Moral affirmation not indifference

"If I now went backward in time and was helping to rewrite the Council for Basic Education's aims of 25 years ago, I would lay more stress on moral education. Is it advancing years only that colors my judgment that the quality of private and public conduct has deteriorated?

"I would like to see the school and the home collaborate in emphasizing the moral aspect of education. I don't mean anything elaborate and organized -- certainly not advocacy of priggish behavior, probably not even courses, and certainly not letting the schools be lured by the sectarian and commercially successful 'revival' groups that have sprung up among us.

"I do not think that schools can be morally neutral, however, that everything we teach can be made 'value free.'

"Teacher and parent must help to emphasize moral affirmation, not moral indifference or moral cowardice; to stress honesty respect for each other, sense of community individual responsibility."