ECI News and Stories

Each semester at Institutional Impact Grantee Radford University, students from across the university gather at the Wicked Festival, presenting original solutions to some of the world’s hardest problems. “Students, community partners, alumni judges, and faculty circulate, ask hard questions, and push back. The students are the authorities.”

In the first installment of a new series, Aaron D. Cobb, ECI’s Director of Collective Learning, invites us to consider whether courage is a virtue we can develop on our own. Practicing by ourselves is not enough. We need guides: people who can help shape how we learn and show us what good practice looks like.

A diverse group of coaches, athletic directors, trainers, and academics came together to discuss the challenges and opportunities of promoting character development in college sports.

ECI Researchers Michael Prinzing and Juliette Ratchford recently ran a study that investigated what students think about intentional efforts on the part of faculty or institutions to foster their character growth.

“We’re going to develop the leadership for the next generation of leaders, and we’re going to do it in the ways that we care about when it comes to character,” Chris Marsicano, P.I. for Davidson College’s Institutional Impact Grant and the inaugural director of the Martin Institute for Public Good, recently told LearningWell magazine.

When Robert J. Hartman began teaching his first-year seminar, “Becoming a Better Person,” in Fall 2023, he set out to help students reflect on who they are, who they hope to become, and how to take steps in that direction. As he built his syllabus, though, he noticed a gap: there simply weren’t enough succinct, engaging resources on character designed for students just starting out.

In an essay published in The Christian Century, ECI Senior Research Scholar and Associate Director of Partnerships Emily Hunt-Hinojosa considers the texture, complexity, and invitation to character in relationship to power. She offers a unique and nuanced exploration of MLK Jr.’s vision of character, braiding multiple ways of knowing into a story of character and love.

“This letter describes what my imagined companions—sociological archetypes to draw out complexities beyond my own experience and knowledge—might encoun­ter together on the path to joy,” writes Senior Research Scholar & Associate Director of Partnerships Emily Hunt-Hinojosa in this month’s Virtues & Vocations magazine.

Howard University is developing an H.B.C.U.-based theoretical model for character education. In this work, they are looking at key considerations of character education through an H.B.C.U. lens, including the legacy of character within Black education and the paucity of Black-centric character education within the literature. 

The ECI Research Team often gets questions like the above from educators leading character-related projects. Before discussing assessment tools, we first need to answer a deeper question: What kind(s) of evidence could tell us whether your institution or program is having the intended effect on students? 

We’re pleased to share the Educating Character Initiative 2025 Project Brief, a snapshot of our shared work and its direction. This document reflects the ECI Community’s collective efforts and commitment to forming students, institutions, and cultures shaped by character for the common good.

“I teach courses in leadership and ethics in the law, and I begin most of those courses by asking students a series of questions, including: ‘By a show of hands, how many of you think there’s a decent chance you’ll go to prison for something you do related to your future work as a lawyer?’ writes Kenneth Townsend, Executive Director of Leadership and Character in the Professional Schools.

Is being virtuous good for you – or just people around you? “People who are habitually more compassionate, patient, and self-controlled tend to experience better well-being. And when people display more compassion, patience, and self-control than usual, they tend to feel better than they usually do,” the ECI’s Michael Prinzing explains in The Conversation.

“Many American colleges are elevating discussions of character. Wake Forest University has developed the Educating Character Initiative, a national network of colleges committed to putting character at the center of curriculum,” writes Clark Gilbert in The Chronicle of Higher Education.

United Negro College Fund’s Jelani Favors and the ECI’s Emily Hunt-Hinojosa and Michael Prinzing make the argument that character education efforts at HBCUs have been underappreciated. To kick off conversations around research on the role of HBCUs in educating character, they invite you to collaborate and join the discussion.

Current ECI grantees share what helped them develop strong proposals, build partnerships, and connect their ideas to their institutions’ needs. Together, they remind us that this work matters, that there’s room for many approaches, and that you are not alone in the process.

In 2025, ECI Webinars brought together diverse perspectives on how communities can cultivate wholeness, reciprocity, care, justice, and hospitality, and how character can be intentionally developed through community.

In the episode, Aaron Cobb discusses hope—not just as a feeling or a fleeting optimism, but as a virtue that shapes character and community.

“We don’t just train people to be doctors or engineers or business leaders; we train people to think for themselves, and that is profoundly liberating,” Duncan Pritchard recently told LearningWell magazine about the university’s character work.

This fall, George Fox University hosted ECI Community members united in exploring the formation of student character in faith-based higher education. Together, this group of thoughtful leaders represents a growing subset within the ECI Community: faith-based institutions committed to forming students with the qualities they need to serve the common good.

What does it mean to build the traits of a peacebuilder rather than just theoretically know how to resolve conflict? At Utah State University, a religious studies professor and a political science professor are collaborating to enhance the university’s core curriculum with peace studies pedagogy that’s integrated with character education.

The North Carolina Central University (NCCU) Office of Community Engagement and Service, NCCU Wesley Campus Ministry, and Duke University Chapel co-sponsored a public conversation on “What an Education is For: Character and the Second Curriculum at HBCUs” at NCCU on Thursday, Oct. 16.

Seton Hill University is weaving its founding spirit, rooted in the mission of the Sisters of Charity, into a modern approach to character education. With support from the ECI, faculty and students are turning archives, classrooms, and conversations into spaces where virtues like humility, wisdom, and gratitude spark to life.

A recent study found that framing discussions about race around virtues like courage and patience reduces defensiveness, fosters openness, and encourages meaningful action. Our ECI Senior Research Fellow Juliette Ratchford contributed to the research.

The Educating Character Initiative announced a request for proposals from U.S. colleges and universities for grants between $50,000 and $1,000,000 to develop the character of their faculty, staff, and students.

In socially diverse contexts, character educators often struggle to articulate what “good character” means. They want to avoid both moral dogmatism and relativism. In this webinar, three distinguished presenters draw on Anishinaabe principles of relationality, process, and reciprocity to offer a third way, showing character educators how they can help students develop a contextualized understanding of good character.

Philosophy graduates consistently score higher on tests of verbal and logical reasoning than their peers from other majors, according to the new research by members of the ECI Community.

Once a federal Indian boarding school, Fort Lewis College is using its ECI Institutional Impact Grant to address its painful past by “centering character education within a reconciliation initiative that goes beyond atonement to institutional change,” writes LearningWell Magazine.

In the August installment of our media partnership with LearningWell Magazine, a publication of the LearningWell Coalition, Syracuse University’s “Character Development and Sport Fan Engagement” project is highlighted for differentiating itself from most sports-driven character-building projects by focusing on the fans.

In July, 52 faculty members from Wake Forest and beyond joined us for our “Character Across the Curriculum” workshop. The goal was to support educators who want to integrate leadership and character development into new and existing courses.