The Department of Formative Education at Boston College integrates students’ intellectual, social, and spiritual lives, empowering them to discover their most authentic selves through self-reflection and engagement with faculty, staff, and peers. Rooted in the Jesuit tradition, the Center offers mentorship programs, retreats, leadership opportunities, and service experiences that encourage students to identify their deepest desires. As a Jesuit, Catholic university and leader in the liberal arts, BC views this integration not as a supplement to education but as its animating core: preparing students who will use their gifts in the service of others.

This commitment runs throughout BC’s academic programs. Cornerstone introduces first-year students to reflective inquiry alongside their faculty advisors. Perspectives, a four-year interdisciplinary program, invites students to wrestle with enduring questions about identity, origin, and purpose. Portico bridges business education and the liberal arts through an ethical lens. And Pulse pairs community service placements with classroom engagement with philosophy and theology. Complementing these programs, the Department of Formative Education, housed in the Lynch School of Education and Human Development, brings rigorous interdisciplinary inquiry to questions at once perennial and pressing: How do we educate whole persons for meaningful lives? How do we cultivate community? How do we nurture vision and values? The department offers a Ph.D. in Formative Education, an M.A. in Learning, Design, and Technology, and a B.A. in Transformative Educational Studies.