On-Demand Webinar Archive
Character For, With, and In Community
These sessions, hosted in the Fall 2025 semester, feature panelists and presenters who engage questions about how to deepen, extend, and shape communities for greater wholeness; how to engage in this work with reciprocity, care, justice, and hospitality; and how character is formed and expressed through good communities.
Session Leaders: Jeff Fritz, Associate Director for Learning and Partnership Development with the Kern National Network for Flourishing in Medicine (KNN) and Associate Professor at the Medical College of Wisconsin; and Kimara Ellefson, National Director of Strategy and Partnerships, Kern National Network for Flourishing in Medicine.
Moderator: Aaron D. Cobb, Senior Scholar of Character, Educating Character Initiative
Description: The session will explore the KNN’s Framework for Flourishing, highlighting the integration and interdependence of character, caring and practical wisdom toward flourishing. Defined as a wholeness of being and doing, flourishing as the guiding aim of health professions education links the essential concepts of character, community and our wholeness as persons. Based on insights from work with 50+ healthcare organizations and schools, discussion will explore how the KNN Framework can be applied to encourage the holistic development of learners, faculty and clinicians. The KNN’s national work offers an exemplar for professional programs seeking to connect conversations about character with broader vocational concerns.
Session Leaders: Jenae Nelson, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Brigham Young University; Anne Jeffrey, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Baylor University; and Sarah Schnitker, Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at Baylor University.
Description: In this Educating Character Initiative webinar, Jenae Nelson, Anne Jeffrey, and Sarah Schnitker draw upon Anishinaabe philosophy to explore how three principles — relationality, process, and reciprocity — and their alignment with Mino-Bimaadiziwin (the good life) might inform a different inflection of character development efforts in higher education. Dr. Nelson is of Anishinaabe heritage, and her tribe is the Bois Forte Band of Chippewa. Adopting a contextualistic pragmatic approach — while taking care to honor the wisdom of the Anishinaabe and avoid cultural appropriation — the session leaders highlight how Anishinaabe principles and analogous approaches within the existing scientific literature might inform character development efforts. They pay particular attention to how the Seven Grandfather teachings (Truth, Humility, Respect, Love, Courage, Honesty, and Wisdom) guide individuals and communities towards harmony — the telos of Anishinaabe flourishing.
Moderator: Aaron D. Cobb, Senior Scholar of Character, Educating Character Initiative
Session Leader: Angel Adams Parham, Associate Professor of Sociology and senior fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia.
Description: Many colleges and universities see important connections between character development and community-engaged learning. In this session, we engage Angel Adams Parham in a conversation about her experiences living and working in an inner city New Orleans community and how this shaped her life and work. We discuss her work with college students utilizing both traditional methods of service learning and a community host program in this community through the non-profit she founded, Nyansa Classical Community. And we reflect on insights from college students working in Nyansa’s inner city Philadelphia program.
Moderator: Aaron D. Cobb, Senior Scholar of Character, Educating Character Initiative
Session Leader: Suzanne Shanahan, Leo and Arlene Hawk Executive Director at the Institute for Social Concerns and Professor of Practice at the University of Notre Dame.
Description: In this webinar, we engage with Suzanne Shanahan about what it means to pursue the common good with character and in community. Shanahan discusses how the Institute for Social Concerns develops students’ character through the lens of social justice. Shanahan’s research focuses on understanding the refugee experience in East Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia with special attention to how displaced persons construct moral boundaries around what is right, just, and fair. Her recent research examines the causes and consequences of domestic child sex trafficking for children and families in the United States.
Moderator: Aaron D. Cobb, Senior Scholar of Character, Educating Character Initiative
Session Leaders:
- Joseph Clair, Associate Provost of the Division of Humanities and Honors and Professor of Theology and Culture at George Fox University
- Daryl Van Tongeren, Director of the Frost Center for Social Science Research and Professor of Psychology at Hope College
- Thane Erickson, Professor of Clinical Psychology and Director of the Clinical Psychology Internship at Seattle Pacific University
- David Henreckson, Associate Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Weyerhaeuser Center for Christian Faith & Learning at Whitworth University
Description: Principal Investigators from grants at George Fox University, Hope College, Seattle Pacific University, and Whitworth University discuss the unique affordances and challenges of forming character for the common good at faith-based institutions.
