|
 |
LEARNING MORE THAN
THE THREE Rs
|
NEW CHARACTERplus
PROMOTION URGES BUSINESS TO..."ALWAYS TAKE THE HIGH ROAD."
BY C.B. ADAMS
When he talks about the importance of character education in our
schools, Sanford N. McDonnell, former chairman and CEO of McDonnell-Douglas,
is fond of quoting Martin Luther King: “Intelligence plus character—that
is the goal of true education.”
McDonnell then likes to add his own thoughts: “I believe that character
education is just as important as the learning side of academics.
Character without knowledge is weak and feeble, but knowledge without
character is dangerous and a potential menace to society.”
“I
believe that character education is just as important
as the learning side of academics. Character without
knowledge is weak and feeble, but knowledge without
character is dangerous and a potential menace to society.”
|
Sanford
N. McDonnell
former chairman & CEO,
McDonnell-Douglas,
chairman of Character Education
|
|
|
These are not just words to McDonnell, they are the guiding principles
behind the nation’s largest community project in character education—a
project that McDonnell himself helped create and still leads as
chairman. It was founded in 1987 as a division of the Cooperating
School Districts of Greater St. Louis (CSD). Originally named the
Personal Responsibility Education Process (PREP), it had seven local
school districts as charter members and four corporate sponsors.
A year later, 14 school districts had embraced the initiative to
enhance the ethical and academic responsibility of youths.
“This was the first major initiative in this country to weave character
education into the basic curriculum into every aspect of school
life. It is not a program or a class that students take as part
of their education. Rather, it is woven and integrated into every
aspect of their lives, including school, home and community,” says
Les Landes, a member of CHARACTERplus’ planning and advisory council
and COO of Leadership By Design, a consulting firm that provides
executive coaching and leadership development.
In 1997, on its 10th anniversary, PREP was renamed CHARACTERplus
to better reflect the work and purpose of the organization. The
goal of the program is to provide quality training, resources and
leadership to help parents and schools develop the character, sense
of responsibility and academic achievement of students.
Today, CHARACTERplus has grown into a statewide collaborative effort
with 100 school districts and more than 40 businesses, community
organizations and media outlets. The program now involves more than
20,000 teachers and 300,000 students in more than 500 schools. Additionally,
CHARACTERplus is being used as a model both nationally and internationally
in countries such as Hong Kong, Mexico and Denmark.
CHARACTERplus
promotes character education through a series of compelling
posters. |
|
“St. Louis was a wonderful laboratory. From the very beginning,
it was a very grass roots process for character education. It is
the only character education program that has this many school districts
participating, and where they each go about it in their own way,
working with their local districts to decide what the best resources
are for their schools and their children,” says Linda McKay, who
was the program’s director from 1988 to 2002. This January, McKay
accepted a new position in the Bush Administration U.S. Department
of Education, working in the area of character education. Liz Gibbons
is the program’s new executive director.
CHARACTERplus takes a holistic approach to character education by
emphasizing the need for schools, parents, community organizations
and businesses to collaborate in the process. Pursuant to this goal,
CHARACTERplus is promoting the program through a compelling series
of posters. In one, a young man holding a trumpet stares out with
the headline, “He’d love your thoughts on bending the rules.” In
another, a girl holds a dancer’s pose as the headline states, “She
wants your opinion on stretching the truth.” All the posters end
with the call to action: “Always take the high road. Support character
education.”
“We are trying to convey to adults with this outreach program that
it is all the little decisions, judgments and actions that we make
everyday that are going to have an impact on how our kids grow up.
They contribute to whether or not they are going to be truly responsible
corporate citizens,” Landes says.
ELIZABETH
GIBBONS
executive director,
CHARACTERplus |
|
Along with the posters, CHARACTERplus has developed a list of six
requests for businesses:
- Communicate
with school districts to encourage them to continue supporting
and providing character education
-
Ask employees with school-age children and grandchildren
to do the same
-
Distribute a soon-to-be-released guide for parents to
help them talk with their children about difficult ethical
choices and actions
-
Attend a seminar called “Ethical Fitness”
-
Hang the “High Road” posters in their facilities
-
Volunteer to pay for the framing of “High Road”
posters for local schools
|
“Slowly and
surely, more and more businesses, corporations and foundations have
come on board with the idea of the importance of character education.
I am confident that will continue to be the case, because we in
the business world don’t want people who are coming out of school
and into our businesses or communities who are brilliant, but dishonest,
who have great intellectual knowledge, but don’t really care about
people, who have great creative minds, but are irresponsible,” McDonnell
says.
EDUCATING
THE EDUCATORS
|
Character
education involves more than just students. It also requires
that schools and school districts prepare teachers and other
school leaders to have the knowledge, understanding and continuity
to maintain the character education processes. According to
CHARACTERplus materials, “Principal leadership in the St.
Louis area will experience its greatest turnover ever in the
next five to 10 years, and it will be critical that these
new administrators continue to be advocates and leaders of
character education in their schools.”
That is why Sanford N. McDonnell, former chairman and CEO
of McDonnell-Douglas and chairman of Character Education endowed
the Sanford N. McDonnell Professor in Character Education
at UM–St. Louis—the first such endowed professorship in the
United States. The primary goal of the professorship is the
training of up to 30 high school principals per year. The
yearlong in-service program meets once a month and helps principals
design and tailor a character education program for their
individual schools.
“Principals are the CEOs of their school. They need to know
how to design and implement an effective, quality character
education program,” McDonnell says.
In 1998, CHARACTERplus increased the program through the establishment
of Character Education Leadership Academies at both UM–St.
Louis and Webster University in collaboration with CSD. The
academies can now help train up to 60 principals annually.
At the Parkway School District, professional development of
teachers and other school leaders is proving to be a vital
way to attract the highest quality employees and then to retain
them. Parkway has distinguished itself for its approach to
professional development, according to Jere Hochman, superintendent
of the district.
“The way to build a strong organization is by hiring talented
individuals and growing them through their careers. Teaching
is no different than any other profession. Our process is
to go out and find talented teachers and other staff positions
and then engage them professionally, so they are here for
a career. We have an obligation to our kids to make sure that
those teachers are good to go for 30 years,” he says.
At Parkway, professional development is not a program. It
is a framework that is designed to address changes in the
evolution of teaching, learning and other factors. The process
is “very much organically grown within the District” and focuses
on students, learning, the learning community, systemic thinking
and managing and monitoring progress. It also involves a standardized
induction process that is the same for everyone, followed
by professional development that is based on the strengths
of individuals and their choice.
For instance, one of the District’s English teachers became
interested in the concept of “critical friends,” which involves
a cohort of teachers who work together and serve as their
own developers. The teacher implemented the concept in her
high school, took on a leadership role, and has helped implement
it in 10 other schools.
“Our framework empowers people with a focus on achievement,”
Hochman says. “All of this is a means to an end. In the end,
it is student achievement and their membership in our schools
that powers our efforts. The return on investment is incredible—in
motivation, new learning, adding to one’s repertoire, having
a sense of competency and staying ahead of the game.” |
C.B. Adams is a St. Louis-based writer and an adjunct communications
professor at UM—St. Louis and St. Charles Community College.
|
|
|
|
|
-
- - - - - - -
- - - - - - -
- - -
-
- - - - - - -
- - - - - - -
- - -
-
- - - - - - -
- - - - - - -
- - -
-
- - - - - - -
- - - - - - -
- - -
|
