Ethics: It's Just Good Business

by Keith Goree
Applied Ethics Program, St. Petersburg College

Let Your Students Help Write Ethics Scenarios

It's true that necessity is the mother of invention. Several years ago I was asked to put together an ethics curriculum for law enforcement officers. I was excited about the opportunity, but apprehensive for two reasons. First, I've never been a law enforcement officer. Second, there is a strong underlying "us vs. them" attitude in this culture. Police officers are a tight-knit group and are sometimes slow to welcome advice from outsiders. Earning credibility with officers would be difficult.

Specifically, I knew we would need ethics scenarios in the curriculum, but I wasn't sure that I could write ethics scenarios that would seem believable to them. It takes an intimate understanding of a profession to be able to connect at that level. So I did the best I could in the beginning. I interviewed some officers and got three good stories. But that wouldn't be enough. I pondered for awhile before stumbling across the solution. Starting with the very first training class, I asked the officers if they would write a short scenario that we could use with future classes. I asked them not to use real names, but to work in small groups to create a situation in which an officer faces an ethical dilemma or problem. Within a few months we had over twenty usable cases. Several years later now, I have a collection of hundreds.

The project worked so well that I've started doing this with other professional groups, including teachers, public officials, firefighters, and emergency medical workers. The scenarios are far better and more realistic than anything I could make up myself. Here are a few examples:

It is the fire department's policy that firefighters should not consume alcohol in the eight hours before their next shift. Bob went out with friends the night before his shift and was still drinking heavily at 4 am. He arrived at the station at 5 am, found an empty bed in the bunkroom and crashed there so he would not be late for work at 8. A fire call came in at 8:15. Bob dragged himself out of bed, struggled into his protective gear, and climbed onto the truck. Do Bob's actions present an ethical problem?

____________________

Officer Joe is a community police officer for Horizon Point, a retirement community. One July morning he responded to a call in reference to a residential burglary. The victim was an elderly woman named Madge. While taking her report, Joe noticed that Madge's apartment was uncomfortably warm. She apologized for the heat, but said that her air conditioner was broken and she had no money to have it repaired on her fixed and limited income. Joe happened to supplement his income by doing small repair jobs, including air conditioning. He offered to take a quick look and saw the problem immediately. At the end of the day, Joe returned and made the needed repairs for a minimal fee. Do Joe's actions present any ethical problems?

____________________

Stacy is a paramedic. Her job frequently puts her in people's homes during times of crisis. People in crisis don't tend to be as observant and careful with their belongings as they normally would. Stacy often sees watches, jewelry, cash, and other valuables sitting unguarded on dressers and tables. She realizes that the homes' occupants are too traumatized to even notice that a few specific items are missing. By the time they do notice, Stacy will be long gone. Who would suspect the paramedic that saved your husband's life? So she pockets a few items here and there, telling herself that she isn't taking enough to seriously hurt anyone. Besides, hers is a difficult job. In a fairer world, paramedics would be highly paid professionals. In a sense, she feels entitled.

____________________

You can already see why this works so well. The stories ring true to those in the trenches of these professions. They've probably experienced similar situations themselves, or at least know someone who has. So I've started doing similar projects with my classes at St. Petersburg College, asking students to write short scenarios relevant to their future careers or jobs they've had in the past.

For some students, the process seems to be almost therapeutic. Sometime in the past they witnessed or got caught up in a situation that bothered them. Something didn't feel right, but they didn't know what they should do about it at the time. Turning the situation into an anonymous, hypothetical scenario gives them the freedom and perspective to work through some of their inner conflicts. In at least a few cases, the projects have motivated students to go back and try to right a wrong from the past.

Give it a try as a classroom activity sometime.

Keith Goree is on the faculty of St. Petersburg College's nationally acclaimed Applied Ethics Program. Keith teaches professional ethics and ethics education at conferences and workshops for teachers, school administrators, law enforcement officers, and other professional groups throughout the country. He is the author of an ethics textbook, Ethics in American Life, and has been a contributing author to several other ethics books and texts. In 1997, the Florida Association for Community Colleges named Keith as a semi-finalist for the Florida Professor of the Year Award. Recently, Keith was awarded the Carol Burnett Award for Ethics in Journalism.