Crew chief's story -
Jefferson Center for Character Education
The Jefferson Center for Character Education, formerly known as the Thomas Jefferson Research Center was founded in 1963 by Frank Goble as a non-profit corporation. In its thirty-eight year history, the Center has worked in nearly every state of the nation, in major metropolitan cities, as well as in Canada.
The Center’s educational curricula and publications have been used in 6,000 schools and in approximately 60,000 classrooms reaching an estimated four million students.
The Center focuses on the systematic teaching of the life values of personal responsibility, honesty, respect, integrity, courage, tolerance, justice, and politeness.
The Center currently has two curriculums that are in use throughout the United States in elementary and middle schools. The two curriculums are (a) the elementary school curriculum, STAR Responsibility Skills Success Through Accepting Responsibility and (b) the three-year middle school curriculum, How To Be Successful in Less Than 10 Minutes a Day.
The Center funded an independent study conducted in the early 1990’s within the Los Angeles Unified School District which evaluated the systematic use of the Center’s school curriculum in classrooms. The following results were confirmed after one year:
- Major discipline problems including fighting, drugs, and weapons decreased by 25%
- Minor discipline problems dropped by 39%
- Suspensions declined by 16%
- Number of tardy students dropped by 40%
- Unexcused absences fell by 18%
Currently, the STAR program is experiencing success in schools in fifteen states.
In December, 1999, the Jefferson Center for Character Education, merged with Passkeys Foundation to form one non-profit entity. In early 2000 Passkeys Foundation changed its corporate name to Passkeys Foundation Jefferson Center for Character Education.
