This project builds upon Saint Mary’s work in character education throughout students’ academic, civic, professional, and community experiences. / Photo by Francis Tatem
Character Counts: Saint Mary’s Receives Educating Character Initiative Institutional Impact Grant
Character for the Common Good, a new three-year initiative, will expand character education across the undergraduate experience.
Saint Mary’s College of California has received an Educating Character Initiative Institutional Impact Grant to advance Character for the Common Good, a three-year, College-wide initiative designed to intentionally integrate character formation throughout students’ academic, civic, professional, and community experiences.
The $291,000 grant comes from the Educating Character Initiative (ECI), a project of the Program for Leadership and Character at Wake Forest University. ECI supports colleges and universities in developing institution-wide approaches to character education that reflect their distinctive missions, curricula, and campus cultures.
The initiative at Saint Mary’s is led by Sarah Beth Dempsey, EdD, who serves as Director of Engaged Learning and as a visiting professor in the School of Arts and Sciences. Character for the Common Good will build upon the College’s existing work in character education and create a coordinated framework for cultivating moral, civic, intellectual, and professional character throughout the undergraduate experience. Rooted in Saint Mary’s Lasallian Catholic identity, the initiative builds upon the College’s longstanding commitment to educating the whole person, fostering inclusive community, advancing justice, and preparing students to use their education in service of the common good. The three-year project runs from August 2026 through July 2029.
The initiative will connect character formation across some of the College’s most distinctive academic and student experiences, including First-Year Advising, Collegiate Seminar, January Term, the Core Curriculum, Engaged Learning, community partnerships, democratic engagement, and career preparation. Faculty and staff development, shared assessment practices, and opportunities for reflection will help establish a common approach to character education across the institution.
Focusing on Students and Community
The project is organized around three interconnected areas: Character Within, Character Together, and Character in Action. Character Within focuses on personal virtue and moral formation through advising, academics, experiential learning, and professional preparation. Character Together develops a shared culture of character through dialogue, community learning, academic integrity, and engagement across differences. Character in Action creates opportunities for students to put those virtues into practice through civic participation, environmental and community engagement, and career preparation.
“This is an amazing opportunity for our faculty, staff, and community partners to collaborate in developing courses and programs that will positively impact every Saint Mary’s undergraduate student,” said Dempsey. “Character education is central to our mission and who we are as Lasallian educators, and this investment in Saint Mary’s will allow us to build on the educational experiences, expertise, and sense of community that make a Saint Mary’s education so distinctive.”
Among the project’s major components will be an Engaged Learning Faculty Fellows program, a campus-wide Community Read, character-focused programming within Collegiate Seminar and January Term, expanded democratic engagement, a Character in the Community speaker series, Community Partner Day, and development of the Gael Career Compass, which will integrate character formation with students’ professional preparation and experiential learning.
“Character education is central to our mission and who we are as Lasallian educators, and this investment in Saint Mary’s will allow us to build on the educational experiences, expertise, and sense of community that make a Saint Mary’s education so distinctive.”
—Sarah Beth Dempsey, EdD
The Gael Career Compass will connect advising, Engaged Learning, internships, Federal Work-Study employment, and career preparation while helping students develop professional competencies alongside qualities such as integrity, accountability, humility, perseverance, communication, and relational responsibility. Students completing the professional formation modules will earn a professionalism certificate recognizing their development in professional character and workplace readiness.
“Saint Mary’s has always understood that a college education is about more than preparing students for their first job. It is about preparing them for lives of purpose, leadership, and service,” said Saint Mary’s College President Roger J. Thompson. “Character for the Common Good reflects that distinctly Lasallian, Catholic approach by connecting what our students learn in the classroom with how they lead, work with others, engage with their communities, and respond to the challenges they will encounter throughout their lives. Our graduates should leave Saint Mary’s ready to succeed professionally and prepared to use their talents with integrity while contributing meaningfully to the common good.”
Over the three-year grant period, Saint Mary’s will also develop assessment tools to measure student growth and create resources that can sustain the work beyond the grant. The project ultimately seeks to establish a lasting institutional framework connecting character formation with academic learning, civic engagement, professional preparation, and community life.
About the Educating Character Initiative
The Educating Character Initiative, a project of the Program for Leadership and Character at Wake Forest University, is catalyzing a national movement focused on character in higher education. Through grantmaking, collective learning, and community engagement, ECI provides institutions with funding, resources, and support to integrate character into their distinctive institutional contexts, curricula, and cultures. The Educating Character Initiative is funded by Lilly Endowment Inc.
