Abstract
The purpose of this study was to assess whether flagged ‘values intensive’ courses within a public university's general education curriculum impacted on students' abilities to reason ethically. The major research question to be explored was, ‘what effect does taking a values intensive course have on students' ethical reasoning ability, when factors such as initial matriculation ability and total coursework are taken into account?’ Papers written by a sample of students in Legal Environment of Business (BSAD 240), mainly first‐year students and sophomores, were holistically scored to determine the level of values reasoning exhibited by the students. Demographic information and information about the number of values intensive courses each student had completed were correlated with the scores on the samples. It was found that students who had completed more values intensive courses scored higher on the samples used for this research. After providing an overview of the university and the State System of Higher Education (of which the subject university is a part), this paper provides an overview of the university's General Education Programme. This is followed by a description of the study's methodology, demographics of the research population, review and discussion of results, suggestions, and suggestions for future research.