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Does art – literature – have a place in the ethical life? Can it practice moral formation? Moral philosophers from the nineteenth century through the modern era have answered both questions in the affirmative. In this paper, I argue that several of the former, such as G. E. Moore and Arthur Schopenhauer, inspired the modernist writers Virginia Woolf and Thomas Mann to use distinctively modern narrative strategies to morally form their readers. To establish a vocabulary useful in explaining how and to what end they did so, a brief exposition of contemporary virtue theorists opens the paper. Analyses of each writer follow; first, Mann relies on irony, emotional and deliberative narration, and the sublime to provoke the reader into confronting their biases on ethical-aesthetic problems throughout Death in Venice. Woolf creates ordinary “common meeting-places” and uses stream-of-consciousness narration to engender readers’ sympathy in “The Mark on the Wall” and “Mrs. Dalloway in Bond Street.” Despite those strategic differences, however, both draw their readers into morally valent individual psychological realities without trying to destroy them. In this way, their texts are capable of re-creating the reader as “finely aware and richly responsible,” a faculty which I then situate in late modernity’s nascent discomfort with and inability to disavow grand narratives. The paper concludes that Woolf and Mann’s formative modernism is a critical midpoint between modernity and poststructuralist postmodernity.

The study of marginalized students in higher education has been critiqued for focusing research attention on common areas of struggle rather than examining areas of success. This study attempted to address that gap, particularly at faith-based, predominantly White institutions as represented by the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities. The purpose of this study was to explore the lived experiences of high-achieving students from historically marginalized groups involved in the Act Six program--a rigorous comprehensive urban leadership scholarship program--at four predominantly White CCCU institutions. The 30 participants defined their experience in terms of their sense of belonging, as measured by their perceptions of whether they as a student mattered (individual sense of belonging), and whether diversity mattered to the institution (institutional sense of belonging). Data from interviews indicated that peer support, institutional support, academics and faculty engagement, and campus-climate contributions and challenges all played a role in the student experience. The resulting implications for practice include pragmatic ideas for fostering a sense of belonging through the cadre model and campus community, within the classroom and the academic experience, and through the actions of senior leaders. Although this research documents a high degree of success for Act Six students individually, as well as of this particular program at the sponsoring institutions, the inconsistencies encountered by students in relation to their sense of belonging emphasizes the importance of educational leaders expanding efforts to develop hospitable campus services and a supportive campus climate.

The Act Six program includes full-need, full-tuition student scholarships, extensive training and preparation for students prior to matriculation, and mentorship throughout their time on campus. The purpose of this research was to explore institutional decisions and implications in initiating and sustaining an Act Six partnership. Through an exploratory case analysis design, the views of staff, faculty, and administrators at four Act Six partner universities, as well as institutional documents and data, were explored. Ultimately, this initiative appears to be one successful strategy for developing the institutional capacity to respond to the significant changes in student demographic trends, while honoring the biblical call and developing a justice orientation toward diversity.

In this study, the low velocity impact properties of rotationally molded skin-foam-skin sandwich structures were investigated experimentally since there is a need for a greater understanding of the impact behavior of these composites in service to extend the range of their applications. Polyethylene rotationally molded sandwich structures were manufactured at various skin and core layer thickness combinations and tested using an instrumented low velocity drop weight impact testing machine at 20-100 J impact energy levels, at room temperature. This allowed the identification of the impact response, failure mode, and the effects of the skin and core layer thickness on impact resistance. Force-deflection curves, maximum force, contact time, maximum deflection versus impact energy curves were analyzed. Samples were seen to fail due to the indentation dart piercing the upper and lower skins, with crushing and consolidation seen in the core foamed layer. Delamination at the core/skin interface was not observed. It was found that fracture initiates from the lower skin and then continues to grow to the upper skin via the foamed core layer. The impact resistance was noted to increase with increasing skin and core layer thickness; though an increase in skin layer thickness had a greater contribution than an increase in the core layer thickness., INTRODUCTION Sandwich composite structures are made from a single material such as polyethylene (PE) using the rotational molding process, have two solid skins separated by a foam core (Fig. 1) [...]