Syllabus: Philosophy 324: Ethics for Professions

Jeffrey Grupp, Department of English & Philosophy, Purdue University, Calumet

Jgrupp@pnc.edu, and gruppj@calumet.purdue.edu

Sp. 2008, MW 11:00-12:20, and 2:00-3:20

Reading: Ethics for Professions, by John Rowan and Samuel Zinaich, Jr. (2003)

 Tentative Class Schedule (this could change, and/or could be pushed back)

1. Jan 14+16, 23. Topic: class introduction and the levels of the empirical. Reading: none.

2. Jan 23+28.  Topic: What is a Profession? Reading: 56-61.

3. Jan. 30.  Topic: Business and Stakeholders. Reading: 168-180

4. Feb 4+6. Topic: Engineering. Reading: 203-211, 219-224

5. Feb 11+13.  Topic: Health Care. Reading: 283-293

6. Feb 20+25.  Topic: Counseling. Reading, 330-333

Test 1 (Probably will be a take home test). Turned in during classtime.

7. Feb 26+Mar 3. Topic: Law. Reading:  358-367.

8. Mar 5+12. Topic: Journalism. Reading:  373-379, handout on logical fallacies

Presentation topic due March 12 (subject and three-sentence explanation for why you want to cover the topic you have chosen)

9. Mar 17+19. Topic: Education. Reading: 406-417; 423-432

Presentation "evidence statement" due March 17

Sample presentation given by Professor March 19

10. Mar 24, 26, 31, April 2, 7, 9, 14, 16, 21, 23: Student presentations (20-25 mins, 3-4 per class, instructions and details given below, does constitute test material for the final, GRADED ON VERY STRICT TERMS)

11. April  23, 28, 30 Film assignment, final  lectures and class summary

TEST 2 (final exam, cumulative, includes material from presentations, probably a take home).

This second test is going to be handed out the last week of class, and will be due the Friday of finals week at 9 am. You must put it in my box in CLO 235

 Grading:

1. 250 points – Midterm
2. 250 points – Final exam
3. 150 points – Film writing assignment (due with the final at the end of the semester)
4. 100 points – Quizzes
5. 250 points – Class presentation

Total: 1000 points

There are no make-up tests, unless you have an excused absence (see the definition of ‘excused absence’ below’). If you miss a test, you must present valid, legitimate documentation proving you were absent for reasons beyond your control.

Student Presentations:

I consider these the most important part of our class! This is because the presentations take place after most lectures are finished, and after much learning has taken place. Therefore, you will be able to use your new knowledge, and the new energy you have gained from them, to come up with your own creative and informative information for the class. These presentations will be graded in very strict fashion! I will be giving a sample presentation on March 19th. More information will be given to you on this as March approaches.

Topic (20 points). You can choose any topic you'd like, as long as it relates to the class material, the class lectures and discussions, to ethics, and professions. This is up to you, but you must turn it in to me for approval on March 12th, at which time you must tell me on paper (turn in) what your topic is (one sentence), and why you want to cover that topic (three sentence). IMPORTANT: you are not going to do a survey presentation, where you cover large amounts of material, rather, you must find one tiny topic within a field of interest and research it as much as you can, and present on that small topic. For example, if you are going to do a presentation on oil, you don't want to discuss the economic of oil economy, which is a huge topic, but rather, you should discuss only some aspect of peak oil theory, for example.

Procedure and Process (110 points). This is the part that you will be graded on very strictly. Here are the simple steps for carrying out your presentation. If you do not follow these steps exactly, your grade will suffer heavily. You are to give me  a claim that you are defending and backing up in your presentation, and then you are giving me an outline of the evidence you will present, point-by-point. If you do not present evidence in this, you will receive a very large point deduction for your presentation. Evidence is discussed in the first week of class; follow those guidelines. You must turn in this "evidence statement" on March 19.

Presentation (120 points): Your presentation is to be approximately 25 minutes: 5 minutes to discuss your topic and the position you will defend (25 points), 15 minutes to present your case and the data and evidence for your position you will defend (65 points) (this must include a handout or visual presentation of the information that all students can use to follow along with), and 5 minutes for question and answer (30 points).

Tests and Quizzes:

At the start of every class, we will have a quiz over the lecture and reading from the class before. These quizzes will help you keep up in the class, and will prevent you from forgetting important material needed to grasp the philosophic ideas of the class.

The manner in which I will grade the quizzes is as follows. All quizzes are grade as C/NC. At the end of the semester I will drop your two lowest quizzes. I will take the remaining number of quizzes and let each one count towards an equal portion of the 100 points that quizzes are worth. For example, if there are 13 quizzes, each quiz counts as 7.7 points.

Please note that if you talk during any of our quizzes through the semester, if you have your notes out, or if you do really anything but stare straight at your own paper, I will freely give you zero credit on a quiz, whenever I feel it is necessary.

All tests will be essay tests. Before each test we will have a review. At the review you can ask any questions you would like, and I will also go over all topics that are fair for me to put on the test.

The final exam is cumulative, but it will have more emphasis on the second half of the semester.

Note: I use the quizzes to take your attendance throughout the semester. For that reason, it may be a very good idea for you to keep your quizzes all semester, in case you need them to justify your attendance in the unlikely event that my records indicate you missed a class when you believe that you did not.

