Shelby Clark, PhD

Principal Investigator

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Madora Soutter, Ed.D.

Faculty Collaborator & Co-PI

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Who we are…

Lynn Barendsen

Senior Project Director

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Victoria Tse

Research Assistant

Kirsten McHugh

Project Manager

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How We Came To Be

30+ Years of Research.

A continuing commitment to character, culture and change.

The Good Project began more than 30 years ago.

The C³ Lab builds on that foundation—turning research into practice to help young people grow, communities thrive, and a more just future take shape.

● Early 1990s

The “Humane Creativity” Project begins

● 1990s - 2000s

The Good Project research focused on Good Work.

● 2010s

The Good Project work began to focus more on adolescent development.

● 2020

We created Lesson Plans to grow character in four domains.

  • Civic

  • Intellectual

  • Performance

  • Moral

● 2022 - 2025

Our Teacher Communities of Practice strengthen learning worldwide.

● Today & Looking Ahead

All of these strands of work come together in our current projects—advancing character, culture, and change.

Thank you to our funders…

Funding:

The “Intellectual Risk-Taking in Computer Science Education” 2026 pilot study

Funding:

The 2025-2026 “Good Work Value Alignment” study

Learn about our related work…

  • The Good Project promotes excellence, engagement, and ethics in education, preparing people to become good workers and good citizens who contribute to the overall well-being of society. Through our research-based concepts, frameworks, and resources, we seek to help students reflect upon the ethical dilemmas that arise in everyday life and give them the tools to make thoughtful decisions.

    Learn more here.

  • Character Compass, Second Edition

    Four Directions for Building Powerful School Culture and Student Success

    by Scott Seider, Shelby Clark and Madora Soutter

    Learn more here.

  • Our most recent curricula consist of three separate sets of lesson plans.

    Learn more about each distinct curriculum below and discover how you can bring The Good Project to your classroom.

  • Our work explored the impact of a UWC education on a sample of thousands of students and alumni, and the wider world.

    We also included a set of 13 other non-UWC schools. The five-year longitudinal study culminated in the report Educational Experiences and Outcomes at the United World Colleges (UWC): An Investigation of Impact.