing the behavior of individuals. The challenge is identifying an effective approach to environmental education that will result in greater environmental awareness and consequent behavior. Based on the arguments presented and the countering argument, a holistic environmental education not only encompasses environmental knowledge but also advances moral education so that the two facets can complement each other.

5. Recommendations in Research for Moral and Environmental Education

5.1. recommendations for holistic moral education.

The effectiveness of moral education is its ability to develop a moral consciousness. Moral education should also focus on building a moral consciousness. One of the effective moral education approaches is religious education. Religious education is an instrumental tool for moral education development and consequently leads to the development of moral consciousness. Religious education seeks to shape individual reasoning and feelings to produce cognitive behavior that is moralistic. When an individual has internalized religious morality, it acts as a catalyst for observation of norms through the providence of motivational support. In the scriptures, there is moral consciousness that is manifested in followers of the different sects. This moral conscience is acquired by individuals when they are assimilated into the scriptural teachings and practices that accompany certain religions. In the research conducted by Estrada et al. [ 68 ], 55% of the individuals who practiced moral behavior attributed it to their religious affiliations. This finding indicates that moral beliefs found in religious education are the recipe for moral behavior among some people. Religious practice is cyclic, and this makes religious principles dwell on the conscious level, strengthening moral principles.

Creating a moral atmosphere within the school and the community where certain values are being forged can foster the development of moral consciousness [ 69 ]. This is because morals are acquired by individuals from their environment and the content of their moral education. According to Araujo and Arantes [ 37 ], values are not predispositions in people, and neither can they be easily internalized, but they are rather a product of a continuum of socialization through objective and subjective actions. Through day-to-day association with other people, lived experiences, and internal musings, individuals get to adapt and practice certain values. Further, Araujo and Arantes [ 37 ] said that individuals should be understood from the naturalistic approach, which purports that human perception of reality is a derivative of different social contexts. If there is a culture of morality, and ethical principles guide the actions of individuals in a certain environment, then the inclinations of the members of the community will tend toward moral personhood [ 51 ]. This position is supported by Aristotle, who said that the actualization of virtues in an individual is a product of the support and impressions made on an individual by the community of which they are a part. One of the ways of helping the community to own up and craft its moral direction is through periodic forums that interrogate their moral direction and craft projects that reinforce their moral direction [ 37 ]. These forums should include all members of the community, including the NGOs, the management, staff, and students, among others. Ethical themes that emanate from these forums should be integrated into the learning framework and the community engagements.

Moral education should be accompanied by moral leadership to create a consciousness of morality at an institutional level. Institutional administrators and instructors should be beacons of morality to inspire the learners to emulate them [ 26 ]. Bacchini et al. [ 39 ] researched the effect of exposure to deviant contexts on moral grounding among teenagers. The research found that the students exposed to high deviance ended up exhibiting moral decadence, the genesis of which is in peer groups. This finding confirms the postulation of the domain theory that states wo/man’s behavior is shaped by the domains of which they are a part [ 40 ]. Individual actions are subject to change based on domain and are constantly molded by justifications to escape harm, administer justice, and ensure the welfare of the subjects involved [ 38 ]. Walsemann et al. [ 70 ] said that it is important to integrate values in the formative years of children and learners since their formative values have a residual effect in later years.

Moral education and reasoning should be extended to all areas of life, including leisure activities. Leisure is a large part of learners’ lives, and it should be used as an avenue for creating a moral consciousness. Kowasch and Lippe [ 19 ] claimed that the scarcity of inquiry into the ethics of some leisure practices is partly to blame for the low social and professional preparedness of students. An awareness of the intricacies of leisure activities in the environment should be created to enable students to be prepared to use moral judgment in recreation activities. Further, education should be advanced through a sociological critique of leisure activities. This will aid in the growth of environmental consciousness and reduce the pedestrian reasoning influenced by the diversity of factors.

There is a need to simulate real-life applications in moral education to equip learners with real-life capabilities and develop their moral consciousness. Often, moral reasoning on environmental sustainability is plagued by moral dilemmas [ 71 ]. Indecision on what action to take can be eliminated through an approach where knowledge is not mere indoctrination but a proactive process where learners construct meanings and develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills [ 71 ]. As such, there is a need for the creation of an ecosystem where holistic thinking can be fostered through knowledge and action-based learning. Požarnik [ 71 ] carried out research on moral reasoning in environmental dilemmas among 11–15-year-olds. The context of the research was investigating the decisions that the learners could make if faced with a moral dilemma that involves suitability efforts as well as economic factors of the individuals involved. Polzarnik’s research found that the learners were unable to make decisions when confronted with moral dilemmas. This is a reflection of the gaps in moral education, which does not equip learners with the capability to process real-life situations that learners will encounter despite their extensive moral education.

Moral education should be structured in a way that will facilitate harmony in the development of religious morality and moralistic consciousness. Religious values are a complement to moral education. This is because moral education equips individuals with intellectual principles, while religious morals develop affective states. This makes the two sides work in coherence to bring about unity in actions and thoughts. There is a need for an interdisciplinary approach to moral education, as identified by Denisa [ 57 ]. This is because it is not only in the religious and educational sector that morals become impressed on the individual, but it also happens within the cultural predisposition, artistic representation, and sporting field, among others. Denisa [ 49 ] recognized that moral education does not teach all the moral grounds that one is supposed to adopt. However, it does create a suitable internal environment that facilitates the internalization of the aspects that constitute social morality. This happens through a systematic change in the personality structure of an individual, which is the driving force of moral conduct [ 70 ].

5.2. Morals Consciousness Development through the Ubuntu and Ukamu Concepts

Values and moral consciousness are inherent in the internalized value system, such as Ubuntu. The Ubuntu concept of humanness, which has its genesis in Sub-Saharan Africa, is defined in terms of the relationship of an individual with other people in a positive way [ 72 ]. Based on this concept, one only becomes a person through other people, as expressed in its “Nguni Expression” [ 73 ]. The Ubuntu concept also highlights that the most supreme obligation of mankind is to others. One needs to act in a benevolent, just, and truthful way to realize one’s humanity. Grange [ 72 ] also noted that community is the other dimension of the Ubuntu concept, where harmonious living following community values is emphasized as deeper relationships with other people. Coghlan and Brydon-Miller [ 73 ] said that Ubuntu can best be seen as a social philosophy with its grounding in taking care of family and the community, living in harmony with other people, and being hospitable to other people, being respectful, and expressing a sense of community. Ubuntu also underlines the need for collaboration and cooperation to build a strong community. Altruism is advanced through Ubuntu, harmony, and synergy between humanity and nature. The moral obligation that is domiciled in Ubuntu extends not only to other humans but also to other non-human entities such as the environment. Coghlan and Brydon-Miller [ 73 ] said that the Ubuntu concept is an alternative to individualistic and utilitarian concepts, which have their roots in Western countries. Ubuntu is being advanced in an African Renaissance, especially in different reformations that are taking place in education and public service. Van Breda [ 74 ] stated that the Ubuntu concept advocates for the development of ethics, sustainability, and an eco-spiritual attitude.

Closely linked to Ubuntu is Ukamu, which, according to Murove [ 75 ], is a concept that encompasses relatedness to the larger universe. This concept advances the idea that there is an ecological togetherness that is forged by the relationship between humans, ecology, and the spiritual being. Tangwa [ 76 ] confirmed this assertion when he said that Africa is convinced that all of the cosmos is an intricate interrelation of humans, plants, earth, and animals. Alluding to the Ubuntu and Ukamu concepts, Grange [ 72 ] stated that the goal of education should be to create personhood among learners with a focus on the community in the natural world so that they can value their shared destiny in society and the elements that safeguard the continuity of their community.

Ubuntu and Ukamu offer alternative worldviews for social transformation toward sustainability, downplaying economic incentives. Markets are crowding morals, and competition is relegating environmental issues to secondary positions, giving way to the growth of vices. Ubuntu and Ukamu ideologies create fully rational beings whose priorities are anchored in virtues. Through the advocacies that Ubuntu and Ukamu represent lies the potential of developing a moral consciousness in people that will drive a positive attitude towards social relations and the environment.

5.3. Moral Consciousness Development through Environmental Education

Environmental education contributes to the development of moral consciousness. According to Jickling and Spork [ 35 ], the actions being adapted to save nature in the world reflect societal ethics, with the accords and treaties being made on environmentalism amplifying the clarion call for a more ethical humanity. Felber [ 54 ] advocated for the creation of an economy that is inclusive through democratic systems of governance, sustainability, social justice, and dignity for all people, implying that morality and sustainability work in collaboration. Zsóka and Ásványi [ 77 ] found that education on sustainability develops instructions into value-based conduct and actions. The social support in which an individual exists is responsible for shaping an individual’s personality [ 61 ]. Kowasch and Lippe [ 19 ] said that when learners are engaged in an inquiry into consumption and production, values and morality become part of the dialogue.

Environmental education is a recipe for advancing ideologies that line up with virtue. Forgas and Jolliffe [ 29 ] researched the relationship between environmental concerns with political attitudes and libertarian attitudes. The research found that greater environmental concern had a direct correlation with radical political views. The radical political views identified include a lack of ethnocentrism, anti-free enterprise rhetoric, and economic conservatism. Further, the research also found that higher environmental concerns were associated with libertarian attitudes, which cut across different ethical and moral spheres. Such libertarian attitudes include advocacy for more ethical governance and equality. Forgas and Jolliffe [ 29 ] traced the genesis and the progression of environmentalism over the last century, and according to them, environmentalism gained most prominence in the 1960s. Furthermore, the efforts to care for the earth are congruent with traditional ideals, and to some extent, they are a component of religious moral practice. There is an association between the rampant environmentalism that emanated and the social libertarianism that occurred in the 1960s, especially in the West [ 78 ].

6. Recommendations for Environmental Education

According to Littledyke [ 10 ], cognitive development is most eminent in early childhood development and adolescent years. Through this stage, ideas are assimilated into the brain’s schemas in a way to adapt to the existing environment. As brains undergo biological maturation, the cognitive conflicts emanating from conflicting environmental information become ironed out, and individuals become aware of their learning. Through this tenet, it becomes apparent that moral reasoning and environmental education impressed upon the developmental brain go through maturation over the developmental stage and consequently become part of the mental framework in later life. It is imperative that during this developmental stage, great effort should be applied towards environmental awareness, forging environmental literacy, fostering environmental responsibility, and growing environmental competence [ 48 ]. Pedagogical initiatives that have environmental concerns should be introduced in this developmental stage to influence the children’s moral and cognitive development [ 10 ].

Individual behavior and reasoning are influenced by several factors, which include age, culture, intrinsic motivations, environment [ 29 ], social pressure, and information that is available to them [ 64 , 65 , 66 , 79 ]. As such, environmental education needs to be holistic so that environmental consciousness can be manifested in all the different facets of an individual. Reducing the monotony and rigidity that is associated with lectures and lessons on environmental responsibility is one of the ways of making it holistic [ 52 ]. The internalization of environmental education is forged by personal experience and by presenting it in an interdisciplinary manner. Using environmental challenges that challenge the ability of individuals to respond responsibly positions the environment as being worthy of important social action [ 28 ]. Actions such as watering plants and protecting trees from deforestation are tangible accomplishments that help to build a positive attitude and commitment toward environmental sustainability. The labor that the students put into environmental conservation will also teach them respect for labor and strengthen their belief that physically working to improve the environment is a worthwhile cause. “Reduce, Re-use, and Re-cycle” strategies should be encouraged among learners. Further, the learners will learn to shift the focus of their actions from themselves and to expand it to the environment, which is an element of selflessness [ 52 ].

