While acknowledging success in certain cultural areas during the 1990s, the report speaks clearly to the increasing breakdown of the American family. secretary of education William Bennett compiled the Index of Leading Cultural Indicators 2001. In an effort to inform legislators, policy experts and the general populace regarding some of these changes, former U.S. Other changes have been clearly for the ill: for example, the dissolution of familial and community bonds that has cut millions of children loose from the guidance and protection that they need during their formative years.” Some changes have been unquestionably to the good. . . . So what’s behind the failure Damon cites? Could the problem be that we have not transmitted standards because we no longer have a consensus on what to transmit?Īccording to Damon, “no one can doubt that modernity has affected childrearing in many profound ways. But until we individually accept responsibility for the culture that breeds such problems, the battle for the minds of our youth will continue to go against us. A society cast adrift from its moral moorings will have difficulty doing that. When the next generation demonstrates antisocial and self-destructive behavior, we have to accept that something is wrong, then find the problem and fix it. He further asserts in his book Greater Expectations: Overcoming the Culture of Indulgence in America’s Homes and Schools (1995) that “at the heart of the crisis is a failure in our society’s capacity to guide the development of young people in productive directions.” In his capacity as professor of education and director of the Center on Adolescence, Damon believes there is a battle for the future of society and that at this point it has no certain outcome. One such expert is Stanford University psychologist William Damon. Yet, although experts agree on the existence of the problem, they differ greatly in their approach to the solution. Any way we look at it, we have a crisis of ever increasing proportions on our hands when it comes to the development of children. Accordingly, the character of our young people should be of major concern to us all.
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