Moral formation is the core of all education, especially education for democratic citizenship. Moral formation requires, among other things, institutions with clear moral visions to which individuals can aspire. Moral clarity can be difficult in a society with broad diversity of moral commitments. In schools, the recognition of diversity has largely been dealt with by developing clear sets of rules by which behavior of students can be efficiently controlled. In contrast, the process of moral formation requires that schools become morally normative communities in which there is a core set of commitments that define them. Examples are examined that show institutions that are so constituted: The United States Marine Corps is one paradigm, and two school examples are also briefly considered (Vivian Paley and Deborah Meier).