Don Feke for the ABET Readiness Committee: The Recommendation of the ABET Readiness Committee (ARC) said "In recognition that most engineering faculty feel unprepared to incorporate meaningful ethics content in their courses, the ARC recommends that the proposed handbook be the equivalent of a Guide to Ethics for Dummies.
Caroline Whitbeck for the Ethics Advisory Committee: The first need is a resource to prepare the faculty to include ethics in their courses, since students are not likely to think that as engineers they need to know about something unless they see that the engineering faculty know something about it. Since the suggestions for materials to be included in this resource are already available in the Online Ethics Center for Engineering and Science and online resources are superior to hard copy in that they
Once the ARC has had the opportunity to review the statement and add other specific requests that may occur to them, a Web page with this information can be created.
Don Feke for the ARC: 1. A statement (or statements) of philosophy or motivation, answering the question "why is it important to incorporate ethics content into the curriculum."
Caroline Whitbeck for the EAC: The statement should emphasize that we are not attempting to offer remediation for moral education that should have taken place in childhood. Our goal is to foster learning about the responsibilities of adult citizens and professionals, learning that could not be acquired in childhood. Sample: "The responsibilities of adults as citizens, community members, and professionals are complex and demanding. University education should enable students to integrate ethical understanding of these complex responsibilities with the advanced knowledge that they will draw on in deciding how best to meet those responsibilities."
MDF/ARC: 1. Some basic definitions of terminology, highlighting the distinctions between terms.
CW/EAC: See Glossary of Ethical Terms
MDF/ARC: For instance, define "academic ethics"
CW/EAC: The entry on academic integrity in the Glossary
MDF/ARC: and "research/laboratory ethics."
CW/EAC: The entry on research ethics in the Glossary
DF/ARC: Describe the differences between ethics and standards of professional conduct.
CW/EAC: The entry on ethics in the Glossary
DF/ARC: 2. What are some basic guidelines regarding intellectual property?
CW/EAC: It depends on what specific topic you are interested in. These range from software piracy to benchmarking to a guide for graduate students on using the knowledge they acquired in their thesis research. Here are a few examples:
DF/ARC: 3. Some guidance on the types of topics that can be included in studies of ethics.
CW/EAC: The Online Ethics Center has an Index of Topics. This list is called "topic index" on the graphical template that appears in the upper left corner of the graphics version of each page (and in the pull down menu of the text version of each page). For example,
DF/ARC: 4. Ethics resources. Examples are:
Listing of Web sites pertinent to ethics cases. The ethics cases should not be limited to issues of safety.
CW/EAC: Cases Index
The Online Ethics Center also has other resources, such as guides to relevant literature under topics in the topic index, Index of Topics, a comprehensive bibliography, a listing of relevant organizations and the abbreviations for them,, and more--see the OEC Main page for a listing of the contents of the main sections (the sections marked by the colored tabs). The subsidiary sections are shown in the upper left hand corner of every page.
DF/ARC: 4 b) Annotations on the content and value of these Web sites (do the Web sites contain only case studies, or do they include contain reasoning, interpretation and context?).
CW/EAC: All our links are annotated. We have an annotated listing of Web sites (in addition to our listing of cases on Web sites) at the Other Sites Page. However, the links that are likely to be most useful for getting to sites that best suit specific needs are those to other sites under particular sections, such as Cases, Research Ethics, Education, Essays.
DF/ARC: c) Compilations (or pointers to Web sites) for the Codes of Ethics of the professional societies.
CW/EAC: Index of Codes of Ethics
DF/ARC: 5. Handouts and/or packaged study aids that will guide the instructor on how to use the ethics material in the classroom.
CW/EAC: Instructional Index
Active learning methods (the methods most favored by learners) for learning practical ethics were a featured track in our March 1999 International Conference on Ethics in Engineering and Computer Science.
DF/ARC: 6. How can the faculty help students to think about ethical issues? Most faculty will need detailed help on how to assemble and incorporate ethics materials within courses.
CW/EAC: I am willing to run a workshop to show them how to do that.
An essay on a related topic: A Plan for Undergraduate Education in Practical Ethics with sample assignments for engineering students using teaching materials from the Online Ethics Center.