Moderator: Aaron D. Cobb, Senior Scholar of Character, Educating Character Initiative
Cultivating Communities of Character in the University Webinar Series
These four webinars, hosted by the Educating Character Initiative, were recorded in Spring 2025 semester.
Session Leaders: Michael Lamb, Executive Director of the Program for Leadership and Character, and Jennifer Rothschild, Director of the Educating Character Initiative, Wake Forest University
Moderator: Aaron D. Cobb, Senior Scholar of Character, Educating Character Initiative
Description: In this moderated panel discussion, Michael Lamb and Jennifer Rothschild will answer questions about the work of building institutional capacity and empowering faculty and staff to educate for character. Join them for reflection about their experiences and the lessons they’ve learned at Wake Forest and through the Educating Character Initiative. And bring your questions so that we can enter into a conversation about how to do this important and challenging work across distinct institutional contexts.
Session Leaders: Cristy Guleserian and Alma Barnett, Arizona State University
Moderator: Aaron D. Cobb, Senior Scholar of Character, Educating Character Initiative
Description: In this presentation, Cristy Guleserian and Alma Barnett share how Arizona State University and Ashoka U collaboratively formed and fostered a community that creates space for developing practices and nurturing relationships that are founded in a shared desire for individual character development and organizational transformation. In addition to a discussion of the origins and development of this community of practice, this session will demonstrate new reflective and relational practices that participants can add to their toolbox; ideas for how to integrate these new tools into their own practice, curriculum, and culture; and an understanding of how these foundational practices support the development of individual character and organizational conditions that are conducive to character formation.
Session Leaders: Paul DeBell, Fort Lewis College; and Glenn Sanders, King University
Moderator: Aaron D. Cobb, Senior Scholar of Character, Educating Character Initiative
Description: In this moderated panel discussion, Paul DeBell, and Glenn Sanders answer questions about the efforts to educate for character on their respective campuses. DeBell is principal investigator for an ECI Capacity-Building grant titled “Character Building Conversations on Reconciliation & Restorative Justice,” and Sanders is principal investigator for an ECI Institutional Impact grant titled “Thoughtful, Resourceful, Responsible: Three Years on Character at King.” Join them for reflection about their experiences and the distinct lessons they’ve learned as they work to shape character in their distinct institutional contexts. And bring your questions so that we can enter into a broader conversation about how to do this important and challenging work within your own institutional contexts.
Session Leaders: Rachael Baker, Network for Vocation in Undergraduate Education
Moderator: Aaron D. Cobb, Senior Scholar of Character, Educating Character Initiative
Description: Engaging in vocational exploration encourages students to think beyond what they want to do to also consider who they are and hope to be, who they can serve, and what shapes their vision of a life of meaning, purpose, and ethical contribution. In this session, Rachael Baker will discuss the advantages and challenges of conversations about vocation with students and how they can unfold in the classroom, done practically in a way that supports overall learning and engagement. In particular, she will explore the ways that vocational work in the classroom directs us toward skill development and habit formation with our students, which can also become a way into conversations about and the exploration of character development.
How to Assess and Measure Character Education in the University Webinar Series
These four webinars and two in-person session recordings, hosted by the Educating Character Initiative, were recorded in Fall 2024 semester.
Session Leader: Betsy Barre, Assistant Provost & Executive Director, Center for the Advancement of Teaching, Wake Forest University
Description: When faculty hear “character assessment,” we sometimes think we are being asked to do a kind of data collection outside of, and at no value-add to, teaching in our area of expertise. In this session, Betsy Barre will lead a conversation about why classroom assessment is not just about measurement or social science; rather, she shows us such assessment plays a valuable role in course design, faculty understanding of classroom success, and student growth. Barre will introduce some principles and examples of effective assessment for disciplines across the university, as well as consider some of the risks and challenges with assessing character in the context of classroom relationships.
