COLLEGE ETHICS BOWL 2012

Eighteenth Intercollegiate Ethics Bowl March 1st, 2012 in Cincinnati, OH.

After placing fourth out of 24 teams at the Southeast Regional Ethics Bowl competition, St. Petersburg College advanced to the National Intercollegiate Ethics Bowl Competition in Cincinnati, Ohio on March 1, 2012. The competition included 32 teams from across the U.S. and British Columbia. The competition was set for three preliminary rounds, a quarterfinal, semifinal, and final round. With only three students consisting of Sarah Pemberton, Dylan Lundsford, and Kevin Healy; SPC won two of three preliminary rounds against the University of Florida and Brazosport College respectively.

The Ethics Bowl is a team competition that combines the excitement and fun of a competitive tournament with an innovative approach to education in practical and professional ethics for undergraduate students. Each team receives a set of cases which raise issues in practical and professional ethics in advance of the competition and prepare an analysis of each case. For the 2012 national competition, each student analyzed, researched, prepared, and delivered five cases each for a total of 15 cases within a demanding eight week timeframe.

At the competition, a moderator poses questions, based on a case taken from that set, to teams of three to five students. Questions may concern ethical problems on wide ranging topics, such as the classroom (e.g. cheating or plagiarism), personal relationships (e.g. dating or friendship), professional ethics (e.g. engineering, law, medicine), or social and political ethics (e.g. free speech, gun control, etc.) A panel of judges may probe the teams for further justifications and evaluates answers. Rating criteria are intelligibility, focus on ethically relevant considerations, avoidance of ethical irrelevance, and deliberative thoughtfulness.