Environmental education campaigns should be launched in schools, where the students can be equipped with environment-protection knowledge and participate in taking care of plants and the environment [ 52 ]. Participation in environment-protection day and consequent activities will strengthen the collective spirit and mental attitude toward environmental sustainability. Another educative process is organizing periodic symposiums and conferences on sustainability. These could also create excitement about conservation among learners as they exchange ideas about sustainability [ 80 ]. Organizing green exhibitions for students is also a proactive way of approaching environmental education. Learners can present projects and give speeches on their environmental ideas. According to Jie [ 13 ], learners educate themselves through organizing and performances. Another potent idea is the organization of summer camps that are structured around environmental protection. Fun activities that involve nature, conservation of resources, and keeping nature clean would help to prop up the personal and collective responsibility towards the environment. Participation in non-governmental organizations among learners should be encouraged, as they get to participate in environmental sustainability on a larger scale [ 81 ]. The above proactive efforts must be cyclic to keep environmental issues and commitment toward sustainability alive in the students’ minds until it becomes an integral part of their thought processes.

Active environmental learning and education should be scaled based on the level of understanding and commitment of the learners. At the infancy stage of environmental learning and for lower grade school, learners could be requested to take care of a flower bed, a lawn, or a few trees. Leaners in higher grade schools can be assigned larger environmental areas for which to care. Friendly competitions among the students and classes on who took care of their assigned sections would also help develop environmental responsibility and collective responsibility. To further strengthen environmental learning, environmental programs can be expanded to the community, where the learners take care and participate in community environmental programs and activities. The learners can be assigned pieces of the community’s green pastures to care for through cutting grass, watering and trimming trees, or even picking leaves [ 81 ].

The environment within which students exist should also inspire environmental sustainability. This can be done through the implementation of green campuses and spaces in learning institutions. Green technology in campuses and other institutions of learning should be used, and this includes the use of solar energy, and recycling [ 81 ]. There should be open spaces that have trees, waterways, lawns, and flower beds, creating a micro-climate within the campus premises and its surrounding. The learners should navigate through these ecosystems as they go about their studies and other activities, creating a feeling of oneness with nature. Such ecosystems will also enrich the quality of life of the learners on the campus [ 82 ]. De Graaff and Kolmos [ 83 ] highlighted that effective learning should adopt a problem–solution framework and also a project-based framework.

Problem-solving techniques should be integrated as part of the learning process to inspire the learners to become curious and problem solvers. Further, the problem-solving learning process should focus on real-life case scenarios and practical aspects that can be implemented within the learning environment and surrounding community [ 83 ]. Lindberg et al. [ 84 ] advocated for the use of the design thinking approach, which is a human-centered approach to designing educational programs. This approach is a conglomeration of different disciples that works iteratively to spur a culture of innovation. At the center of the design is a focus on the individuals that are involved. Specifically, an examination of the focus groups, their driving force, and aspirations is undertaken, after which the programs are created and are tailor-made on the focus groups. The design thinking approach is a problem-solution approach and seeks to drive frameworks that serve a specific group of individuals or societies [ 37 ].

Castro and Jabbour [ 8 ] presented a framework for a sustainable campus that can also be used to evaluate the level of sustainability in campuses that are used globally. The framework has three factions strands: first is university EMS (environmental management services), second is public participation and social responsibility, and the third is sustainable teaching and research. The EMS is a constituent of the environmental management and improvement processes that reduces the carbon footprint of the campus and fosters a green campus. The public participation and social responsibility element involve the formation of a partnership among all the stakeholders of the university to advance public participation, community service, and social justice. Sustainability teachings involve educational activities that include coursework and curriculum, research and development, conferences, seminars, and workshops [ 8 ].

7. Implications and Conclusions

The combination of moral and environmental education eliminates one-sided indoctrination, creating a cosmopolitan set of ideologies that offers justification for avoiding harm and ensuring justice, rights, and welfare of the environment. The emanation of environmentalism as a desideratum to drive the conscience in knowledge and pursuit at an individual as well as a communal level is the sole purpose of environmental education. On the other hand, moral education seeks to change the personality of individuals so that they can be aligned with the values, attitudes, and behaviors that drive environmentalism. Contrary research indicates that environmental knowledge cannot change the behavior of people towards the environment in isolation. However, when environmental knowledge is coupled with moralistic values, there is a possibility of change in individual behavior towards the environment.

This research has found that environmental education is largely deficient at the university level and at high school and grade school levels as well. Most learners have pedestrian knowledge and a low level of commitment to environmental issues. The partial understanding and efforts that most learners exhibit are inherent to the accrued experiences about environmentalism during their studies. The learning period is a formative stage for learners, where their personalities, personal values, and behavior are forged, which directs them for most of their later life. Moral and environmental education must be instilled in them in these formative years of their lives to create a conscience that will always foster environmental responsibility. Significantly proactive environmental education is more potent as an educational instrument as compared to passive environmental education. The integration of concepts such as Ubuntu and Ukamu in education systems will facilitate an intrinsic change in personality and perceptions towards environmentalism. Further, environmental education should also be extended to the community to facilitate the integration of ethics, values, skills, and attitude toward sustainability.

Funding Statement

This research received no external funding.

Author Contributions

A.B. and J.L. conceived, designed, and wrote the paper; A.B. and H.Q. helped with research and provided directive on the structure of the paper; H.Q. and A.M. helped in revising the paper. All authors contributed to writing of the paper on different sections present. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Institutional Review Board Statement

Not applicable.

Informed Consent Statement

Data availability statement, conflicts of interest.

The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.

Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

• Latest updates
• About 4 Pillars
• Our story so far
• Pilot Schools
• UAE Principals Symposium
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Volunteering Opportunities
• Our Morals Our World Competition
• Course Resources

Students Activities

Complete puzzles, do crosswords, and more at the Hub. These activities are not only a fun pastime, but also keep your mind active, challenge you to think outside the box, and leave you with a sense of pride when you complete them!

A Moral Puzzle

Did you know that puzzle activities are over 250 years old? This ancient but popular pastime is also packed full of benefits like sharpening your focus, developing cognitive dexterity and…

Spot the Morals!

Have you ever wondered why search games are so enjoyable? It’s all down to visual search, a basic but very satisfying element of the cognitive process. Our brains guide our…

Memory with Morals

Did you know activities that engage you to think critically and analyze can help improve your memory and concentration skills? Use our activity below to test your memory and keep…

Meal Planner – What’s on My Plate?

Let’s think about food! It’s important to eat a balanced diet to stay healthy. The easiest way to accomplish this, is with a little bit of meal planning. When you…

Find the Moral Word Search!

Solving a word search is great for more than one reason! It’s a new challenge, it increases memory and brain development, and even helps you improve your mood and relax…

Artistic Interpretation

It’s time to explore your creative side and put your skills to the test! Creating art is not only a fun pastime, but also an outlet to relax and a…

Moral Education is an innovative, engaging curriculum designed to develop young people of all nationalities and ages in the UAE with universal principles and values, that reflect the shared experiences of humanity.

In a growing knowledge-based economy and an increasingly interdependent world, there is a need for a holistic approach to education. The program encourages youth to explore questions core to everyday life, building on the cultural values shared across the UAE’s diverse communities.

It promotes character building to develop the next generation of role models and leaders, who contribute positively to the long-term health and well-being of society and the wide world. Adopting a logical approach, the program fosters universal concepts relevant to any community.

Quick Links

• What is Moral Education?
• Get Involved

TWITTER #UAEMoralEducation

Instagram #uaemoraleducation.

Copyright 2017 © Moral Education | All Rights Reserved

[ Placeholder content for popup link ] WordPress Download Manager - Best Download Management Plugin

• The Yale Review

• Volume 111, Number 1, Spring 2023
• Johns Hopkins University Press

Additional Information

• A Moral Education
• Garth Greenwell (bio)

Milena Mihaylova, Silence , via Creative Commons.

[End Page 12]

I: the dilemma

here's a way of putting the problem: on one hand we want art to be free, and on the other we want it to mean. Not just to mean, but to be meaningful—to be useful for, and so maybe responsible to, other realms of life: our sense of community, say, or politics, our moral relations. As often happens when competing positions have claims to truth, the pendulum of consensus swings between them, and the pendulum has swung quite far, in recent years, toward the pole of responsibility and holding art to account. Within the small world of people who care about literature and art, the culture is as moralistic it has ever been in my lifetime: witness our polemics [End Page 13] about who has the right to what subject matter, our conviction that art has a duty to right representational wrongs, that poems or novels or films can be guilty of a violence that seems ever less metaphorical against an audience construed as ever more vulnerable. We have a sense that the most important questions we can ask about a work of art are whether and to what extent it furthers extra-artistic aims, to what extent it serves a world outside itself. The idea that artists should make what they feel compelled to make, regardless of such considerations, that in fact art should be protected from responsibilities of this kind, seems part and parcel of a discredited Romantic model of the artist as exempt from workaday morality, licensed by genius to act badly, or at least to disregard the claims of others. When I work with students now, graduate or undergraduate, their primary mode of engagement with a text often seems to be a particular kind of moral judgment, as though before they can see anything else in stories or poems they have to sort them into piles of the righteous and the problematic. These responses sometimes seem to me an index of an anxiety I see more and more in my students, in my friends and myself, a kind of paranoia about our own moral status, a desire to demonstrate our personal righteousness in our response to art.

Such responses can sometimes place me in what seems an antipathetic relationship to my students as they fail to respond as I wish they would to books that I love. But this is a false antipathy, or a misplaced one; really my students and I share the most important values, and our visions of a desirable world, and even of the place of art within it, overlap far more than they diverge. When I was beginning my literary education in the 1990s, the pendulum hovered close to the other pole; at least among a certain cadre of poets and literary scholars, maybe in response to moralistic crusades of the '70s and '80s, a doctrine of ars gratia artis reigned. I chafed against that, too. To treat art as purely aesthetic, a question merely of formal exploration and sensuous experience, is one way to preempt the claims of moralism, as is treating art as exclusively play, a stage for invention and virtuosity. (To be clear, I think art can be all these things, all of them valuable.) [End Page 14] Another, more extreme claim for the freedom of art is articulated in Maggie Nelson's "Art Song," which entertains a conception of art as "a metabolic activity, a 'way of churning the world.'" In my darker moments I sometimes think it's true that art is simply a biological process, shorn of significance; but I'm not sure it's a truth I can live with, a story to tell about myself that I can bear. Certainly it's not an adequate account of my experience of art, of what I would continue to call "great" art, though greatness is another idea called into question in our anti-exceptionalist moment. Maybe it's a delusion to think that the central activity of my life, art making, has more significance than digestion; maybe it's a saving delusion. One reason a particular strain of our current moralism—the strain that would subject artists to tests of acceptability, that says we shouldn't consume art made by bad people—is so dismaying is that it sees works of art as endlessly fungible, just another commodity on the market. There's so much art available to us, this reasoning goes; there's nothing Lolita or The Enigma of Arrival or Wise Blood might offer that we can't find in a writer less problematic than Nabokov or Naipaul or O'Connor. But a profound experience of art is an experience of something like love, which is to say of singularity; when you've had a profound encounter with Giovanni's Room , say, or a portrait by Alice Neel, you can't imagine swapping it out for something more conveniently affirming of social values we cherish. This affinity is more mysterious than evaluation or ranking or canon-formation; it seems to me analogous to other relationships we form. The love I feel for my partner or my friends isn't the result of comparative evaluation, it isn't founded on a claim that of all candidates I've judged them worthiest. The question of comparison doesn't enter; they are simply themselves, incommensurate, irreplaceable. My life wouldn't be my life without them, as my life wouldn't be my life without any number of artists who failed, in various ways large and small, to be excellent outside their art.

