Critical Lessons

Nel Noddings is Lee L. Jacks Professor of Education, Emerita, at Stanford University. She is past president of the Philosophy of Education Society and of the John Dewey Society. In addition to fourteen books - among them are Caring: A Feminine Approach to Ethics and Moral Education, Women and Evil, The Challenge to Care in Schools, Educating for Intelligent Belief or Unbelief, and Philosophy of Education - she is the author of some 200 articles and chapters on various topics ranging from the ethics of care to mathematical problem solving. Her latest books are Starting at Home: Caring and Social Policy, Educating Moral People: A Caring Alternative to Character Education and Happiness and Education (Cambridge University Press, 2003). Noddings spent 15 years as a teacher, administrator, and curriculum developer in public schools. She served as a mathematics department chairperson in New Jersey and as Director of the Laboratory Schools at the University of Chicago. At Stanford, she received the Award for Teaching Excellence three times, most recently in 1997. She also served as Associate Dean and as Acting Dean at Stanford University for four years.