Adapting ‘Ethics Bowl’ Strategies for Teaching Introductory Ethics Course – A Case Study of an American Community College

ABSTRACT

Teaching introductory ethics course or courses with strong ethics content to first- and second-year undergraduate students presents numerous challenges. Most students register for these courses to meet a general education requirement or believe they do not need education in ethics because they have received cultural, social, and religious instructions. Furthermore, many college and university administrators, employers, and policymakers confuse ethics with compliance and misunderstand their connection. In this context, this paper argues that undergraduate students can learn ethics subject content (e.g., metaethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics, etc.), attain course objectives, and apply their learning in professional and personal situations. Strategies used to prepare students for the Intercollegiate Ethics Bowl (IEB) competition have proven effective means of introducing and reinforcing ethics course content outside of the classroom setting. The qualitative data obtained from the respondents suggests that the methodology and strategies adopted to prepare students for ethics bowl competitions reinforced the ethical theory participants learned in courses where ethics content was prominent and led them to make rational and ethical decisions. These findings also suggest that strategies to prepare ethics bowl teams for the IEB competition can similarly impact non-ethics bowl team members in a traditional classroom setting.

Acknowledgement

Prof. Satya Sundar Sethy thanks the USIEF (United States-India Educational Foundation) for the Fulbright Scholar-In-Residence Fellowship grant for 2022–2023. During his stay in Utah, USA, his association with the host institution’s Ethics Bowl coaches (colleagues) prompted him to think about this paper and develop ideas in collaboration with them.

Dr. Gregory Wright thanks Satya Sundar Sethy and Mike Salitrynski for their persistence in publishing this research. He especially thanks his ‘Ethics Bowl’ co-coach, Mike Salitrynski, for dedicating time and guiding students to bring out their best and especially to Aly, Christian, Ashlyn, Catalina, Mckinley, and Brian, whose hard work made them the champions of the 2022 Regional Ethics Bowl competition held at Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The national ethics bowl competition was organized with The Association for Practical and Professional Ethics (APPE) conference. In 2023, it was organized in Portland, Oregon, USA.

2. Retrieved on April 5, 2023, from https://snow.edu/news/2022/big-win-for-snow-college-ethics-bowl-team.html

3. Retrieved on April 4, 2023, from https://www.appe-ethics.org/about-ethics-bowl

4. For more details about the case, please see pp. 4–5 of the document. Retrieved on March 03, 2024, from https://growthzonecmsprodeastus.azureedge.net/sites/36/2023/06/REB-Cases-2022_FINAL.pdf

5. Snow College is a two-year college. The Ethics Bowl program recruits students each semester to replace graduating team members. Some years, coaches recruit an entirely new team because of the size of the institution and the limited number of team members. Hence, the potential participants in the study are few.