The value I find in the art I love seems different from and greater than formal experiment or technical display, greater than play, certainly greater than "metabolic churning." Art has a value [End Page 15] that seems to me moral, and, like my students, like much of what we've taken to calling The Discourse, with its purity tests and cancelations, its groupthink and dismissal, I want to think of art making as an activity with moral implications. More, I want to place it at the heart of one way of striving toward a moral life, by which I mean at the heart of our attempt to live flourishingly with others, or at least bearably and with minimal harm. The problem is that, in much of our discussion of art, I think we've made a mistake about what moral engagement is , and so what art's role in it might be. In much of our commentary, there's a desire for art to be exemplary, to present a world the moral valence of which, whether positive or negative, is easily legible; there's a desire for the work of art to provide an index of judgment clearly predicated on values the reader can approve. We want the work to give us a place to stand that grants access to righteousness, a place from which to judge a work or its characters. But more and more I question the role of this kind of judgment in moral life. I don't mean the constant, shifting, provisional evaluations we make moment-to-moment, the moral echolocation by which we position ourselves and our actions. I mean the act of coming to judgment, to a verdict: of assigning someone a durable or even permanent moral status. This is sometimes necessary, of course, though maybe less often than we suspect; it's what we do, hopefully with some seriousness, in courts of law, and what we do sometimes flippantly, recklessly, in social media campaigns for de-platforming and cancelation. The seriousness of our verdicts depends in large part on the density of their contextualization; and, since the context of a human life is so nearly depthless and made up of such incommensurable elements, ideally righteous judgment is impossible. To be bearable, to be plausibly adequate, even our imperfect, sublunary judgments require an immense amount of work; the idea that we might carry that work out on social media is one of the genuinely repulsive aspects of our moment. I am immensely grateful, every day, that judging others in this way is not my job. The best thing about being a novelist, in fact, is that my job is actively to resist coming to [End Page 16] such judgment. Plausibly adequate verdicts may be a necessary feature of the real world, but they are never necessary in matters of art.

When we place this kind of definitive moral judgment at the heart of our engagement with others, assigning a person or a work a status as problematic or righteous, we make a mistake about what a moral relationship to another is , I think. If a moral relationship means to live with or beside another in such a way as to recognize the value of their life as being equal to and independent of our own—that impossible, necessary Kantian standard—then passing judgment is the abrogation of that relationship: it destroys the reciprocity necessary for moral relation, it establishes a hierarchy utterly corrosive of it. This is another reason to reject the idea that we should only consume art made by good people: Who am I to judge the goodness of another? (For all the ravages of Calvinism in America, one misses a sense of the inscrutability of election.) Coming to judgment in this way is anathema to the novelist because the task of art isn't to judge, but to know, to observe, to carry out research into the human—and passing judgment is a radically impoverished form of knowledge. An important part of the moral work of art is to teach us how much richer and more capacious our engagement with others can be.

This essay is an attempt to clarify my sense of what the relationship between art and morality might be, since the loudest accounts of that relationship in our moment seem to me inadequate. To help think that through, I want to consider how a book that flouts all our pieties about decency and responsibility, about sociality and moral uplift, a novel about a rancidly obscene, sexually voracious, inveterately grieving puppeteer—Philip Roth's Sabbath's Theater , probably the filthiest major American novel I know—seems to me as powerful an example of morally engaged art as English-language literature can offer. More, I want to test my intuition that it is precisely the book's obscenity, its determination to shock and affront, to "let the repellent in" ("fuck the laudable ideologies," cries its hero), that, far from hindering the moral work it does, is central to that work. If the great moral question is how to live bearably [End Page 17] with others, Sabbath's Theater pursues an answer through the very things that make the novel's protagonist morally repulsive—the very things that, by our current standards of what is acceptable in art, should place the novel beyond our regard. A moral education depends not on condemning or averting our gaze from filth, the novel suggests, but on diving wholeheartedly into it.

filth 1: an etymology

at the center of Roth's novel, which chronicles three days in the breakdown of Mickey Sabbath, a disgraced, arthritic, sixty-four-year-old puppeteer, is Sabbath's grief for the loss of Drenka Balich, the married Croatian innkeeper with whom he had a thirteen-year affair until her death, of a ferociously swift cancer, six months before the novel's present action begins. If this present-day timeline pulls the novel forward, however, the bulk of the narrative is entirely unmoored in time, roaming over Sabbath's past with special attention to his relationships with women: the prostitutes who provided his sexual initiation as an adolescent in the merchant marines; his first wife, whose disappearance haunts him; the undergraduate whose recording of their phone sex has made him a pariah; his current, despised wife, Roseanna, a recovering alcoholic who is bracing herself to separate from him. Expelled from his home, Sabbath returns to the landscapes of his past: New York City and, in the book's astonishing final movement, the Jersey Shore, where his idyllic childhood, what he characterizes as an experience of endlessness, was shattered by his beloved brother's death in World War II. The novel is a fulfillment of currents already present in Roth's work—Sabbath is a Portnoy without the complaint, all erotic id without any tortured compulsion to be good—and also it represents something entirely new. It has a formal freedom and linguistic virtuosity unmatched in his earlier books, and a profundity in grappling with the absolutes of existence—sex, love, need, the urge to make, the irrevocability of death and the inescapability of grief—I'm not sure Roth ever achieved again. It is also, maybe it doesn't quite go without saying, very, very funny. [End Page 18]

A source of both the humor and the profundity is how seriously the book takes obscenity and the desire that fuels it. Here's a sentence from very early on:

Lately, when Sabbath suckled at Drenka's uberous breasts—uberous, the root word of exuberant , which is itself ex plus uberare , to be fruitful, to overflow like Juno lying prone in Tintoretto's painting where the Milky Way is coming out of her tit—suckled with an unrelenting frenzy that caused Drenka to roll her head ecstatically back and to groan (as Juno herself may have once groaned), "I feel it deep down in my cunt," he was pierced by the sharpest of longings for his late little mother.

The audacity of the sentence lies in the huge tonal registers it crosses: from the high literary "uberous," with the pedantic, scholarly excursus into Latin, and the even higher reference to myth and Tintoretto, to the vertiginous drop to the carnal in "cunt," to the truly shocking, wildly inappropriate exit from scene with the memory of his mother. The exit is given an amazing adjectival flourish with "late little mother," swooping from Drenka's pornographic exclamation to an affect we conventionally take as the opposite of sexual: that of filial devotion. The "little" is wonderful: English doesn't have ready access to diminutives, a temperature that many other languages can avail themselves of, like Spanish and Bulgarian and German and Yiddish, which is the immediate referent here; suddenly we are in the linguistic world of Sabbath's childhood, hearing an echo of his father's immigrant past.

Shock is a characteristic aesthetic maneuver in Sabbath's Theater , but Roth avoids the deadening effect that usually accompanies repeated shocks by distributing their weight in unexpected ways. The sudden turn of this sentence— turn is too pale a word: the sudden whipping of the sentence, the sudden lash—comes not with "cunt" but with the last three words: bizarrely, it is not "I feel it deep in my cunt" but "late little mother" that seems obscene. This feels electrically fresh to me. The effect is only strengthened with greater [End Page 19] familiarity with the novel, in which "cunt" appears dozens of times, and so loses its sense of taboo. It's a word Roth loves, both for its visceral force and also, I think, for its history. Roth isn't often thought of as a writer who lingers over etymologies, but he should be—that's another reason this sentence is instructive—and his use of "cunt" is redolent with the history of the word, a history that goes hand in hand with that of the word quaint , which was its synonym in Middle English. The word runs through Chaucer's Canterbury Tales , which Roth first encountered in high school and lines from which he could still recite late in life. "The Miller's Tale" can read like a meditation on queynte , which means, as a noun, "cunt," and also, as an adjective, "intricate," "elegant," "pleasant"; also "mysterious," "queer." This history encapsulates something important in the relationship between Drenka and Sabbath, which is predicated on sex, the wilder the better—their shenanigans allow each of them to tolerate intolerable marriages—and also profoundly affirmative of whatever we might mean by an ethical relationship with another. It's hard for me to imagine that Roth didn't have the history of cunt/queynte in mind in this very beautiful passage, which Drenka delivers after a threesome Sabbath has arranged with Christa, a much younger woman:

I find the cunt actually quite beautiful. I never would have thought that looking in the mirror. You come with your shame to look at yourself and you look at your sexual organs and they are not acceptable from the aesthetic perspective. But in this setting, I can see the whole thing, and although it is a mystique that I am a part of, it's a mystery to me, a total mystery.

I understand "mystery" here to mean something like "possessed of a significance, a value, that is bottomless, that can't be measured." Through sex, through her erotic life, Drenka transforms shame—a sense that the meaning of her body is known, fixed, finite—into mystery, a sense of a surplus of meaning, an uncountable worth. This is an extravagant claim to make for the work sex can do, in [End Page 20] literature and in life; I think Roth means to make it. The proximity of flesh and spirit is one of the animating paradoxes of sex; it seems plausible that orgasm, that tiny replicable shattering of self, is the source of all our metaphysics. Any writer attempting a sex scene has to manage the relationship between the horizontal axis of bodies in space—the logistics of sexual acts—and the vertical axis sex makes available, an intimation of something, spirit or soul, that exceeds the body. Roth is a remarkably unmetaphysical writer, and his treatment of sex is often marked by a resolute refusal to entertain the vertical axis; this too makes Sabbath's Theater unique among his books. In the first passage quoted above, transcendence is all over the sentence: sex is written into myth; Drenka is made a goddess; she and Sabbath fuck among the stars. Five months after her agonizing death from cancer, months he has spent in nighttime graveyard masturbation, Sabbath falls prostrate over Drenka's grave and cries, "You filthy, wonderful Drenka cunt!" Both the filth and the wonder are real; the wonder proceeds from the filth. How else should we think of this, if not as a work of love?

ii: Disidentification

sabbath's theater is not a story of moral reform; from beginning to end Sabbath does very bad things. Some of these are played for laughs, as when he deliberately humiliates Drenka's husband or spends an entire night and morning ransacking the bedroom of a friend's college-age daughter, searching for evidence of her erotic life. Elsewhere Sabbath is less entertainingly repulsive. An extended sequence early in the novel's second half concerns Kathy Goolsbee, an undergraduate in Sabbath's puppetry workshop, who records (without his knowledge, as Sabbath also records it without hers) one of several phone sex sessions they have, a recording that, perhaps accidentally, perhaps by design, makes it to the college's administration. (It is then appropriated by a feminist action group and played on a loop for anyone who calls in to a local phone number, a bit of Rothian satire that raises harrowing questions about whose exploitation of Kathy is more destructive, and whether, in a [End Page 21] context where everyone claims to be educating her, anyone is concerned for her well-being.) Sabbath has made dozens of tapes of conversations with the six students with whom, over the years, he's had similar relationships, thinking of the recordings as testaments to a pedagogy of liberation and as works of art. Destroying those tapes, he thinks—they are, after all, evidence—would be "like defiling a Picasso. Because there was in these tapes a kind of art in the way that he was able to unshackle his girls from their habit of innocence." As part of his indignant self-defense, he places his tapes in the lineage of literary filth, alongside Réage, Miller, Lawrence, Joyce, Cleland, and the Earl of Rochester.

