What is an educated person? - Richard Pring - Address given to the Education Forum NUI Maynooth

Oct 22, 2026

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Address given by Richard Pring to the Education Forum at NUI Maynooth, outlining a philosophical response to “What is an educated person?”. The speech frames education as more than factual schooling: it is evaluative growth toward the good life through knowledge and virtues. Policy driven by economic imperatives is contrasted with the need to cultivate moral character and virtues such as caring, self-respect, and self-respect-based dignity. The argument calls for educational partnership and the return of teaching.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages17

Reading Time43 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction: Maynooth’s mission

Theme: the good life shaped by knowledge and virtues

Virtue of caring and self-respect

What follows in the argument

On being a person

Two connected meanings of “education”

What is an educated person? Richard Pring Address given to the Education Forum NUI Maynooth, 20th June, 2013-05-28 Introduction: Maynooth’s mission First, I must express my delight at being once again, not only in Maynooth, but also embedded in the Dublin Room in Stoyte Hall. Did that great Professor of Ethics, the revered and Reverend Dr Michael Forker, once grace that room, remembered for his praise of, and expertise in, the virtue of prudence? Was it not he, Professor of Ethics for 40 years from his appointment in 1895, who felt confident to declare to the assembled students (with overtones of Aquinas) that ‘summum bonum is here’ (yes, here in Maynooth)? However,(and those of you from Universities other than Maynooth will be glad to hear) he then felt it prudent to add, ‘but I can assure you that it has at least a quasi-domicile elsewhere’. But that surely is what should be the case. When Lord Macauley, in 1845, vigorously denounced in the British Parliament the representatives of the universities of Oxford and Cambridge for opposing the wishes of Prime Minister Peel to enlarge the grant to Maynooth, he surely warmed the hearts of Maynooth men when he declared: Whatever this institution be, whether good or bad, it is clearly an important institution. It is established to form the opinions and the moral character of those who are themselves to form the opinions and moral character of a nation. 1 Hence, the importance of a tradition in Maynooth, represented in the 40 years’ formation of moral character by that Professor of Ethics, in whose famous black notebook lay all the ethics he cared about, the residuum of all ethics, a crystallization, an irreducible minimum, an essence, a formula formulorum. 1 See Kevin, N., 1945, I Remember Maynooth, Burns, Oats and Washbourne. And in this mission to form the opinions and the moral character of those who were to form the opinions and moral character of a nation, that eminent philosopher was ably assisted by the Professor of Sacred Eloquence. After all, does not the pursuit of our educational aims require not only knowledge of summum bonum but also the communication skills to convey it to the minds of the young (although ‘sacred eloquence’ is now referred to more prosaically as ‘pedagogical skills’)? That is the theme ofwhat I shall argue. For, in addressing the question ‘What is an educated person?’, I want to point to a central feature of being a person, namely the capacity to pursue the‘good life’, that is, a life which is shaped by both knowledge and virtues. This is worth saying because it is rarely recognised by those who shape educational policy and too often remains implicit only in the practice of our schools. In the case of the former, policy is understandably shaped by perceived economic needs. The economic imperative reigns supreme. In the case of the latter, ‘virtue’ seems, along with piety, a rather medieval quality. ‘Virtuous women’ thrived once upon a time in England, according to the plaques on the walls of our ancient churches, but rarely in the more recent ones. One never hears a teacher say to a parent that, though Johnny is rather backward in his reading and mathematics, he is extremely virtuous. In pursuing this argument, I pay particular attention to the virtue of ‘caring’ since it is the key to so much else that we aspire to in our schools, but received little attention from our Professor of Ethics, bent on being prudent, or indeed from Aquinas or Aristotle. But the pursuit of this virtue of 'caring' would seem to be a central aim of those teachers in our schools and colleges who are, in the words of Macauley, ‘to form the character and moral opinions of a nation’. In what follows, therefore, I shall, first, examine more closely the idea of being ‘a person’, and of being one more abundantly, for that remains central to the educational enterprise; second, pay particular attention to the development of the virtuous life with particula

FAQs

Why does Richard Pring focus on the question “What is an educated person?”

He uses it to highlight a central feature of personhood: the capacity to pursue the good life, shaped by both knowledge and virtues, rather than only accumulating knowledge or satisfying economic needs.

How does the speech distinguish education from mere schooling or training?

Pring contrasts a descriptive answer (“where you were educated”) with an evaluative sense in which education makes someone a better person, implying growth and reform for the better.

What role does the virtue of “caring” play in Pring’s argument?

He treats caring as a key virtue that connects to broader educational aims, arguing it should receive more attention in schools and colleges than it does.

Oct 22, 2026

Uploaded by Bulrr