Richard Weissbourd

Runner Up, National Awards for Education Reporting 2012. Opinion in an Education-Only Newsroom: Promoting Moral Development in Schools, Harvard Education Letter, 28(1), Jan/Feb 2012. (2012),(2012)

Awarded One of Top 10 Education Books of All Time by American School Board Journal, for The Vulnerable Child (Addison-Wesley, 1996)

Best Editorial Award from Association of Educational Publishers for The "Quiet" Troubles of Low Income Children, Harvard Education Letter, 24(2), March/April 2008.

Book selected by New Yorker reviewers as one of the top 24 nonfiction books of 2009. Weissbourd, R. The Parents We Mean to Be: How Well-Intentioned Adults Undermine Children's Moral and Emotional Development (Houghton Mifflin, 2009).

Understanding the Scalability of Parenting Strategies Designed to Promote Key Virtues (2021-2023)
John Templeton Foundation

Making Caring Common proposes a two-year project to examine the take-up and implementation of evidence-based strategies-- routines, practices and activities-- that support the development of three key virtues in children—empathy, gratitude, and diligence. While parents and caregivers are frequently offered strategies and activities intended to promote these virtues by nonprofit and commercial organizations and parenting experts, rigorous data is distressingly scarce about whether and why parents actually take-up specific strategies and about if and how they use them over time. To answer these questions about usage, we propose to assess various engaging, evidence-based activities, practices, or routines designed to promote these virtues in 7-to-10-year-old children. We will conduct this research with 270 families, each engaging in an evidence-based strategy for eight months (nine strategies, 30 families per strategy).This study will generate vital information about which evidence-based strategies that promote these virtues are more or less likely to be used on a large scale and whether there are demographic and family factors that contribute to which strategies work for whom. While this study focuses mainly on take-up and implementation, we will also collect data on parents’ perceptions of the impact of strategies on both children’s and their own beliefs and behaviors related to the three virtues. We will disseminate our results and activities widely to parents, caregivers, practitioners, and researchers via myriad channels, including reports, blog posts, partnerships with organizations working with parents and caregivers and prominent media outlets such as Cartoon Network and Disney.

Weissbourd, R., Batanova, M., Lovison, V., and Torres, E. (2021, Feb.) MCC Report, Loneliness in America: How the Pandemic Has Deepened an Epidemic of Loneliness and What We Can Do About It https://mcc.gse.harvard.edu/reports/loneliness-in-america

Weissbourd, R., Way, N., and Bracket, M., (2021, Feb. 9) The pandemic is fueling a crisis of connection. The next surgeon general should tackle both. The Hill. https://thehill.com/changing-america/opinion/537996-the-pandemic-is-fueling-a-crisis-of-connection-in-the-us-the-next

Weissbourd, R. and Cashin, A. (2020, Feb. 20). Parents’ obsession with raising happy kids is a big problem. Boston Globe. https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/02/20/magazine/parents-obsession-with-raising-happy-kids-is-big-problem/

Weissbourd, R. (2020, May 5) 5 ways to teach our children empathy in these challenging times. Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/on-parenting/5-ways-to-teach-our-children-empathy-in-these-challenging-times/2020/05/04/a5670cda-895a-11ea-ac8a-fe9b8088e101_story.html

Weissbourd, R., Barnard, B., and Anderson, T.R. (2020, May 29) Will the Pandemic Revolutionize College Admissions? Wall Street Journal Saturday Review https://www.wsj.com/articles/will-the-pandemic-revolutionize-college-admissions-11590763879

Weissbourd, R., Batanova, M., McIntyre, J., and Torres, E. (2020, Jun.) How the Pandemic is Strengthening Fathers' Relationships with Their Children, https://mcc.gse.harvard.edu/reports/how-the-pandemic-is-strengthening-fathers-relationships-with-their-children

Weissbourd, R. (2020, Dec. 11) To Build It Back Better, Learn to Talk Across the Political Divide. Nations Well. https://nationswell.com/to-build-it-back-better-learn-to-talk-across-the-political-divide/

Weissbourd, R. and Barnard, B. (2019, Sept. 5). The college admissions process is ‘unconscionably unjust.’ Here’s one way to help change that. Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2019/09/05/college-admissions-process-is-unconscionably-unjust-heres-one-way-help-change-that/

Weissbourd, R. and Cashin, A. (2019, Dec. 16). Here’s How to Raise Healthy, Well-Adjusted Teens. Thrive Global. https://thriveglobal.com/stories/heres-how-to-raise-healthy-well-adjusted-teens/

Weissbourd, R. and Cashin, A. (2018, Oct. 16) 5 ways parents can help kids understand consent and prevent sexual assault. Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2018/10/16/ways-parents-can-help-kids-understand-consent-prevent-sexual-assault/

Weissbourd, R. (2018, Oct.). “Let’s take a Stand Against Sexual Harassment in School,” Educational Leadership. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1193631

Weissbourd, R. and Gardner, H. (2017, Sept. 6). The fundamental things we aren’t teaching our kids. Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/09/06/the-fundamental-things-we-arent-teaching-our-kids/

Weissbourd, R. (2009). The parents we mean to be: How well-intentioned adults undermine children's moral and emotional development. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

The Vulnerable Child: What Really Hurts America's Children and What We Can Do About It, (1996).