Before we can teach values, we need to stop pretending that everyone’s values are completely different. Turn on cable news or spend ten minutes on social media and you might conclude that Americans disagree on everything from breakfast cereal to the meaning of life. Yet most parents, regardless of politics, income, religion, or ZIP code, want their children to be responsible, hardworking, honest, resilient, and kind. We may argue endlessly about the route, but most of us are headed toward the same destination. The mistake is assuming that because we disagree loudly on a handful of public issues, we have nothing meaningful in common. In reality, the shared values that hold communities together are often far larger than the differences that dominate headlines.
At the same time, schools must recognize that technology has fundamentally changed the value of intellectual achievement alone. There was a time when success depended largely on who could remember the most facts. Today, every student carries a device that can answer questions faster than the smartest kid in the class and, occasionally, with greater confidence than accuracy. Artificial intelligence, search engines, and digital assistants have become the world’s most overqualified study partners. The competition is no longer about who can access information; it is about who can use information wisely. As machines become increasingly capable of storing, retrieving, and even generating knowledge, qualities such as grit, focus, judgment, resilience, and courage become more valuable—not less. Technology may be winning the race for information, but character remains a distinctly human advantage.
This reality places schools in a unique leadership position. Schools are one of the few institutions that still bring together children from every background and ask them to prepare for a shared future. If they are to fulfill that mission, they must do more than develop intellect; they must intentionally cultivate character. Teachers should be empowered to teach the habits and values that help young people succeed in life: responsibility, perseverance, generosity, courage, and a positive mindset. In an era when almost every institution seems to be losing public trust, schools have an opportunity to unite families around a common purpose. The goal is not to tell children what to think, but to help them develop the character needed to think well, work hard, and contribute meaningfully to the communities they will one day lead.
We welcome you to the conversation. Please let us know that you care by liking comments, forwarding posts, or joining in our dialogue at johnzurn.com. We would love to hear your own “Stories From the Classroom….”.
From our first posting:
“As parents and teachers, we need to reclaim our traditional role as influencers of our children – not by shouting louder than the influencers our children discover online, but by stressing ideas that are more important than fancy shoes and snappy TikTok tunes. We need to emphasize traits that everyone agrees children will honor. We need to convince our children that the people who are most important to them have a better understanding of what it takes to be successful in life.”
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