Why sociologists of education are moral (personally) but don't write about morality (professionally): a cultural sociology of education

The author argues that North American sociologists of education have generally been motivated by a «consequentialist» morality that focuses on individual achievement measured in the aggregate rather than a teleological morality focused on communal achievement measured in the virtue of the individual. As such, the subdiscipline has generally avoided discussion of morality in schools except inasmuch as it can be used to explain stratification. The author provides data from two prominent moral education movements and suggests a reading of contemporary moral philosophy and Durkheim’s Moral Education to develop a «cultural sociology of education».