The episode with Kathy occurs five years before the primary action of Sabbath's Theater , but it sets in motion crucial elements of the plot: Sabbath's disgrace and increasing penury after he loses his teaching job; his wife Roseanna's breakdown, subsequent recovery from alcoholism, and increasing independence. In the book's single scene between Sabbath and Kathy, we see Sabbath at his worst, or close to it. Enraged at Kathy, whom he holds responsible for Roseanna's breakdown and apparent suicide attempt, he intends—it's not clear how seriously—to kill the student, who weepingly denies her guilt and begs to give Sabbath a blow job. Beneath this scene, in a twenty-one-page footnote, Roth provides a transcript of the call Kathy recorded, which is decidedly, cannily, not art on the order of Lawrence or Colette. One of the challenges of writing sex is to create, using the formal resources of the novelist, some approximation of the atmosphere of desire, in which acts and proclamations that, viewed dispassionately, might be merely ridiculous can be transfigured by passion. In presenting a transcript shorn of scene and verbal artfulness, banality ("Oh God. I'm going to come. / You're going to come?") remains simply banal, underscoring Sabbath's delusion that these exchanges are either art or education. In the scene that runs above the transcript, Sabbath alternately suspects Kathy of entrapment and entertains the possibility of accepting her propositions, imagining the satisfaction of the act: [End Page 22]

To peer down at her head cradled in your lap, your cock encircled by her foaming lips, and to watch her blowing you in tears, to patiently lather that undissipated face with that sticky confection of spit, semen, and tears, a delicate meringue icing her freckles—could life bestow any more wonderful last thing?

Sex as vengeance and humiliation: the discomfort of the moment is deepened by the fact that the passage is addressed ("Maestro, what would you do?") to the memory of an old puppeteer Sabbath met while studying in Italy, who interrogated Sabbath about his lovers and their ages and then, in satisfaction, boasted that his own girlfriend was fifteen, though "Of course I've known her since she's twelve." (This becomes even more discomfiting in the light of Blake Bailey's 2021 biography of Roth, which recounts an almost verbatim exchange Roth had with the Czech novelist Jiri Mucha, decades before Sabbath's Theater was published.) It's hard to recuperate anything redemptive—anything even morally complex—from this vision of eros.

In his many quarrels with Roseanna, Sabbath mocks her devotion both to AA-speak and to what she calls "the story format": "'But what happens with the story format,' she went on, oblivious not merely to his sarcasm but to the look in his eyes of someone who had taken too many sedative pills, 'is that you can identify.'" The question of identification has a central role in our current debates about what art is worth our attention and the work that it should do. The role of literature, these conversations presume, is to show us a certain kind of image of ourselves, an image often characterized as positive or affirming or empowering. I take the desire for representation seriously, and I take seriously the consequences of living in a culture that doesn't provide bearable images of oneself. My concern is that we take too prescriptive a view of what constitutes affirmation. None of the books that gave me succor as a gay kid in the pre-internet American South—novels by Yukio Mishima, James Baldwin, Edmund White, André Gide—would pass muster [End Page 23] if judged by today's standards of positive representation. The moral seriousness of those books, it seems to me now, lies in their refusal of an image one might identify with in any frictionless, any merely self-comforting way. Roth's novel does something similar, I think: Sabbath is magnetic, fascinating, irresistible; it is impossible to look away from him. But he is not, in the simplistic, flat sense often invoked in our discussions of literature, sympathetic. Roth's novel stands distinct from much of recent American narrative practice in its model of narrative as dis identification, in the way Sabbath constantly rejects our sympathy, throwing up roadblocks to identification, rubbing his repulsiveness in our face.

But the novel wouldn't be so discomfiting if this were all it did. Sabbath can reject our sympathy only once the novel has tempted us into it; Roth invites us to condemn Sabbath only to push us past our condemnation. Roth's manipulation of these responses—the way he shows Sabbath as alternately repulsive and pitiable, entertaining and horrifying, destructive and grievously wounded—is key to the novel's moral force. When he first arrives in New York, angling to be taken in by a friend, Sabbath finds himself weeping uncontrollably over his various losses, while also telling himself he's performing grief as an elaborate manipulation. "Sabbath didn't believe a word he said and hadn't for years.... True lives belonged to others, or so others believed." And yet, as Sabbath breaks down repeatedly, even he begins to be convinced: "He was crying now the way anyone cries who has had it. There was passion in his crying—terror, great sadness, and defeat." And then, after a paragraph break: "Or was there?" In the way the scene makes these turns again and again, dizzyingly convincing us of sincerity and professing insincerity, it is a microcosm of the entire novel. Finally, Sabbath is as unsure as we are of the moral status of his tears. Perhaps, he thinks, his weeping is less "to be chalked up to guile than to the fact that the inner reason for his being—whatever the hell that might be, perhaps guile itself—had ceased to exist." The story Sabbath has told about himself, told to himself, proves [End Page 24] inadequate; the meaning he had considered fixed gives way to mystery. If this is a novel of (partial, constantly backsliding) moral education, it begins and ends in bewilderment.

filth 2: dirty thoughts

drenka is the fullest , richest realization of one of Roth's female character types: the eager, indulgent lover. Roseanna, for the first half of the novel, seems like a strikingly thin embodiment of another: the long-suffering, long-suffered, shrewish wife. One of the marvels of the novel is how, over the book's second half, both the reader's and Sabbath's vision of Roseanna is sharpened, deepened, as she emerges into a complexity the book's first half denied her. The catalyst for this transformation—a transformation not of Roseanna, but of Sabbath's understanding of her—is a peculiarly charged species of fiction: sexual fantasy. Sabbath is nominally a puppeteer, but the kind of artist he most resembles is a novelist—a novelist, it might be said, of a Rothian sort. Like any good writer he's an alert perceiver, "ever vigilant to all stimuli"; he's also equipped with a remarkable ability to use his observations to construct complex inner lives. Take for example Michelle Cowan, a rich and ambivalent minor character, electrically vivid though she appears in a single scene. Sabbath is dazzled by her; as her house-guest he watches her with an attention whetted by appetite but not, perhaps, reducible to it, observing her so intently that he times her hot flashes. He loves her laugh, a sound that he endows with a novelistically dense inner life:

The laugh said that she was sick of staying, sick of plotting leaving, sick of unsatisfied dreams, sick of satisfied dreams, sick of adapting, sick of not adapting, sick of just about everything except existing. Exulting in existing while being sick of everything— that's what was in that laugh! A semidefeated, semiamused, semiaggrieved, semiamazed, seminegative, hilarious big laugh.

[End Page 25] The novel is exquisitely ambivalent on the question of whether Sabbath's portrait of Michelle is right . He flirts with her throughout dinner, even playing footsie with her—he thinks—throughout the meal (the foot turns out to be her husband's), and later, when she shows up at his door in a kimono (after Sabbath has gone on a racist tirade against the Japanese, whom he holds accountable for his brother's death), it's not at all clear what she's after. Sabbath propositions her, and she puts him off, seeming to make a date for several days later. He grows increasingly manic until, in a very beautiful moment, anything at all seems possible between them: "'Christ...' she said and allowed her forehead to fall forward onto his. To rest there. It was a moment unlike any he'd had all day. Week. Month. Year. He calmed down." But immediately after this, when Sabbath exposes himself, Roth says that Michelle recoils , a word that suggests not a willed but a reflexive action, though what it signifies is unclear. Shock? Alarm? Disgust? We can't know, just as Sabbath can't know whether the story he tells about her is correct.

But then we can never know whether such stories are correct; human life, human relation is precisely not knowing. Fiction is all we can have. In his next novel, American Pastoral (1997), Roth goes even further: "Getting people right is not what living is all about anyway," he writes there. "It's getting them wrong that is living, getting them wrong and wrong and wrong and then, on careful reconsideration, getting them wrong again." So maybe it doesn't matter if Sabbath is right, or maybe what matters more is the richness with which he imagines the lives of others, the extent to which what he imagines is excessive is any simply self-serving fantasy. This is the case with Michelle, I think: he endows her with a complexity, a self-division ("semidefeated, semiamused, semiaggrieved, semiamazed, seminegative") that exceeds, that may in fact impede , any version of her that would merely serve his own interests. Maybe what matters, in our dealings with others, is not whether what we imagine is fiction or reality, but whether it is an easy or a demanding fiction, I mean whether it is easy on ourselves or hard, whether it serves self-flattery or demands self-correction. [End Page 26]

For decades Sabbath has been telling himself a self-serving story about his wife. The reader's sense of her begins to change in a long flashback of Sabbath visiting her in the hospital, where she is recovering from her breakdown. She has asked him to bring letters her father wrote to her when she was a child, in the year he committed suicide. Against her stated wishes, Sabbath reads these letters, as well as a journal she has left unguarded in her room. The novel reproduces all of these texts, which are excruciating to read—the father's letters especially, with their banality, their cruelty, their terrible need—and which fundamentally and durably revise our sense of Roseanna, of what she has been through and what resilience she has required. "She came by her pain honestly," one of her fellow patients tells Sabbath. Opening her journals, Sabbath expects to read about himself; in the simplistic, flattening story he has told himself about her, he is the malignant defining feature of her life, the grand antagonist. Instead, he finds that he is never mentioned. "What a bother we are to one another," he muses, "while actually nonexistent to one another, unreal specters compared to whoever originally sabotaged the sacred trust."

