Engaging Ethics: A Campus Quality Enhancement Plan

To help us practice and develop skills of ethical reasoning, Salem's Engaging Ethics program offers a method or process in four phases or steps. Drawing from philosophic and other humanistic traditions, this process may be practiced and adapted across a range of academic disciplines, professional situations, and dimensions of life. Complex thought processes are not as linear as these steps may seem, but taking time with distinct phases of thought can lead to more nuance, sensitivity, clarity, and validity in moral or ethical inquiry. (Note: we use the terms moral and ethical as mostly interchangeable). 

The acronym READ captures four phases in ethical reasoning or inquiry:  Recognize, Evaluate, Analyze, Decide.

RECOGNIZE: What is a key ethical issue, problem, or decision that needs addressing in a given situation?
We exercise critical thought about many problems and issues that are not necessarily ethical: for instance, problems may be practical, strategic, or interpretive; issues may be scientific, aesthetic, or legal. At the same time, such problems and issues may have a moral dimension. In ethical inquiry, the first key step is to perceive that a particular issue, situation, or choice has something morally/ethically at stake, and to be able to say why. From that starting place—the basic perception of a moral concern—one may then develop the capacity to recognize ethical matters in complex, multilayered contexts, and to grasp cross-relationships among related issues – that is, to see obvious or subtle connections among issues. A complex analysis may also involve identifying underlying causes.

EVALUATE: What ethical principles, concepts, or theories can be used to support inquiry into the ethical situation being considered?
Ideas and concepts from philosophy can help us make sense of and evaluate ethically challenging situations—for example, theories of virtue, duty, or rights; arguments for accepting limits to one’s own desires and self-interest, maximizing pleasure and benefit for many, or giving care. Salem’s Engaging Ethics program also points to particular touchstones which draw from philosophic and humanistic thought and may be used as accessible (but not simplistic) concepts to support ethical inquiry (Courage, Integrity, Justice, Care, Respect). Different academic and professional disciplines also provide other ethical codes, principles, standards and theories. In this second phase of the READ process, one evaluates how an ethical issue or situation may be informed by one or more ethical principles, concepts, or theories, and presents and analyzes information about selected principles or concepts accurately and with effective detail. This kind of evaluation is necessary for the application step, which comes next.

APPLY: How do I apply the ethical perspectives or concepts I find useful to the specific question or situation being addressed?
The “Evaluate” and “Apply” phases are interwoven. At the “Apply” phase, one applies ethical perspectives or concepts to an ethical question with accuracy and appropriate scope. As one advances in ethical reasoning, one can make these applications more independently, attentive to more implications, and in ways that analyze a dynamic relation between theory and practice. For example, applying a concept like “Integrity” to a particular situation may help with analyzing that situation, but that analysis could also change how we understand “Integrity” or virtue more generally. Another example -- applying care ethics to a situation may help one make an argument, but is also likely to change how one perceives care ethics. Analyzing a particular ethical issue might also lead one to demonstrate that moral theories or principles (perhaps Justice and Care) can be in conflict or tension with each other. The interconnected “Evaluate” and “Apply” steps are critical as they impact the depth, scope, and balance of ensuing ethical decisions.

DECIDE: What ethical position will I take? Or what action or outcome will I choose? Or what ethical interpretation or argument will I advance?
Ethical challenges arise in complex personal and social contexts and can almost always be argued or decided in different ways. Deciding among varying ethical positions and perspectives may therefore be challenging. How do we know when we have arrived at a valid or defensible ethical position? Whose interests and priorities may this position include or exclude? Such considerations make the decision-making phase of ethical reasoning an important and multilayered effort. Ethical decision making involves taking a position, making a rational case for it, and also acknowledging alternatives and others’ positions. We should aim to show how other conversation partners and collaborators have informed the ethical positions we take. In addition, we will express and defend our own positions on ethical questions more effectively when we also present nuanced, fair, and even compelling statements of alternative positions, not oversimplifying or distorting others’ views.

In an essay or other written expression of ethical inquiry or reasoning, the four READ steps may be presented in interwoven, nonlinear ways. But each phase of critical thought should be evident, and may be assessed using Salem’s Ethical Reasoning Rubric.

Ethical Reasoning Rubric

Created December 2021

Lightly Revised April 2023

Adapted from the AAC&U VALUE rubric for Salem College’s QEP

This rubric is intended to help faculty evaluate written work samples and collections of work that demonstrate student learning about ethics. Although the goal of a liberal education should be to help students turn what they’ve learned in the classroom into action, pragmatically it would be difficult, if not impossible, to judge whether or not students would act ethically when faced with real ethical situations. What can be evaluated using a rubric is whether students have the critical thinking tools to deliberate about ethical choices.

Evaluators are encouraged to assign a zero to any work sample or collection of work that does not meet benchmark (cell one) level performance.

Note from AAC&U: The VALUE rubrics were developed by teams of faculty experts representing colleges and universities across the United States through a process that examined many existing campus rubrics and related documents for each learning outcome and incorporated additional feedback from faculty. The rubrics articulate fundamental criteria for each learning outcome, with performance descriptors demonstrating progressively more sophisticated levels of attainment. The rubrics are intended for institutional-level use in evaluating and discussing student learning, not for grading. The core expectations articulated in all 15 of the VALUE rubrics can and should be translated into the language of individual campuses, disciplines, and even courses. The utility of the VALUE rubrics is to position learning at all undergraduate levels within a basic framework of expectations such that evidence of learning can be shared nationally through a common dialog and understanding of student success. [for more information, please contact value@aacu.org ]