 
  Grading Scale:

 Writing Intensive Course:

This course is writing intensive. This means that there is some emphasis put on teaching you to write well, if you don't already write well. I will tell you exactly what I am looking for in your writing, so you will not have to wonder at all about what I am looking for in good writing. There are several keys to writing well, but in general they all involve you being able to merely get your point across to others. In this class, there are no papers you have to write. Instead, you will have essay tests, where the tests are to be written well. So in addition to knowing the material of the class, you will have to write it out coherently, nicely. I will not be so concerned with spelling errors; I will be mostly concerned with how you organize a piece of your writing, and secondly how you use words.

It is important for you to understand that you need not worry much about this writing part of the course. Students often get scared by this, especially if they don’t already have confidence in their writing. When students find out that this class is concerned with your writing, they may feel that they won’t “match up.” But it is important to understand that this writing improvement exercise will be a semi-painless process of my instructing you in improving on your writing skills. In my teaching I have found that whenever I say, “you will be working on your writing this semester,” students shutter in fear, often. But you should offset that by my telling you that I will help you in writing, and I will tell you exactly what I am looking for.

 Grade Definitions

[ A ] Outstanding. Work displays thorough mastery of material and genuine engagement with the subject-matter. This grade is reserved for those students who attain the highest levels of excellence in thought and study. 

[ B ] Good. Work displays accurate understanding of the material.

[ C ] Fair. Work displays basic grasp of material, though there may be the occasional misunderstanding or inaccuracy.

[ D ] Marginal. Work displays a grasp of the material adequate for credit, but quality of work indicates lack of effort or aptitude. Tests really quite poor.

[ F ] Unacceptable. Excessive absences, assignments not completed, or assignments unworthy of credit. Tests clearly not at the college level. Cheating or plagiarism will earn an automatic F for the assignment and/or the course.

 Attendance:

Please do not arrive late for class. You are expected to attend all class sessions. Getting a good grade depends on having a good attendance record. An absence will be excused when it is due to an illness that is documented by a doctor’s excuse, or because of a death (documented) in the immediate family. If you try to show me a document that is in any way questionable, I will ignore it. (Questionable documents often include, for example, those which do not have your name on them, even though they are doctor's notes.)

If you receive an unexcused absence, the following deduction of points will occur:

1^st unexcused absence — 25 points

2^nd unexcused absence — 25 points

3^rd unexcused absence — 50 points

4^th unexcused absence — 100 points

5^th unexcused absence —200 points

6^th unexcused absence —300 points

(These point deductions are cumulative. For example, in the second unexcused absence you have a total of 50 points taken off your total.)

On your sixth  unexcused absence you will receive a grade of F for the class.

Attendance will be taken each lecture meeting. I will take it by seeing who has taken a quiz. If you arrive late and miss the quiz, you must arrive shortly after class begins in order to receive credit for attendance. If you leave after attendance has been taken but before class is complete, this of course is an unexcused absence.

I will give you one excused absence (but note that this would make you ineligible for the final exam reward--see below). After that all absences are unexcused unless you show that it should be an excused absence. An excused absence is, for example, documented proof that will inform me that, for example, your pet has died, that a relative has died, that you are very sick.  Excuses such as: “my friend was thrown in jail”, “I overslept,” “it was raining,” or “I ran out of gas” are not acceptable. Absences usually reflect that one has a lack of interest to attend lecture meetings; therefore, grades must reflect this. Also, all material that will appear on tests will be thoroughly covered in lectures; it is therefore critical that you not miss class. However, there are reasons that do arise that prevent one from attending lectures. If you have such a reason, you must talk to me about it. In all but the most particular circumstances, any form of undocumented absence is considered an unexcused absence.

Adequate documentation for an absence is a legitimate note from, for example, an employer or doctor, that shows it was impossible for you to attend class. That note has your information on it, and theirs. If you show me inadequate documentation for your absence, I will not argue with you about whether or not you have given me adequate documentation. Rather, I will merely leave it up to you to provide me with appropriate documentation.

Reward:

There will be a small reward for those of you with perfect attendance. Perfect attendance means you have not missed more than a half-hour of a class. Therefore, if you have an excused absence, this means you will not be eligible.

The reward is as follows: your lowest grade on the final (with respect to percentage) will be turned into a full-credit answer.

Class-time:

 Lecture, Discussion, and Questions:

                The subject matter in this course will generate much discussion. This is welcomed and expected, and you should feel free to take advantage of this as I see it as often the most beneficial and productive part of a student’s learning. If discussion gets too far off track or too drawn out, I will end such discussion that when appropriate.

                It is very important in a class of this nature that you interrupt lecture or discussion and ask questions every time there is a subject or issue in lecture or discussion that you do not understand. I frown upon those who sit in their seats not understanding the material and yet unwilling to ask for clarification. This usually only leads to frustration during lecture meetings and worse, it usually leads to poor test scores. So it is your responsibility as a student to ask questions as you feel you need to. Students should also note that it is usually the case that, the more basic a question is the better. Therefore, questions such as: What is science? What is God? What is technology? What is nature? Or What is Metaphysics? are extremely important appropriate and welcomed in this class. In summary, this class will teach you not to ask the “right questions,” (i.e., those that are seen as appropriate and ) but to develop an urge within you to ask the questions that you are truly interested in, regardless of who might say it is the right question or the wrong question.

 How the class works (the daily experience):

I will assign reading before each class (this reading is also on the syllabus schedule above), then I will go over that reading during lecture. I will bring in photocopied notes to you of what you will be responsible for in the reading. For that reason, you will never need to take any notes in class, but you are encouraged to if you need to, if there is anything you need to write down in order to help to understand the material. It is up to you if you want to do the reading before or after lecture.