The Case for an Education Based on Virtues

The Role of Respect in Education

The consequences of not respecting young people enough to tell them honestly about deficiencies in their work are serious.
The Role of Respect in Education
Many grades now reflect good citizenship instead of worthy scholarship. MYKOLA KOMAROVSKYY/SHUTTERSTOCK
Mark Hendrickson
Mark Hendrickson
contributor
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Respect for others is the key to social harmony and a functioning democracy. It is a check on willfulness and selfishness, as respect recognizes that others have rights and feelings, too, and acknowledges that our own pursuit of happiness does not entail the right to trample on the rights of others.

Respect is a key component of the greatest of all rules for social conduct: the Golden Rule, which enjoins us to do unto others as we would want them to do unto us.

Mark Hendrickson
Mark Hendrickson
contributor
Mark Hendrickson is an economist who retired from the faculty of Grove City College in Pennsylvania, where he remains fellow for economic and social policy at the Institute for Faith and Freedom. He is the author of several books on topics as varied as American economic history, anonymous characters in the Bible, the wealth inequality issue, and climate change, among others.
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