Only at the very end of the novel does Sabbath fully realize how profoundly ignorant he is of his wife; from a story whose meaning he has long exhausted, she becomes an utter mystery. Having become custodian of a box of his brother's things, each of them a banal, precious reminder of a world that seemed whole, Sabbath finds that he cannot kill himself, as he had imagined doing. Instead, he returns home and sits in his car at the bottom of his driveway, entertaining the possibility of reconciling with his wife. His thoughts take the form of an elaborate fantasy, a meticulous imagining of Roseanna masturbating. The equation of marriage with erotic death is a recurring theme in the novel—marital intercourse is the one taboo he resists breaking—but now he imagines her in their bed, reading, and then distracted from her reading as she begins to play with herself. Sabbath's fiction is precise, methodical, with the kind of exact logistical description we expect from Roth: "Circular movement of the fingers, and soon the pelvis in a circular movement, [End Page 27] too. Middle finger on the button—not the tip of the finger, the ball of the finger." But he doesn't imagine merely as a voyeur; he enters into Roseanna's experience, with intimacy and density of texture: "It changes what she feels when she introduces her finger into her cunt—on the button it's very precise, but with the finger in her cunt the feeling is distributed, and that's what she wants: the distribution of the feeling ." A virtuoso performance, Sabbath thinks; still in his car, still at the bottom of the driveway, he applauds and cheers. "His wife. He'd forgotten all about her. Twelve, fifteen years since she let me watch. What would it be like to fuck Roseanna?"

This passage might give us pause. Surely there's something objectionable here, an infringement on Roseanna's privacy, even a violation—a reduction of her to a sexual object, an appropriation of her experience in a fantasy that must be essentially, if not quite literally, masturbatory for Sabbath. "What would it be like to fuck Roseanna?" is not exactly, a certain kind of argument might run, a sign of profound moral engagement with another person. But what if it is? It seems at least plausible to view it generously, and I find myself wanting to defend Sabbath, to argue that there's something morally ample in imagining Roseanna in the fullness of her sexuality, and in an experience in which she exists for herself, bringing about her own pleasure, an image of intrinsic, non-instrumental value. There's something moving, I want to argue, in seeing Sabbath rediscover his spouse as an erotic being. But defending Sabbath isn't the point; it may be as much a trap as condemning him, since it presumes precisely the idea the experience of the novel contests: that Sabbath possesses a moral status we can fix. What's more, Sabbath's sympathetic or generous view of Roseanna is short-lived. In a characteristic move, his experience of plenitude—his reawakened interest in his wife, the prospect of a reconciliation with home—is brutally snatched away: in a baroque, Rothian fillip of a plot twist, he discovers that Roseanna is having playful, passionate, ecstatic sex with Christa, the young woman Sabbath and Drenka invited into their bed. Sabbath, after listening [End Page 28] to them make love, turns monstrous, an embodiment of male jealousy and rage. Roaring, he pounds on the bedroom window until it crashes in on the terrified lovers. So much for moral education.

iii: an apophatic theory

in 1999, the romanian novelist Norman Manea taught a course on Roth's work at Bard College. Each week, after a day in which Manea discussed one of Roth's novels with the students, Roth would join for questions and further discussion. According to Bailey's biography, the final session, on I Married a Communist (1998), was rancorous, with the students objecting to the novel's portrayal of women. Roth frequently found himself on the wrong side of righteousness, hectored early in his career as an anti-Semite, and criticized later for misogyny. The latter charge has stuck, and not without reason. I've argued that Drenka and Roseanna, while recognizable Rothian feminine types, have a richness and complexity that render them compellingly human. In certain of Roth's other novels, female characters can collapse into stereotype, evacuated of the mystery and depth he frequently lavishes on his male protagonists—though Roth himself mocked this kind of criticism as "puritanical feminism." In I Married a Communist , the book under discussion in Manea's class, Eve Frame is a particularly stark example of this flattening approach to female characters, a transparent caricature of Roth's ex-wife Claire Bloom, whose memoir Leaving a Doll's House (1996) he saw as a betrayal. Anticipating trouble, and perhaps prepared by the previous week's discussion of Sabbath's Theater , Roth arrived at the final session of Manea's class armed with the book On Trial: The Case of Sinyavsky and Daniel (1967), a collection of documents relating to the prosecution of two writers by the Soviet regime. Roth produced the book after a male student offered an "excruciatingly careful" comment in the class, using it to draw a comparison between what he called the "intimidating atmosphere" of the undergraduate seminar and the censorship and prosecution carried out by the Communist state. [End Page 29]

The students weren't having it: "We don't want to arrest you and put you on trial," one not unreasonably retorted. It's striking how closely this exchange parallels debates we're having twenty years later, in which intellectuals committed to the classical values of liberalism, chief among them free speech, seem as alarmed by the left's supposed cancel culture as by the right's attacks on democratic institutions. How dismaying these debates are, not only because they serve to fracture possible coalitions among people who to a very great extent share a vision of a desirable world, but also because there is so much bad faith on all sides. Assertions that Twitter cancelation campaigns or undergraduate seminars are equivalent to totalitarian persecution are prima facie absurd; so are claims that cancel culture is a figment of the right's imagination, that social media pillorying doesn't have real, grievous, and often unjust consequences, or that the specter of those consequences has not had a chilling effect on cultural life. Every artist I know is conscious of a new and mounting pressure to police their work for potentially objectionable elements; many have abandoned projects; nearly all have undergone what I think of as crises of relevance: a sense that the art they want to make will fail to speak to our moment in a way that can cut through the noise of incessant, hectoring, social-media-amplified topical debate. One longs for a lessening of that noise, for space to recognize the validity of competing values, the need to accommodate multiple claims.

What I want, really, is an escape from argument altogether. We need a way to think without the kind of untrammeled assertion that characterizes public discourse, especially on social media, which has, to the detriment of our institutions and ourselves, become public discourse. Much of the value of art for me lies in its ability to provide a space free of such argument. Turning from Twitter to Henry James, say—an early and enduring influence on Roth—I'm amazed by how much more spacious thinking feels in his sentences, not for their length exactly but for their avoidance of plain assertion, for their endless qualifications and corrections, their syntax of scruple. We have created a public discourse in which one's ability [End Page 30] to be heard depends on speaking with a certainty, a lack of nuance, a stridency utterly inadequate to reality. When I consider debates about the relationship between art and morality, what I long for is an apophatic theory of that relation—a theory that would allow us to explore the moral work of art without limiting or prescribing that work, as certain theologians attempt to develop ways to think about God without defining God in a manner that would violate God's freedom. What I want is a kind of syntax, which is to say a kind of thinking, that appears more and more frequently in the final pages of Sabbath's Theater , a syntax of paradox and negation, which gives Roth access to a kind of affirmation utterly unprecedented in his work—an affirmation, uniquely for this resolutely secular writer, that I think can properly be called theological.

filth 3: pissing, a theology

if i'm right that Sabbath's Theater gains access to a theological dimension, it's Sabbath's devotion to filth, his determination "to affront and affront and affront till there was no one on earth unaffronted," that provides it. Religious allusion is everywhere in the novel, much of it of an ironic, Wildean, transvaluation-of-values kind, at least at first glance. "You must devote yourself to fucking the way a monk devotes himself to God," Sabbath muses early on. The appeal of statements like this is a comedy of transgression, a blasphemous thrill. But blasphemy is unstable; the circuit it establishes between apparently incompatible terms can sacralize as easily at it desecrates. Roth's novel treats sex as a kind of limit-experience, an ultimate thing; as religious allusions pile up, the comic, ironic application of religious concepts comes to seem less ironic. Or maybe it's truer to say that the irony seems less totalizing, it leaves open the possibility of earnestness. "If anything served Sabbath as an argument for the existence of God," the book tells us, musing on the clitoris, "it was the thousands upon thousands of orgasms dancing on the head of that pin." Is this an instance of sex undermining religion, or of religion illuminating sex? As Sabbath listens to Roseanna and Christa making love, he reaches again for [End Page 31] a religious amplitude: "They had taken unto themselves the task of divinity and were laying bare the rapture with their tongues." The tone of this isn't earnest, exactly: the exaltation ("taken unto themselves") offers the cover of irony. But neither is it dismissive; the sacred does seem the proper frame of reference for what these women are doing. And then there is Sabbath himself: the name, of course, but also the odd ways in which he comes to seem a holy figure, with his Old-Testament-prophet beard, his truth-telling (when he isn't telling lies), his destitution. Sabbath's transvaluation of values can be comic and Wildean; it can also be beatitudinal. This is especially clear in his sense of the moral authority of abjection, which is the only moral authority he claims. "You have kindhearted liberal comprehension," Sabbath says to a friend who has attempted to rescue him, "but I am flowing swiftly along the curbs of life, I am merely debris, in possession of nothing to interfere with an objective reading of the shit." Here is something like a formula for sainthood, wherein abjection and utter powerlessness confer privileged knowledge. Sabbath, with his fondness for prostitutes, his preference for the homeless and destitute over the affluent and comfortable, his utter rejection of the secular logic of the world—what is all of this if not saintly, even Christ-like? I don't think the novel lets us feel settled about how seriously we should take this, and Sabbath himself seems unsure: "Can it be that there is something religious about me?" he wonders. "Has what I've done—i.e., failed to do—been saintly?"

The odd hitch in that sentence, the revision or correction, the flip into negation—"what I've done, i.e., failed to do"—is a feature that appears more and more frequently in the book's final pages. Faced with the irresolvable dilemma of his life, Sabbath finds himself increasingly turning to negative formulations: "There was no bottom to what he did not have to say about the meaning of his life." The tactic of using negation to seek a way through insoluble dilemma has a long tradition, one that, by the end of Sabbath's Theater , it seems clear Roth is drawing from. At the heart of this apophatic tradition, the tradition of mystic thought, is the hope [End Page 32]

that the relentless pursuit of negativity will somehow arrive at an experience of affirmation. I've never read a better account of how that process might work than this passage from Roth's novel, about oral sex with Roseanna:

The swampy scent Roseanna exuded in her twenties, most unique, not at all fishy but vegetative, rooty, in the muck with the rot. Loved it. Took you right to the edge of gagging, and then, in its depths something so sinister that, boom-o, beyond repugnance into the promised land, to where all one's being resides in one's nose, where existence amounts to nothing more or less than the feral, foaming cunt, where the thing that matters most in the world— is the world—is the frenzy that's in your face.

"Boom-o": sex is the key that unlocks the mystic's logic, releasing some mechanism of grace that flips the values of the workaday world on their head and delivers one, inexplicably, to an experience of plenitude and bliss. In the novel's final scene Sabbath returns to Drenka's gravesite, where he has spent so many nights weeping and masturbating, and the book's engagement with the negative syntax and paradoxical image repertoire of mysticism reaches its peak. "Imagine a stone carrying itself," Roth instructs his reader as he describes Sabbath climbing the hill to Drenka's grave. And then, once he reaches the final resting place of the woman he loved—in many ways the entire book has been a cry of grief for her—he proceeds to piss on it.

