American higher education—historically and inherently—is a morally formative endeavor. Yet, in order to respond to America’s moral pluralism, higher education has increasingly taken a reductionistic approach to moral formation. Consequently, it abandoned the effort to supply students with moral expertise. Current approaches help students learn how to be excellent professionals and citizens, but they fail to provide the necessary tools for living the good life—in college and beyond.
Identity Excellence: A Theory of Moral Expertise for Higher Education addresses this problem by setting forth a multi-disciplinary theory of moral expertise for fostering moral excellence in an array of important identities. To this end, it teases apart the essential elements of what it means to be excellent in an identity before discussing the philosophical, sociological, psychological, and educational processes necessary for students to internalize traditions of identity excellence as part of their own moral identities. Overall, the emergent theory exposes the shortcomings in contemporary general education, professional ethics, and co-curricular education.
Finally, this book sets forth a bold but compelling vision for a more hopeful future for American higher education. As outlined within, such education involves teaching students’ excellence in the Great Identities, as well as how to prioritize and integrate their pursuit of identity excellence.

Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Higher Education’s Confusion about Moral Expertise
Part I. Understanding the Relationship between Moral Excellence and Identity
Chapter 1. Who Am I and Who Should I Become? The Philosophical and Sociological Frames
Chapter 2. The Most Important Ingredients for Moral Motivation: From the Sociological to the Philosophical, Psychological, and Moral Frames
Chapter 3. The Challenge of Ordering Our Multiple Identities for Excellence: Combining the Philosophical, Psychological, and Sociological Frames with Theology
Part II. The Problems with Contemporary Collegiate Moral Education: Using the Frames for Critical Analysis
Chapter 4. The Ethically Challenged Curriculum: General Education
Chapter 5. The Curricular Reduction of Ethics to Professional Ethics
Chapter 6. How Contemporary Student Affairs Diminishes Moral Education
Part III. The Pursuit of Human Flourishing through Identity Excellence
Chapter 7. Teaching Excellence in the Great Identities: A Revised Educational Frame
Chapter 8. Identity Prioritization and Integration for Excellence
Conclusion: The Humanizing Imago Dei University
Bibliography
About the Author