Closing the Character Gap

This chapter is structured around an imaginary conversation between the author and a university president. Topics include what a virtue is, what the list of virtues looks like, why it is important to foster virtue in the university, whether students should be the primary focus of efforts to cultivate virtue in universities, and whether we should assume that most students are virtuous, vicious, or neither to begin with. The chapter ends by focusing on the virtue of honesty in particular. It first clarifies some of the philosophical issues and experimental findings which pertain to this virtue. Then it briefly outlines some strategies for fostering honesty in university students.