August/September 2019 49
Spelling it Out
LEARNING ETHICS IN THE SCHOOLYARD
Given the growing awareness of the potential damage
caused by pressuring teenaged students to succeed,
amplified by the lack of scruples most recently
on display by some high-profile parents, it is not
surprising that many college-prep schools are now
embracing their roles as the first lines of defense
against the larger ethical crisis that produced the
admissions scandal in the first place.
One irony is that—at first glance—these same
South Bay and Peninsula private day schools seem
to bear out the region’s stereotype as the elite, harddriving
heartland of a culture of competition. That
culture shoulders at least part of the blame for unrealistic
expectations around childhood academics
and collegiate aspirations.
The schools vary in philosophy and practice, but
all are looking past the basics of classroom learning,
and the necessity of high test scores, to create learning
environments that produce, in their words, good people.
The Harker School in San Jose, one of the leading
college-prep schools in the region, includes charac-
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