In a basic sense, small learning communities are rooted in ethics of care, particularly in terms of a focus on close, reciprocal relationships between students and teachers and the [End Page 43] personalization of the school environment. Noddings’ (1995a) ethics of care contends that the primary educational aim should be to encourage “the growth of competent, caring, loving, and lovable people” (p. 24), not in the superficial sense of caring as “a warm and fuzzy feeling that makes people kind and lovable” (1995b, p. 676), but as a morally, ethically, and intellectually defensible act.