It's worth pausing to note that Sabbath is a remarkably liquid man, constantly spouting fluids: his ejaculations and tears, his three-times-nightly trips to piss, not to mention the words that come, endless, fluent, from an apparently limitless source. And yet now, as he tries to piss over Drenka, he finds himself dry: "He was fearful at first that he was asking of himself the impossible and that there was, in him, nothing left of him." His watering of Drenka's grave, which he imagines as an "anointing," recalls an earlier scene in which Drenka, on her deathbed, relives with Sabbath an [End Page 33] afternoon when they pissed over each other. Roth considered this scene one of the two greatest he wrote in his career; it's the most extraordinary sex scene I know. In remembering, re-narrating, re-experiencing this scene, a memory of kinky erotic experience—of transgression, of generosity to each other ("Why not?" Drenka responds to Sabbath's request, "Life is so crazy anyway.")—allows them to mourn together Drenka's imminent death, and also generates an expansiveness that transcends their current situation and its limits. "It was like we were forever united in that," Drenka says to him. "We were. We are," Sabbath replies, turning piss-play into a sacrament—a kind of marriage—that affirms a scale of temporality not typically available in Roth's novels: everlastingness. Hoping to commemorate this moment, Sabbath finds himself unable to piss, literally out of juice. "Perfect metaphor," he thinks, "empty vessel." I'm not sure how to understand this emptiness except as an example of kenosis , the self-emptying necessary before the aspirant can be filled up in divine union. "There was, in him, nothing left of him." And, as is the mystic's hope, emptiness is followed by plenitude; Sabbath begins not just to piss but to gush, to overflow, in something that seems like a violation of the natural order of things—that seems, I mean to say, miraculous. "Sabbath was peeing with a power that surprised even him, the way strangers to grief can be astounded by the unstoppable copiousness of their river of tears." He finds he can't stop; in another mystically charged image—Margery Kempe and Julian of Norwich both figure Christ as a nursing mother—he becomes "to urine what a wet nurse is to milk." He imagines his urine drilling a hole to Drenka's lips, reviving her, bringing her miraculously to life—but here the book closes the door on the transcendence it has courted: "he could never again reach her in any way... nobody dead can live again." Again and again in the novel, Roth gives only to take away; he opens a door and then slams it shut. And yet the very restlessness of the book calls all finality into question, even the finality of finality itself. Maybe the door isn't shut forever. [End Page 34]

iv: a moral education

sabbath isn't alone at Drenka's grave, as it turns out: his miraculous flow of urine finally stops when he is accosted—swung around by his prophet's beard—by Matthew, Drenka's grieving and aggrieved policeman son. To Matthew, locked out of the circuit of desire and devotion that transforms what looks like an act of degradation into a sacrament, Sabbath can only be what he seems: an old adulterer pissing on his mother's grave. "What are you?" Michael asks when Sabbath refuses to be penitent, refuses even to put his dribbling cock back in his pants. "This is a religious act," Sabbath insists, a claim he only somewhat revises a few pages later: "I do not say correct or savory. I do not say seemly or even natural. I say serious." But Matthew has his own grief and his own devotion; his tears, his forbearance as Sabbath baits him, wanting to make him his final puppet, the instrument of his suicide, carry a moral force that make his reading of Sabbath's act undismissable. The power of this final scene lies in its presentation of radically incommensurable interpretive frames, and in the novel's refusal to reconcile them. We feel the force of both meanings: Sabbath pissing on Drenka's grave is a sacred act and an act of desecration, an act of love for Drenka on the part of her grieving, beloved lover and an act of cruelty against her grieving, beloved son. In a world of conflicting authoritative interpretive frames there is no final judgment we can pass. Whatever calculus might make the competing claims of Sabbath and Matthew commensurate, and so allow us to weigh one against the other, is unavailable to us, in the novel as in life. The novel forces us to experience both meanings, to live in the dilemma of their conflict.

Confronting us with that dilemma is crucial to the moral education art can offer. How should one judge Sabbath, who has done so many things that are, by any reasonable standard, unforgivable? The wonder of Sabbath's Theater , the measure of its achievement, is that after 450 pages with this intolerable man I don't want to turn my back on him. I can't, because I've come to cherish him. This [End Page 35] posture, of finding another intolerable and at the same time cherishing their existence, is deeply uncomfortable and urgently necessary. Because, at least in part: what's the alternative? What do we do with people who refuse to act in accordance with our standards, our sense of decency, who have no interest in being reformed? Lock them all up? Exterminate them? (People who commit sexual crimes should be locked up forever, some of my friends believe, who also believe that prisons should be abolished.) I am a decided atheist, as was Roth, and I also, as perhaps Roth did, feel nostalgia for certain theological concepts. Chief among these is the idea of the Imago Dei —that no matter what someone might do, they are still possessed of an inalienable dignity, an infinite value that derives from the divine image in which they are made. Roth said that Sabbath was his most autobiographical character, which one can see both as a puckish provocation—Sabbath is 5'5", fat, destitute, a failed artist, a much less obvious surrogate than Portnoy or Zuckerman or Kepesh—and also as not entirely untrue. Roth also said that were Sabbath sitting on the couch next to him, he would kick him out of his house. In life, we bear what we can bear and risk what we can risk, and make our necessary accommodations. But in art we don't have to make those accommodations: we can bear things in art we can't bear in real life, and so art can offer us a crucial moral training, placing us in the impossible position, which is also the only morally defensible position, of cherishing the existence of others we cannot bear. By repeatedly tempting us to pass judgment on Sabbath and then inviting us past that judgment, Roth's novel reminds us how much more a person is than their worst acts. Had I turned my back on Sabbath at his first indefensible act, had I canceled him or blocked him or deplatformed him, had I cast aside the book as terminally problematic, I would have missed much that has felt useful to me, in the not-quite-articulable way art is useful: the sense of life, of manic energy, the texture of existence and the terror of the abyss. Our current obsession with purity, our sense that we cannot associate with others who do not share our political and social values, our intolerance of disagreement are not just [End Page 36] corrosive of civil society and democratic discourse. They are also impoverishing of ourselves. I feel the appeal of that intolerance. Sabbath's Theater helps me to resist it.

The ability of art to do this moral work, the work I think it is uniquely equipped to do, depends on our acknowledging the power of a frame as a kind of magic circle separating the world of art from the actual world. I don't mean to suggest that art is cut off from politics or history, or that this separation is absolute. I mean that representation has a fundamentally different moral and existential status from that of reality. This is a point that needs defending. The moral and political demands currently placed on art, the charge that art has responsibilities and consequences as grave as actions in the world beyond the frame, the conflation of art and activism, don't just mistake the nature of art and art making. They make it impossible for art to do the moral work proper to it. I can't imagine a book like Sabbath's Theater being published today, certainly not by anyone save a writer of Roth's stature—and, since Toni Morrison's passing, it's not clear to me that there are any writers of Roth's stature. The idea that art should address the monstrous, that much of the moral office of art might lie in making us identify with the monstrous—identification not as consolation but as indictment—is entirely foreign to our current thinking. Terence's famous line, humani nihil a me alienum puto , nothing human is alien to me, which Hardy's Jude echoes when he says, "I have the germs of every human infirmity in me"—well, that seems nearly unsayable now, nearly unthinkable. These days we're desperate to claim the opposite: "It's not hard not to be terrible" is a sentiment I see floating down my social media feeds with alarming regularity. But I am a novelist because I think it is hard not to be terrible. I think it's the work of a life, and most of us fail at it almost all the time. Certainly I do. The greatness of Sabbath's Theater lies in its assertion that the human is ample and impure beyond all codes of conduct, and in its challenge not to reject or unmake that humanity, but instead to acknowledge it ours. [End Page 37]

garth greenwell is the author of two books of fiction, Cleanness and What Belongs to You . A 2020 Guggenheim Fellow, he received the 2021 Vursell Award for prose style from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Previous Article

Summer, 1964, and: Untitled, 1978

Next Article

The Lovers of Modena

Project MUSE Mission

Project MUSE promotes the creation and dissemination of essential humanities and social science resources through collaboration with libraries, publishers, and scholars worldwide. Forged from a partnership between a university press and a library, Project MUSE is a trusted part of the academic and scholarly community it serves.

2715 North Charles Street Baltimore, Maryland, USA 21218

+1 (410) 516-6989 [email protected]

©2024 Project MUSE. Produced by Johns Hopkins University Press in collaboration with The Sheridan Libraries.

Now and Always, The Trusted Content Your Research Requires

Built on the Johns Hopkins University Campus

This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience on our website. Without cookies your experience may not be seamless.

An official website of the United States government

Here’s how you know

Official websites use .gov A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS A lock ( Lock A locked padlock ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Learn How Prevention Works: TVTP Grant Programs Produce Results, Build on Progress

The Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) Grant Program has funded nearly 150 distinct projects over its four-year history. These projects brought education, training, and new TVTP approaches to thousands of people across the country.

View the latest set of grantee-authored closeout reports , external evaluation reports , and grantee project webpages on the Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships (CP3)’s TVTP Grantee Results website as part of our commitment to transparency and sharing best practices and resources with the TVTP community. CP3 continues to add resources quarterly, so be sure to visit the website regularly.

Grantees are required to submit closeout reports following completion of their program’s two-year period of performance. Closeout reports summarize the program’s overall goals and objectives, key accomplishments, deliverables, along with challenges and lessons learned.

In addition, the DHS Science and Technology Directorate contracts an independent evaluator to conduct in-depth evaluations of a subset of grantees for each grant period. These evaluations provide extensive review of the TVTP Grant Program’s outputs and outcomes.

Evaluations for the Fiscal Year 2020 programs are now available online, along with an overall evaluation of the TVTP Grant Program. This report notes CP3’s success in, and the continued importance of, creating connections among stakeholders, and engaging a range of partners to accomplish TVTP work. Targeted violence and terrorism prevention providers are encouraged to reference these resources and Grantee Results as they build or expand their own programs. This site demonstrates the breadth and depth of TVTP knowledge and understanding built from the work of these grantees.

• Preventing Terrorism and Targeted Violence
• Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships (CP3)
• Grant Funding
• Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP)
• Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) Grant Program

• Community and Engagement
• Honors and Awards
• Give Now 

College of Education Awarded $4 Million in Grant Funding From October 2023 Through March 2024

Faculty and researchers at the NC State College of Education, including the Belk Center for Community College Leadership and Research and the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation , were awarded $4,090,192 to support 23 projects from Oct. 1, 2023, through March 31, 2024.

Editor’s note: All dollar amounts listed are reflective of the grant funding awarded directly to the College of Education and do not include funding awarded to other collaborators. 

NC State STEM Education Scholars Program

This $1,176,730 grant from the National Science Foundation will develop the NC State STEM Education Scholars program to increase the number of highly qualified teacher candidates in secondary science and mathematics by reducing financial barriers to teaching, provide participants with targeted experiences to develop teacher candidates’ pedagogical content knowledge with a focus on building community funds of knowledge and increase STEM teacher retention by providing ongoing professional development. Associate Dean of Research and Innovation Karen Hollebrands is the project’s principal investigator. Assistant Teaching Professor of Science Education Matt Reynolds is a co-principal investigator on the project. 

NSF CAREER: Supporting Teachers to Leverage Students’ Languages in Mathematics

This $926,102 National Science Foundation CAREER grant will be used to partner with a mathematics department at a public middle school to co-design, analyze and improve teachers’ translanguaging pedagogies to draw on students’ full linguistic repertoires as resources for their learning and help teachers, teacher educators and researchers to better understand how students’ languages can be leveraged as a resource for mathematical learning. Assistant Professor of Mathematics Education Samantha Marshall is the project’s principal investigator.

NSF CAREER: Integrating Robotics and Socio-emotional Learning for Incarcerated Middle School Students

This $587,700 National Science Foundation CAREER grant aims to provide new choices to confined youth by developing and investigating robotics learning activities within a juvenile justice alternative education program and engaging pre-service teachers in mentoring youth participants. Assistant Professor of Technology, Engineering, and Design Education Daniel Kelly is the project’s principal investigator.