Session Leader: Jennifer Brown Urban, Professor of Family Science and Human Development, Co-Director of the Institute for Research on Youth Thriving and Evaluation, Montclair State University
Description: Developing and implementing a character education program is challenging enough. Knowing how to articulate your distinct approach to character, connecting it to what we know from research, and having a plan for evaluating that program is a whole other challenge. In this session, Jennifer Urban will provide you with practical strategies and tools for articulating your programmatic theory of change, connecting your approach to the already existing literature on character development, and developing an evaluation and measurement strategy.
In her presentation, Jennifer Urban mentions Netway (www.evaluationnetway.com), which is software that can be used to make pathway models. Netway also contains the entire Systems Evaluation Protocol including videos, worksheets, and frequently asked questions.
Learn more about how to create a pathway model at Research Gate Guide to the Systems Evaluation Protocol.
Session Leaders:
● Eranda Jayawickreme, Harold W. Tribble Professor of Psychology and Senior Research Fellow, Program for Leadership and Character, Wake Forest University
● Juliette Ratchford, Research Fellow, Educating Character Initiative, Wake Forest University
Description: As part of developing character-related programs, it is important to assess the impact of these programs on character development. In this session, Eranda Jayawickreme and Juliette Ratchford will introduce different types of character measures, what questions each type can address, and cover common problems and potential solutions to assessing character specifically. This session will prepare participants to make informed choices on which measures they should select for assessing the impact of their program.
Session Leaders:
● Kendra Thomas, Associate Professor of Psychology, Hope College
● Elise Dykhuis, Assistant Professor, United States Military Academy West Point
Description: When considering good educational practice, we want to ensure that we are using good pedagogical and psychometric techniques to support character development. Character assessments vary in their validity and reliability and are often not designed to measure development in context. This session will prepare participants to avoid the most common pitfalls and provide examples of feasible alternatives. Dr. Dykhuis works on character assessment of college students in context, providing robust personalized feedback to promote professional and character development. Dr. Thomas has experience creating and adapting measures to Brazilian schools and to South African home-
mentoring contexts. Both strive to use psychological assessment to promote character development.
Session Leaders from the Institute for Applied Research in Youth Development:
● Richard M. Lerner, Professor, Bergstrom Chair in Applied Developmental Science, and Institute Director, Tufts University
● Elizabeth M. Dowling, Research Professor and Deputy Institute Director, Tufts University
Description: The goal of this workshop is to add to the methodological toolboxes of evaluators of character education programs, and of researchers studying character development, change-sensitive and, as well, dynamic approaches to research design, measurement, and data analysis. Session leaders will aim to (1) acquaint participants with the concepts and associated vocabulary needed to make key decisions about the best designs, measures, and analyses for the specific theory-based question they are using, (2) explain the different methodological options available for ascertaining change or dynamic change across time and place, as well as assess the strengths and limitations of each method, (3) consider empirical examples that have used these methods in actual evaluation or research projects alongside different methodological strategies available for each example, and (4) provide resources for further learning, consultation, or collaboration.
This session was an in-person workshop held at ECI’s Educating Character Across Differences Conference, December 5-7, 2024, at Wake Forest University.
You can find the slides from this presentation here.
Session Leaders from the Program for Leadership and Character at Wake Forest University:
● Rebecca Park, Senior Research Scholar in the College
● Jessica Koehler, Senior Research Scholar in the Professional Schools
● Susan Fesperman, Research Project Manager in the College
Description: Session leaders will lead a workshop designed to help participants (1) understand how the PLC has approached the basic principles of research and program evaluation, (2) gain a more general awareness of a multitude of research methodologies and data management strategies that can be applied in the field of character education, and (3) help participants think about how they might begin to collect and analyze data for their own context and goals.
