PRIMED is an approach to comprehensive school or school system transformation that supports not only academic success but, more centrally, the flourishing of human goodness in all members of the educational community. It is evidence-based, grounded in 25 years of work by the Center for Character and Citizenship (CCC) at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, and organized around six “design principles” of effective character education, rather than functioning as a scripted program or curriculum. The acronym stands for: (P)rioritization, (R)elationships, (I)ntrinsic Motivation, (M)odeling, (E)mpowerment, and (D)evelopmental Pedagogy.

Global demand for PRIMED, particularly within the Americas, now exceeds the CCC’s current capacity to deliver and monitor educator training. Led by CCC co-directors Marvin Berkowitz, creator of PRIMED, and Melinda Bier, this project addresses that gap by formalizing a system to train and certify expert PRIMED Facilitators. It aims to certify 10 to 20 bilingual facilitators who can support PRIMED implementation across partner sites in Mexico, Chile, and Colombia. Five or more organizations in the CCC’s network will be invited to participate based on established criteria, including prior experience and demonstrated capacity.

The project will include six overlapping phases: (1) creation of certification protocols for programs currently active in Colombia, the US., and Spain; (2) development of a bilingual (English and Spanish) PRIMED Toolkit and Facilitators Guide using a Cultural Adaptation Checklist and Ecological Validity Framework; (3) quarterly co-design team meetings at the CCC; (4) ongoing evaluation via participant surveys, retrospective tests, and focus groups; (5) a series of writing and dissemination activities led by Professor Berkowitz; and (6) a sustainable presence on the CCC website to house the contextually adapted materials and PRIMED training.

Anticipated outcomes include credible bilingual character education expertise available to schools throughout the Americas, and certified facilitators scaling up PRIMED’s reach to approximately 45,000 students annually.

Photo by Derik Holtmann: Marvin Berkowitz leads an exercise during the PRIMED Institute in Character Education. The five-day gathering provides educators an intensive overview of the PRIMED model of character education and the virtues of servant leadership. Berkowitz, Founders Professor of Education, and Melinda Bier, Teresa M. Fischer Professor of Citizenship Education, received a grant from the Templeton World Charity Foundation, Inc. to develop expert facilitators of the PRIMED model.