ABSTRACT
Schools hold a central place in the developmental agenda set forth for children and adolescents in nations throughout the world. As a consequence of their central and sustained presence in the lives of young people and their families, schools and educators play essential cultural functions with respect not only to the development of young peoples’ subject-matter learning and educational attainments; but also with respect to the development of their curiosity and motivation to learn, their social-emotional skills and self-awareness, and their broader moral and civic role identities. It is this wider array of outcomes that transcends but includes academic learning that is important not only for young people’s success in school, but for their lifelong love of learning, service to community, and well-being (Battistich, Watson, Solomon, Lewis, & Schaps, 1999; Comer, 1980; Damon, 2002; Eccles & Roeser, 1999; Greenberg et al., 2003; Rutter & Maughan, 2002; Wentzel & Wigfi eld, 1998). How schools can simultaneously address their academic missions and their broader social-emotional, moral, and civic missions in an age of increasing pressures for academic accountability is a challenge facing educators in many developed nations across the world today (Vanderwolf, Everaert, & Roeser, 2009).
