Dr. Arthur Schwartz has been a Senior Program Officer and a Vice President of the John Templeton Foundation for ten years. In his new position as Executive Vice President, Dr. Schwartz is responsible for the execution of new and enhanced philanthropic strategies designed to increase the Foundation’s effectiveness and impact. His challenge is to build an internal management and organizational framework that emphasizes continuous learning and the pursuit of excellence in all aspects of the Foundation’s mission and purposes.

In his former capacity as Vice President for Programs and Research in the Human Sciences, Dr. Schwartz directed the What Works in Enterprise-based Solutions to Poverty prize program, a grants competition to promote public understanding of how entrepreneurship and market reforms are alleviating poverty and accelerating its disappearance in areas of the world where poverty has been most oppressive. Dr. Schwartz also designed and launched Spirituality in Higher Education, a landmark national study that examines the search for meaning and purpose among college students, directed by the Higher Education Research Institute at U.C.L.A. He has also directed the Foundation’s recent funding initiatives within the fields of gifted education and character development. Dr. Schwartz will continue to serve as Executive Editor for In Character: A Journal of Everyday Virtues.

Previous to joining the Foundation, Dr. Schwartz taught at Harvard Graduate School of Education, and before that, served for several years as a director of dropout prevention programs for the School District of Philadelphia. In 1990, he was recognized for successful efforts to reduce school dropouts at a White House ceremony hosted by President George H.W. Bush.

Since 1992, Dr. Schwartz has concentrated his research on adolescent moral and spiritual development. He has delivered papers at numerous national conferences and published articles in the Harvard Educational Review, Journal of Moral Education, Educational Record, Liberal Education, and The Chronicle of Higher Education, among others. He recently authored the lead chapter in the Hoover Institution volume Bringing in a New Era in Character Education.

Dr. Schwartz received his doctorate in moral education from Harvard University. He received an honorary law degree from the College of the Ozarks where he delivered that institution’s 1999 commencement address. He is married with two children, loves coaching little league baseball, enjoys musical theatre, and is an avid reader of abolition history.