This session was an in-person workshop held at ECI’s Educating Character Across Differences Conference, December 5-7, 2024, at Wake Forest University.
How to Educate Character in the University Webinar Series
These five webinars, hosted by the Educating Character Initiative, were recorded in Spring 2024.
Session Leaders: Michael Lamb, Executive Director of the Program for Leadership and Character, and Kenneth Townsend, Executive Director of Leadership and Character in the Professional Schools, Wake Forest University
Description: In this session Michael Lamb and Kenneth Townsend shared their experiences building institutional capacity for educating character by sharing insights from their work at Wake Forest University. They reflected on lessons learned while establishing the Program for Leadership and Character as they looked back on their efforts to engage diverse stakeholders, build faculty and staff partnerships, and support the character development of students.
Session Leader: Michael Lamb, Executive Director of the Program for Leadership and Character, Wake Forest University
Description: In this session Michael Lamb provided a theoretical framework and practical examples for seven strategies of character development: (1) habituation through practice, (2) reflection on personal experience, (3) engagement with virtuous exemplars, (4) dialogue that increases virtue literacy, (5) awareness of situational variables, (6) moral reminders, and (7) friendships of mutual accountability. Based on work at Wake Forest and with the Oxford Character Project, these seven strategies offer potential guidance for educators who aspire to develop character education programs in their institutions.
Session Leader: Jason Baehr, Professor of Philosophy, Loyola Marymount University
Description: For educators interested in forming the character of their students, it can be difficult to know how to integrate this concern with the everyday business of teaching academic content and skills. A focus on intellectual virtues – understood as the character attributes of good thinkers and learners – offers a promising way of addressing this challenge. In this session Jason Baehr, an expert on intellectual virtues and their cultivation, provided an overview of intellectual virtues and identified some practical steps teachers can take to support their students’ growth in these qualities.
Session Leaders:
- Diane Ryan, Associate Dean for Programs and Administration and Affiliate Associate Professor in the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Studies and Human Development at the Tisch College of Civic Life at Tufts University
- Sunah Hyun, Senior Researcher at Tisch College.
Description: During this session, Diane Ryan and Sunah Hyun will share a brief overview of the Tisch College of Civic Life to provide examples of their programs and best practices designed to foster students’ character development. The programs aim to equip students with the values, knowledge, and skills to address social issues and create meaningful change. Tisch College fosters a supportive community to enhance engagement at Tufts University and beyond. The session will also include an explanation of the evaluation framework and the development of objectives specific to different programs.
You can find the slides from this presentation here.
Panelists:
- Robyn Ilten-Gee: Assistant Professor, Faculty of Education, Simon Fraser University
- Chrystal Johnson: Associate Professor of Social Studies Education, Purdue University
- Ashley Floyd Kuntz: Assistant Professor of Higher Education, Florida International University
Description: In this session, panelists discuss educating character across differences, from theory to classroom activities.
ECI Book Club Recordings
Our ECI Book Club gatherings bring together authors and character educators for meaningful conversations about their work. Each session begins with an interview led by an ECI staff member, followed by an open Q&A where participants can engage directly with the author.
ECI Scholar of Character Elizabeth Whiting spoke with author and philosopher Karen Stohr about her book, Minding the Gap: Moral Ideals & Moral Improvement, in a conversation about cultivating student-teacher and peer-to-peer relationships and classroom cultures that nourish character development. Karen Stohr is the Ryan Family Professor of Metaphysics and Moral Philosophy at Georgetown University and a Senior Research Scholar in the Kennedy Institute of Ethics. Her primary research area is ethics, especially contemporary Kantian and Aristotelian ethics.
