# purposeful change Jethro Jones ## Assignment Directions ## Assignment ## Summary This study, “Purposeful Change: The Positive Effects of a Course-based Intervention on Character,” explores the impact of a college course designed to foster purpose and character development in students. The course, focusing on beyond-the-self purpose, personal meaningfulness, and goal orientation, significantly increased the participants’ sense of purpose in the personal meaningfulness and beyond-the-self domains compared to a control group. Through mixed-method analysis, the research highlighted key themes: developing a beyond-the-self orientation, acquiring tools to pursue purpose, individual flourishing, and building relationships. The study concludes that structured, character-focused interventions in educational settings can positively affect the development of purpose, particularly beyond-the-self purpose. ## Agreement 1. Purpose Beyond Self: The idea that purpose, especially beyond-the-self, is critical for personal and communal flourishing, aligns with my leadership and education-focused philosophy. 1. Holistic Development: The importance of developing character in a holistic way through multiple virtues, such as justice, empathy, and courage, aligns with how I approach school leadership. >Applying a broadly Aristotelian approach to character education informed by research in psychology, philosophy, and education, the course combines a careful study of Aristotle’s ancient accounts of ethics with contemporary commencement speeches focused on specific virtues. It also integrates assign­ ments and exercises that apply seven empirically- grounded strategies for character development identi­ fied by Lamb et al. (2021, p. 82): ‘(1) habituation through practice, (2) reflection on personal experience, (3) engagement with virtuous exemplars, (4) dialogue that increases virtue literacy, (5) awareness of situational vari­ ables, (6) moral reminders, and (7) friendships of mutual accountability.’ Assignments based on these strategies challenge students to reflect on themselves, their values, and their purpose and to connect their purpose to the flourishing of others, thereby encouraging them to iden­ tify and internalize their own values and virtues in a light of a broader communal context. (Mendonça et al., 2024, p. 4) ## Disagreement 1. Limited Effect on Goal Orientation: The study found no significant change in goal orientation, whichI find concerning. I believe goals are powerful. However, standards in education actually [cap our achievement](https://jethro.site/synergy). >Unexpectedly, the goal orientation subdomain did not significantly change over time, but when examining the qualitative data where students reflect on their own experiences of change in their pur­ pose, these results are not surprising. By far, the majority of the students (72%) reported their purpose as being affected by the course and specifically mentioned chan­ ging from a self-oriented focus to a beyond-the-self focus (50%), as well as gaining tools to pursue purpose (41%). (Mendonça et al., 2024, p. 11) ## Something to Think About This was a good example of a paper that I should write. More examples like this would be beneficial to our continued growth as students of writing academic papers. ## References Mendonça, S. E., Dykhuis, E. M., & Lamb, M. (2024). Purposeful change: The positive effects of a course-based intervention on character. _The Journal of Positive Psychology_, _19_(2), 323–336. [https://doi.org/10.1080/17439760.2023.2178954](https://doi.org/10.1080/17439760.2023.2178954) [[EDUC 7640]]