This two-part essay is a critical look at the core curriculum in the American college: a diagnosis and call for action. Several assumptions are made: that the college curriculum is a living and evolving part of human culture (and conversely, that it is not value-free); that higher education has value beyond the functions of socialization and…

This commencement address stresses three obligations that colleges and universities must assume to strengthen the intellectual and moral fiber of the United States: (1) colleges underscore the unity of life on earth; (2) a college education must be a truly humanizing experience, a process that stresses the dignity of life and deepens the…

American commitment to education is not just a commitment to access but to excellence as well. We need to ask again the hard questions about our academic purposes. Is there a conscious organization to the curriculum today? The answer is a cautious affirmative, for the goal of diversity has taken us, academically, far from shore. A college…

Although recent American educational practices have stressed the right to be independent, it is thought that education must find ways to affirm independence and interdependence. By focusing curricula on a common heritage as well as current concerns with communication, social institutions, and vocation, students can live wisely in the future.…

Communicating values is at the heart of education. Intertwined with the processes and procedures of schooling, a host of values are taught every day. Education, therefore, carries with it a social and moral imperative. If we are to help students avoid moral bankruptcy, we cannot have a value-neutral education. A basic feature of the social and…