CultureFeed Archives
Who we want to be is the key to how we will act
With regard to developing people of character, I start from a simple premise: identity drives behavior.
How Montana Catholic school students build character through community service
In kindergarten, students collect food during the week and help to sort it at a local food bank. Fourth-graders are hosting a sock drive to clothe area homeless. Others are helping the elderly with landscaping, repainting community signs, and clearing overgrown trails.
Scripps Spellers and Social Ecology
National spelling bee champions are clearly talented kids. But a closer look reveals an important interplay of factors that have shaped their skills—and their moral character.
‘Making Caring Common’ urges more focus on character in college admissions
Students in many schools are loading up their schedules with academics, sports, extracurricular activities, and volunteer work, with the ultimate goal of impressing college admissions officers at top colleges.
Angus McBeath, veteran superintendent on “Character formation as key to school and district academic results”
Character formation involves behaviors that students use both in the school and outside the school. In this way, students embody the highest goal of education: to become responsible people who are accountable to themselves and to others for their actions and behaviors.
Indiana votes to require ’employability skills’
Indiana’s State Board of Education recently voted to require students to demonstrate “employability skills” with service projects or receive college ready scores on entrance exams to graduate from high school.
North Dakota students in need of hope
Survey says: North Dakota students feel hopeless.
Jewish school opens its doors to non-Jewish students
The Jewish Academy of Orlando is opening its doors to students of different faiths for the first time.
Scholars on Schools: Interview with Richard Fournier on Rural Public High Schools
In this short clip, education researcher Richard Fournier talks to CultureFeed Editor Joanna Breault about the ethos of “school as family” found in many rural public schools—a culture that can result in both positive and negative effects.
Ohio school to start International Baccalaureate program
Claire Foltz is excited that multiple-choice tests are becoming somewhat passé at Glen Oak High School in Ohio. Foltz and her classmates will soon be able to enroll in International Baccalaureate (IB) classes, which aim “to develop lifelong learners who think globally and act locally to create a better and more peaceful world,”
Formation in the Trenches: Melinda Mahand
Academic Dean Melinda Mahand explains how a little book by John Milton inspired the vision for character formation at Franklin Classical School. Ancient texts—like the Bible and the chivalric code—serve as sources for Franklin’s definition of what virtue is and how to live it out.
Hundreds of MN educators attend state-sponsored ‘restorative practices training’
Hundreds of educators across Minnesota received “Restorative Practices Training” through the state’s Department of Education this summer as part of a shift toward a softer discipline approach in schools.