“I don’t know Miss. I think this year I just got stupid and nobody really cares anyway.” This is how a seventh grader Marisa responded, when I asked her to talk about why she was struggling to make the grades in her classes and why she could not pass the high-stakes test that would allow her to move on to the next grade. This was truly the low point of my years in education when a student was willing to shoulder the burden for a system that had failed her. This encounter with Marisa was also a turning point. It helped me to recognize that what was missing in the traditional organization of schooling, and in so many other places, was a focus on caring.

The need for care in our society is acute. Patients feel uncared for in our medical system; clients feel uncared for in our welfare system; old people feel uncared for in the facilities provided for them; and children, especially adolescents, feel uncared for in schools.

Caring for ideas and great causes is important, but it goes deeper. I do what I do because to care and be cared for are fundamental to our survival and to being whole—essential for a meaningful existence.