Examining Rural Dual Language Programs, Multilingual Learners, and Rural Community Cultural Wealth

This $413,811 grant from the Spencer Foundation will examine rural dual-language immersion education programs, the rural community ecosystems in which they operate and how rural educators of multilingual students leverage the linguistic resources of their students and families. Goodnight Distinguished Professor in Educational Equity Maria Coady is the project’s principal investigator. Assistant Teaching Professor Joanna Koch is a co-principal investigator on the project. 

Falls Lake Partners in Forensic Science II

This grant from the Burroughs Wellcome Fund will kindle students’ interest in aquatic science careers through short interactive presentations. Professor of Technology, Design, and Engineering Education Aaron Clark will serve as personnel on the project. 

Project Connect

This $157,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Education will provide a comprehensive formative and summative evaluation of Project Connect from the Program Evaluation and Education Research (PEER) group at the Friday Institute for Educational Evaluation. Director of Program Evaluation and Education Research Callie Womble Edwards is a co-principal investigator on the project. 

Validation of the Equity and Access Rubrics for Mathematics Instruction (VEAR-MI)

This $152,733 grant from the National Science Foundation will facilitate the analysis of cognitive interview data from the VEAR-MI project as well as the analysis of mathematics lesson videos. Associate Professor of Mathematics Education Temple Walkowiak is a co-principal investigator on the project. 

Project Read: Reading Extension Activation and Deliver

This $151,196 grant from the Mebane Foundation will launch and deliver a reading-specific extension initiative in connection with convenings that will be held through a partnership between the College of Education and NC State Extension. Assistant Dean for Professional Education and Accreditation Erin Horne is the project’s principal investigator. 

Project Adding Direct Support (ADS)

This $85,555 grant from the U.S. Department of Education will uncover in-service needs related to school counseling, create a recruitment plan, conduct a community needs assessment and develop the planning and implementation of trauma-informed, equity-focused virtual training sessions that will be offered to school social workers and social work programs across North Carolina. Professor of Counselor Education Stan Baker is the project’s principal investigator. Assistant Professor of Counselor Education Rolanda Mitchell is a co-principal investigator on the project. 

IRIS Center

This $71,183 grant from the U.S. Department of Education will help develop and disseminate digital, open educational resources – including training modules and online tools – for Vanderbilt University’s IRIS Center with the goal of supporting educators’ use of evidence-based practices. Assistant Teaching Professor of Elementary Education and Special Education Jordan Lukins is the project’s principal investigator.

Hattie’s Influences on Student Achievement Under an Institutionally Racist System: What Works for Black & Brown Students

This $68,742 grant from the William T. Grant Foundation will fund a study revisiting Hattie’s List to identify and restrict the original studies to only those that include American Black and Brown students and conduct a new meta-analysis based on that data. Assistant Professor of Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis Lam Pham is the project’s principal investigator.

Citizen Math: Using Math Class to Create Informed, Thoughtful, and Productive Citizens

This $61,739 grant from the U.S. Department of Education will enable the Friday Institute’s Professional Learning and Leading Collaborative team to engage middle school administrators and teachers from across North Carolina in order to recruit study cohort participants for a scalable, low-cost program that addresses issues of societal importances in ways that engage students while developing social-emotional skills and rigorous mathematics learning. Friday Institute Senior Research Scholar Emmy Coleman is the project’s principal investigator. 

Empathy and AI: Towards Equitable Microtransit

This $59,450 grant from the National Science Foundation aims to identify, test and evaluate technologically enabled and community-supported solutions for equitably distributing travel demand over time for on-demand public transportation services with a focus on understanding the feasibility and tradeoffs involved in enabling and incentivizing prosocial behavior. Associate Professor of English Education Crystal Chen Lee is a co-principal investigator on the project. 

Understanding the Long-term Effects Adaptation Strategies on Cape Hatteras National Seashore and Ocracoke Island through Co-Production

This $37,933 grant from the U.S. National Park Service will use a barrier island model and adapt participatory modeling and deliberative dialogue approaches while using best practices for co-producing decision-relevant science in order to co-create a process and tools that will support adaptation planning along the Cape Hatteras National Seashore and surrounding communities. Associate Professor of Science Education K.C. Busch is the principal investigator for NC State. 

Hosting the USGS Southeast Climate Adaptation Science Center

This $32,106 grant from the United States Geological Survey, will bring partners, community members and researchers together to discuss global change impacts and train graduate students on how to use and develop global change science. Associate Professor of Science Education K.C. Busch will serve as senior personnel on the project. 

Asset Inventory: Eastern NC Digital Equity

This $27,202 grant from the Camber Foundation will enable NC State’s Institute for Emerging Issues and the Friday Institute to collaborate with the Camber Foundation to support data collection and analysis in the development of Digital Equity Asset Inventories in three eastern North Carolina Councils of Governments to include in their digital inclusion plans. Friday Institute Associate Director of Program Evaluation and Educational Research Erin Huggins is a co-principal investigator on the project. 

Inclusion Diversity Equity & Accessibility (Ideas) To Forestry and Renewable Energy Careers

This $25,982 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture will leverage scholarship funds with existing initiatives in the NC State College of Natural Resources to improve access to forestry and renewable energy careers and graduate education among Indigenous, Black and Hispanic/Latino populations as well as women. Friday Institute Director of Program Evaluation and Education Research Callie Womble Edwards is a co-principal investigator on the project. 

Virtual Training to Manage Legal Risk for Turkey Producers and Processors

This $14,736 grant from the USDA will contribute to the development of a virtual, on-demand education program to help turkey producers and processors manage legal risk regarding animal welfare using engaging multimedia methods presented in both English and Spanish. Goodnight Distinguished Professor in Educational Equity Maria Coady is a co-principal investigator on the project. 

NC State Improvement Project IHE Partnership

This $10,556 grant from the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction will prepare teachers to implement research-based curriculum, employ high-yield instructional practices and utilize an assessment system to make instructional decisions. Assistant Teaching Professor of Elementary Education and Special Education Jordan Lukins is the project’s principal investigator.

Preparing the New Teacher Workforce to Foster Deeper Learning

This $10,000 grant from Stanford University will contribute to the design and piloting of new online modules and supplementary resources aimed at developing pre-service teachers’ capacity to draw on learning science to effectively foster deeper learning. Director of Professional Education Sarah Cannon is the project’s principal investigator. 

Data at Work Course Development and Pilot

This $9,944 grant from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) will support the NC State Data Science Academy in facilitating the development, piloting, and assessment of a customized course for the Early Childhood Division to help participants understand data, tools and analysis within the context of their work at DHHS. Friday Institute Senior Research Scholar Gemma Mojica will serve as an evaluator on the project. 

PK-2 North Carolina Math Convening

This $8,300 grant from the Burroughs Wellcome Fund supported a convening of an interdisciplinary group of experts in Pre-K-2 mathematics teaching and learning to examine areas of agreement and disagreement related to mathematics education, special education and cognitive science. Dean Paola Sztajn is the project’s principal investigator. 

Building Eastern North Carolina Teachers’ Understanding of Climate Change and Community Resiliency

This $1,000 grant from the Burroughs Wellcome Fund will enable 20 educators from Eastern North Carolina to participate in a series of virtual and in-person experiences to build a statewide perspective on climate change and climate resiliency. Friday Institute Research Scholar Kevin Winn serves as personnel on the project. 

• Research and Impact
• homepage-news

More From College of Education News

Distinguished University Professor of Mathematics and Statistics Education Hollylynne Lee Leads Team Named Finalist in 2023-24 Tools Competition 

Goodnight Distinguished Professor in Educational Equity Maria Coady, Assistant Teaching Professor Joanna Koch to Examine Dual-language Immersion Programs in Rural North Carolina Settings through Spencer Foundation Grant 

Friday Institute for Educational Innovation Celebrates 20 Years on NC State’s Centennial Campus 

• Share full article

Advertisement

Supported by

Nicholas Kristof

The Case for Saying ‘I Do’

By Nicholas Kristof

Opinion Columnist

With little notice, the United States may be crossing a historic milestone in family structure, one that may shape our health, wealth and happiness.

Historically, most American adults were married — more than two-thirds as recently as 1970. But the married share has crept downward , and today only about half of adults are married. Depending on the data source, we may already have entered an epoch in which a majority are not married.

“Our civilization is in the midst of an epochal shift, a shift away from marriage,” Brad Wilcox, a sociologist who directs the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia, writes in his new book, “ Get Married .” “In place of marriage, many Americans are remaining single or simply living together without wedding rings. And to be clear, it’s more of the former than the latter.”

Wilcox believes that perhaps a third of today’s young Americans will never marry. As a long-married romantic myself, I find that troubling, but it’s not just soggy sentimentality. Survey data indicates that married couples on average report more happiness, build more wealth, live longer and raise more successful children than single parents or cohabiting couples, though there are plenty of exceptions.

“Fixing what ails America starts with renewing marriage and family life, especially in poor and working-class communities where the fabric of family life is weakest,” Wilcox argues.

He’s up against a counter view that one should dodge family responsibilities, relish freedom and play hard. Many boys and men flock to the online rantings of Andrew Tate , the misogynistic influencer facing human trafficking charges, who has argued, “There is zero advantage to marriage in the Western world for a man.”

Some women have likewise celebrated freeing themselves from an institution that often shackled them to cooking, laundry and second-class status at a cost to their careers. As women have enjoyed more economic opportunities, they’re less often forced to marry some oaf who gets violent after a few drinks — and, anyway, what self-respecting woman with independent means would want to marry, say, a fan of Andrew Tate?

Yet even as marriage has receded, the evidence has grown that while it isn’t for everyone, in many cases it can improve our lives more than we may appreciate.

“Marriage predicts happiness better than education, work and money,” Wilcox writes. For example, survey data indicates that getting a college degree increases the odds of describing oneself as “very happy” by 64 percent. Earning a solid income lifts the odds by 88 percent. Being “very satisfied” with one’s job raises them by 145 percent. And marriage increases the odds of being very happy by 151 percent — while a “very happy” marriage boosts the odds by 545 percent.

I’ve long been interested in family structure for two reasons. First, I believe the left made a historic mistake by demonizing the Moynihan Report, which 59 years ago this month warned about the consequences of family breakdown. Daniel Patrick Moynihan was prescient, for we now know that households headed by single mothers are five times as likely to live in poverty as those with married couples.

Second, loneliness and social isolation are growing problems. One poignant example: Perhaps 100,000 or more dead bodies in America go unclaimed each year, often because there are no loved ones to say farewell. It’s a topic explored in another recent book, “The Unclaimed,” by sociologists Pamela Prickett and Stefan Timmermans.

Marriage doesn’t solve loneliness and social isolation, but it helps. And there is good news on the family front: The divorce rate has dropped to a 50-year low , and the share of children raised in an intact family with married parents has increased slightly in recent years. Today about 51 percent of American kids reach adulthood with the same two parents they started out with.

But it’s also true that the marriage rate has collapsed, particularly for working-class Americans. Of those without a high school diploma, more than two-thirds are unmarried.

