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Home > HeightsCast > Colin Gleason on "Tell me the truth!" Leading Boys to Integrity
Podcast: HeightsCast
Episode:

Colin Gleason on "Tell me the truth!" Leading Boys to Integrity
Category: Education
Duration: 00:51:21
Publish Date: 2026-04-09 17:18:00
Description:

Why tell the truth when it doesn't always pay? It's important to let boys encounter this question through example, literature, and enough freedom to wrestle with his own conscience.

In this rebroadcast of a 2017 talk, Head of Lower School Colin Gleason admits that you can't "teach" integrity with drills and facts. But you can create an environment that encourages it to develop. We have to push past consequentialism and avoid the adult instinct to root out the facts at any cost. Because the truth is a good and natural thing; the boy needs only to embrace it.

Chapters:

3:12 Dishonesty: from toddlers to adults

5:51 Examples of integrity

10:04 Defining integrity, and whether we can teach it

13:36 Getting past "consequence" ethics

22:14 Homes and schools where integrity can take root

24:47 Trust: the power of relationship

33:47 Freedom: their own initiative

38:37 Friendship: ready to guide and help

45:03 Dishonesty from fear, honesty from confidence

Links:

Jeremy Affeldt repaid the Giants $500,000 after clerical error, CBS Sports, May 15, 2013

"Sportsman" Roddick falls in Rome, The Seattle Times, May 6, 2005

Also on the Forum:

The Truth Shall Set You Free by Alvaro de Vicente

Lying to Dumbledore: On Moral Consequentialism in Children's Literature featuring Joe Breslin and Tom Cox

Featured Opportunities:

Parents' Conference at The Heights School (April 25, 2026)
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