Book Description: Most of us care about being a good person. Most of us also recognize that we fall far short of our moral aspirations, that there is a gap between what we are like and what we think we should be like. The aim of moral improvement is to narrow that gap. And yet as a practical undertaking, moral improvement is beset by difficulties. We are not very good judges of what we are like and we are often unclear about what it would mean to be better. This book aims to give an honest account of moral improvement that takes seriously the challenges that we encounter–the practical and philosophical–in trying to make ourselves morally better.
Moral improvement should be understood as the project of articulating and inhabiting an aspirational moral identity. That identity is cultivated through existing practical identities and standpoints, which are fundamentally social and which generate practical conflicts about how to live. The success of moral improvement depends on it taking place within what she calls good “moral neighborhoods.” Moral neighborhoods are collaborative normative spaces, constructed from networks of social practices and conventions, in which we can articulate and act as better versions of ourselves. The book concludes with a discussion of three social practices that contribute to good moral neighborhoods, and so to moral improvement.
Flourishing Student International Webinar Series
This international webinar series, organized in partnership with the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues at the University of Birmingham, features presentations from world-leading universities focused on character education. Educators share their expertise on how universities help students cultivate the character and skills needed to thrive.
The Flourishing Student Webinar, Series 3 (2025/2026)
View the webinar presentation by the team at the Universidad Austral on Canva.
Presenters: Claudia Vanney, Director of the Institute of Philosophy, and Belén Mesurado, Vice Director of the Institute of Philosophy and Director of the Psychology Program at the Faculty of Biomedical Sciences.
The Flourishing Student Webinar, Series 2 (2024/2025)
Presenter: Tyler J. VanderWeele, John L. Loeb and Frances Lehman Loeb Professor of Epidemiology in the Departments of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and Director of the Human Flourishing Program, Harvard University.
Presenters: Suzanne Choo, Head (Research) & Associate Professor, Singapore Centre for Character & Citizenship Education, National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University; and Melvin Chan, Assistant Dean & Research Scientist, Office of Education Research, and Singapore Centre for Character & Citizenship Education, National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University
Presenter: Verónica Fernández, Director of the Virtue and Values Education Centre, and Vianney Domingo, Head of Research and Character Education in the University area at the Virtue and Values Education Centre, Academic Director of the Leaders of Character Program.
Presenters: From the Kern National Network for Flourishing in Health: Jeff Fritz, Associate Director for Learning and Partnership Development, and Joëlle Worm, Director of the Learner Network, with perspectives from medical trainees.
Presenter: Jennifer A. Frey, Dean of Honors College, Professor of Philosophy, University of Tulsa.
The Flourishing Student Webinar, Series 1 (2023/2024)
Presenters: From the University of Birmingham: Deborah Longworth, Pro Vice Chancellor for Education, and Tom Harrison, Director of the Jubilee Centre and Deputy Pro Vice Chancellor for Education.
Presenters: From Wake Forest University: Michael Lamb, Executive Director of the Program of Leadership and Character, and Kenneth Townsend, Executive Director of Leadership and Character in the Professional Schools.
Advocating ‘taught’, ‘caught’ and ‘sought’ methods for the development of character and leadership, the webinar highlighted how important character virtues are in tomorrow’s leaders.
Presenters: Daniel A. Gruber, Associate Dean for Teaching and Learning and Clinical Professor of Management and Entrepreneurship, and Cristy Guleserian, Executive Director, Principled Innovation, both from Arizona State University.
Presenters: Edward Brooks and colleagues from the Oxford Character Project describe the project’s work and research approach in character development and leadership.
Presenters: From Ivey Business School, Dusya Vera, Executive Director of the Ian O. Ihnatowycz Institute for Leadership and Professor of Strategy, and Gerard Seijts, Professor of Organizational Behaviour and the inaugural director of the Ihnatowycz Institute for Leadership.
In this webinar, Dusya and Gerard describe the three pillars of the Institute’s work: research, programming, and outreach.
Presenters: Emma Cohen de Lara, Director of the Leadership as Service Program, and José M. Torralba, Assistant to the Vice President for Student Affairs, both of the University of Navarra