Wilcox writes that “the American heart is closing,” but I wouldn’t put it that way. I think many Americans want to marry but don’t feel sufficiently financially stable, or they can’t find the right person.

I’m staggered by the interest in virtual boyfriends and virtual girlfriends. One virtual boyfriend app offers an assortment of possibilities such as “polite and intelligent Edward” or “romantic and cute Daniel.”

“Don’t be shy, he’ll definitely like you,” the app advises. “He knows how to cheer you up, so you won’t feel sad or lonely.”

Just reading that makes me achingly sad. Virtual mates feel like an elegy for civilization.

One reason for the decline in marriage in working-class communities may be a lack of economic opportunity, particularly for men, and another may be culture and changing norms. That’s worth pondering. In polls, majorities of college-educated liberals seem diffident about marriage, unwilling to criticize infidelity and disagreeing with the idea that children do better with two married parents. Perhaps this liberal lack of enthusiasm for marriage also accounts for the marriage penalties built into benefit programs like Medicaid, in turn disincentivizing marriage for low-income Americans.

Wilcox scolds elites for clinging to traditional values themselves — in the sense that they get married and have kids for the most part — even as they are reluctant to endorse marriage for fear of seeming judgmental or intolerant. Elites “talk left but walk right,” he says.

We are social animals, Aristotle noted more than two millenniums ago, and it’s still true. Spouses can be exasperating (as my wife can attest), but they also can cuddle, fill us with love and connect us to a purpose beyond ourselves. They are infinitely better, for us and for society, than virtual lovers on an app, and that seems worth celebrating openly.

Update: I have the final figures for my 2023 holiday giving guide , so I owe readers a follow-up and a “thank you.” More than 5,400 readers contributed a total of $7.2 million to the three nonprofits I recommended , and here’s what the donations will mean in practical terms: 12,150 girls in rural Africa will be supported for a year of high school through Camfed ; 1,645 young people in the United States will be supported for a year of instruction and mentoring to succeed in college or technical school through OneGoal ; and 4,218 low-income Americans will get free training in information technology through Per Scholas so that they can start better-paying careers in the tech world. All three organizations do excellent work. In addition, 671 readers volunteered to help refugees settle in the United States through my recommended volunteer opportunity, Welcome.US . Thanks so much to all who donated and volunteered: People are benefiting here and abroad from your generosity.

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips . And here’s our email: [email protected] .

Follow the New York Times Opinion section on Facebook , Instagram , TikTok , WhatsApp , X and Threads .

Nicholas Kristof became a columnist for The Times Opinion desk in 2001. He has won two Pulitzer Prizes, for his coverage of China and of the genocide in Darfur. @ NickKristof

Eco Warriors tree project will bolster Watkins Memorial High School campus in Pataskala

PATASKALA – A group of Watkins Memorial students is taking action now to improve the ecosystem around the new high school and surrounding campus for the future.

The Eco Warriors are raising funds to plant 56 trees along U.S. 40 and in both directions of Warrior Way next month, grouping them with shrubs and other pollinators, and they will also go down Smoke Road. Following that, in coming years, there will be restoration of wetlands on the property, and an outdoor classroom space will be created.

In November, Watkins Memorial High School selected six individuals to represent the school at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium’s Teen Eco Summit. There, methods were discussed that could aid in restoring the natural wildlife surrounding the Watkins campus, as it was destroyed when the school was built in 2021.

They decided that planting trees was the most effective way to broaden the ecosystem, reduce carbon emissions, create a sound barrier protecting from passing cars between the school and U.S. 40 and give an overall more pleasing look to the campus.

"The students have done a lot of work, collaborating with the district's architectural firm (Garmann Miller), the Columbus Zoo's Eco Summit, the Ohio Natural Resources Department, the 1,500 Tree Project, the district and the school board," teacher Paula Ball said. "Through the process, their project has evolved, as they have learned more how best to implement it. They have all of their plans done, and the next step is to have support from the community and local businesses to make their dream a reality."

Ball said the different phases will take multiple years to implement.

"Still, the students are dedicated to creating a solid foundation for the group so that the project will continue long after they graduate from high school," she said. "As a teacher, I could not be prouder of their dedication to the environment, the district and the community and the growth I have seen in their leadership skills throughout the project. As suburban development continues to reshape our community, the ecological balance is often overlooked."

Junior Waylon Weese said, "As we're experiencing population expansion, a lot of ecosystems are being destroyed."

Donations are being accepted until May 1 through links on the project's website, www.wmhsecosummit.com , and May 8 will be planting day. Trees will be planted 20 feet from the road, and each tree will be planted 25 feet apart. Garmann Miller will prepare the soil and dig the holes for the trees.

"We have already received $1,050 in seed money from the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium," junior Sarah Downing said.

Added junior Madelyn Light: "Earth Day (April 22) will be our first possibility of really getting the word out."

The six students involved come from a variety of backgrounds.

Weese will major in computer science and engineering, while Downing is vice president of the local chapter of the National FFA Organization. Junior Laura Selfinger plays Warrior rugby, while sophomore Alli Langwasser plays on Watkins' state powerhouse softball team and Sabina Sinchuri is in the band.

"We're all so different, but we're united in a common goal," Downing said. "I am excited to be a part of this project because conservation has always been important to me. I believe if you give back to the environment, it will provide for you. I want to be an environmental engineer, and this is the first step."

Observed Langwasser: "I really think it is important to restore and preserve what we have been given, especially life here on earth. This project is so small, but yet so big, I’m excited to raise awareness and attract more to the field of conservation, to build a healthier and sustainable future."

Light has always loved being outside, and some of her fondest memories are of she and her dad hiking.

"So 'leave no trace' was engrained in me pretty early," she said. "I am so excited to have the opportunity to voice my opinions and help make our school more sustainable for the future."

Sinchuri said helping has always been a passion of hers, whether it be moving stuff for someone or providing a home for wildlife.

"Earth has given us so much, and I also want to give back by helping to conserve," she said. "We hope that this project will create a better place for future generations."

Weese is incorporating his technological expertise into the project and is firmly focused on its effects further down the road.

"What’s more important: problems in the present day that we could change with a few adjustments in our daily lives or preventing problems in the future that will be irreversible by the time we get there?" he said. "I believe while creating a green future may seem like a 'big project' and that our difference may seem minuscule, every single person contributing to the effort counts."

In addition to the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium and Garmann Miller, the Eco Warriors have partnered with 1,500 Trees for Life, which aims to plant 1,500 healthy, native trees in public spaces throughout Licking County for the next five years. It was started by First Presbyterian Church of Granville.

Light said plans are being made to memorialize those who contribute to the project, through bricks on a wall along the front entrance to Watkins Memorial High School.

There are different levels of donations. Tier 1 ($100 or under) will receive a certificate of donation, while Tier 2 (over $100) will receive a custom engraved 4-by-8 brick. Tier 3 (over $200) will receive either a 4-by-8 or 8-by-8 brick, Tier 4 (over $350) will receive either a 4-by-8, 8-by-8 or 12-by-12 brick, and Tier 5 (over $500) will receive either one of the bricks, or four 12-by-12 bricks.

A final ceremony is slated for May 18 at the high school, and the students stressed that this is only the beginning.

"This is something the community needs," Downing said. "And we are literally laying down the roots here."

[email protected]

740-704-7973

X: @grover5675

Instagram: @dfweidig

« RETURN TO NEWS

A&T Receives 2024 IIE American Passport Project Grant for Study Abroad

By Labrina VanCliff / 04/12/2024 Academic Affairs

• 4-H and Youth Development News
• Academic Affairs News
• Accounting and Finance News
• Administration and Instructional Services News
• Admissions News
• Agribusiness, Applied Economics and Agriscience Education News
• Agricultural and Natural Resources News
• Alumni News
• Animal Sciences News
• Applied Engineering Technology News
• Athletics News
• Biology News
• Built Environment News
• Business and Finance News
• Business Education News
• Chancellor's Speaker Series
• Chancellors Town Hall Series
• Chemical, Biological, and Bio Engineering News
• Chemistry News
• Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering News
• College News
• Community and Rural Development News
• Computational Science and Engineering News
• Computer Science News
• Computer Systems Technology News
• Cooperative Extension News
• Counseling News
• Criminal Justice News
• Deese College News
• Economics News
• Educator Preparation News
• Electrical and Computer Engineering News
• Employees News
• Energy and Environmental Systems News
• English Department News
• Family and Consumer Sciences News
• Graphic Design Technology News
• Hairston College News
• Headlines News
• History & Political Science News
• Honors College News
• Human Resources News
• Industrial and Systems Engineering News
• Information Technology Services News
• Innovation Station News
• Journalism & Mass Communication
• Kinesiology News
• Leadership Studies and Adult Education News
• Liberal Studies News
• Library News
• Magazine News
• Management News
• Marketing News
• Mathematics News
• Mechanical Engineering News
• Media Spotlight News
• Natural Resources and Environmental Design News
• News Categories
• Nursing News
• Psychology News
• Research and Economic Development News
• Social Work News
• Student Affairs News
• Students News
• The Graduate College News
• Transportation & Supply Chain
• University Advancement News
• Visual & Performing Arts News

EAST GREENSBORO, N.C. (April 12, 2024) – North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University has been awarded a prestigious 2024 IIE American Passport Project grant from the Institute of International Education Inc.

“We believe that international experiences are invaluable for our students’ academic and personal development,” said Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs Tonya Smith-Jackson. “With the support of the IIE American Passport Project grant, we look forward to expanding access to study abroad opportunities and fostering a more diverse and globally aware campus community.”

The IIE American Passport Project grant facilitates and encourages participation in study abroad programs among Pell-eligible students by providing financial support for U.S. passport application fees. Through this grant, A&T will be able to nominate 25 eligible students and allocate $165 to each to cover the costs associated with obtaining a U.S. passport.

Recognizing the transformative impact of international experiences on academic and career development, A&T is committed to promoting access and equity in study abroad opportunities for all its students. By reducing the financial barrier to obtaining a U.S. passport, this grant aligns with the university’s mission to ensure that every student can engage with diverse cultures and perspectives through international education.

“We are thrilled to announce that North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University has been awarded the prestigious IIE American Passport Project grant for the first time in its history, enabling our students to embark on transformative international experiences,” said Interim Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education Nakeshia Williams, Ph.D.

The award prioritizes first-year students, allowing them ample time to obtain their U.S. passports and use the institution’s resources to realize their study abroad goals. By targeting students early in their academic journey, A&T aims to instill a culture of global engagement and empower students to leverage international experiences for personal and professional growth.

A&T encourages eligible students to take advantage of this opportunity and explore the myriad benefits of studying abroad. For more information about study abroad programs and eligibility criteria, students should contact Kimberly Tyson, director of the Office of International Affairs, at (336) 334-7751 or [email protected] .

Media Contact Information: [email protected]

Latest News

04/12/2024 in Academic Affairs

N.C. A&T Board of Trustees to Hold Special Called Meeting, April 15

Five N.C. A&T Students Awarded Spotify NextGen Scholarships to Grow Podcasts, Creator Culture

04/11/2024 in College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences