Abstract

Competent qualified professional training is highly necessary but not sufficient. The current professional is required to be a person of integrity while being capable of maintaining a personal and ethical identity when facing changing circumstances. However, we are witnessing an early specialization in education that does violence to the formation of youth since it ignores the fact that an integral, humanistic and universal education is the most adequate way through which professional competence has to be developed. The path described by Jacques Maritain, as well as the principles included in some of his works, is valid for finding new answers to the educational problems arising in our time. This work aims to analyse the importance of training the whole person in the light of Maritain’s pedagogical claims, paying particular attention to the need to ensure the development of the comprehensive unity of all dimensions of man. Therefore, we will first refer to the ontological foundations of education, second to its epistemological value, and finally we will explain the implications and educational requirements