Because of changing priorities in education, the traditional classical curriculum in Massachusetts grammar schools gave way to support for vocational and English learning from 1670-1780. (Author)

The modern character education movement emerged in the 1980s as a consequence of growing parental and public concern for moral drift, or what sociologist James Davison Hunter referred to as "the death of character." This public anomie was captured in these words from Sanford McDonnell, chairman emeritus of McDonnell Douglas and chair of…