All undergraduates are required to take one religious studies or philosophy course. And, in the Charles F. Dolan School of Business, all business majors are required to take an ethics course.
Joan Lee, PhD, who is entering her 27th year as a professor of accounting at Fairfield, is a national leader in ethics education and president of Colleagues in Jesuit Business Education (CJBE).
“Schools have two choices when it comes to teaching ethics: integrate it into the courses themselves, or require an entire course just on ethics,” said Dr. Lee. “I believe that when it’s in everything, it’s in nothing, which is why Fairfield has required a separate business ethics course for years. It’s part of the Ignatian pedagogy.”
Dr. Lee and Dawn Massey, PhD, professor of accounting at Fairfield Dolan, have received Excellence in Accounting Ethics Education Awards from the American Accounting Association for their outstanding contributions to integrating ethics into accounting education and their innovative approaches to “teaching students to use their RADAR.” RADAR, an acronym for “Research, Analyze, Decide, Act, Reflect,” is a framework for ethical leadership that helps individuals to identify and respond to ethical issues.
Dr. Lee has seen pragmatic solutions come to life in her classroom. For the past four years, her students have entered a competition held in the spring at Providence College. Two weeks beforehand, contest officials provide the same ethical question to every competing team. Students must then create a 15-minute PowerPoint presentation to show a panel of judges and prepare to take questions for ten minutes. If they make the finals, they repeat this in front of another panel of judges later in the day.
“The question this year was whether AI should be restricted on ethical grounds,” said Dr. Lee. “Our team recommended some restrictions without completely harnessing AI’s growth and development. They viewed it through the lens of Catholic Social Teaching and applied those principals.” Fairfield Dolan’s team took top prize in the competition. Dr. Lee noted that her students — all sophomores — were competing against teams “of almost always seniors, many with two years of intern experience.”
