November 23, 2016

SVSU students head to regional Ethics Bowl competition

Saginaw Valley State University will send its first team to the Association for Practical and Professional Ethics' regional Ethics Bowl this fall. The team, featuring eight dedicated SVSU students, will travel to Illinois to compete against institutions from across the Upper Midwest region.

Harper University will host the event Saturday, Dec. 3.

The purpose of the Ethics Bowl is to give college students from across the country the chance to defend their stance on any number of morally complex ethical issues facing society.

Teams must demonstrate an ability to understand all elements of the given case and present an argument on how to best resolve the ethical dilemma.

SVSU's team is led by advisor Peter Rose-Barry, the SVSU Finkbeiner Endowed Professor of Ethics, who said that the team is "looking forward to a vigorous competition and hope to advance to nationals in the upcoming calendar year."

In preparation for the event, the team has been provided with 15 potential case studies made available to them by the Association for Practical and Professional Ethics.

Since they don't know which case study they will be required to present, they are "attempting to determine all of the ethically salient issues in each case study so that they can put together a presentation in response to whatever the moderator asks just prior to the competition," Rose-Barry said.

Out of 11 regions, 36 teams in total will be selected to advance to the Ethics Bowl Nationals, taking place Feb. 26 in Dallas.

SVSU's Ethics Team is supported by a generous grant from the SVSU Foundation.