'The definitive version is available at www.blackwell-synergy.com.' Copyright Blackwell Publishing. DOI: 10.1111/1467-8527.t01-1-00174 [Full text of this article is not available in the UHRA]Three proposals are made regarding values acquisition in schools. It is believed that: (a) optimal conditions for the integration of values into school-students' lives will include students' voluntary commitments; (b) values learning must lead to personally transformed relationships between students and topics considered worthwhile; (c) since values learning is, arguably, the core of formal education, there has to be some consistency between what is learned and the wider socio-political scene. It is argued that these conditions are hard to fulfil via the prescribed, performance-oriented curricula currently on offer in English school classrooms

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