Teaching engineering ethics to non-engineering students - IEEE Xplore

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Teaching Engineering Ethics to NonEngineering Students Marilyn A. Dyrud

ngineering surrounds us. Technology permeates our daily lives: every day, we drive in, on, and over it on our way to work; we wear it, we cook with it, and we entertain ourselves using it. As a capitalist culture, we are wedded to the fruits of engineering ingenuity. Engineering is, above all, a public profession, as Herbert Hoover so eloquently reminisced about his experiences as a mining engineer:

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“The great liability of the engineer as compared to men of other professions is that his works are out in the open where all can see them. His acts, step by step, are in hard substance. He cannot bury his mistakes in the grave like the doctors. He cannot argue them into thin air or blame the judge like the lawyers. He cannot, like the architects, The author is with the Communications Department of the Oregon Institute of Technology, 3201 Campus Drive, Klamath Falls, OR 97601; email: [email protected].

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IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, Winter 2001/2002

cover his failures with trees and vines. He cannot, like the politicians, screen his shortcomings by blaming his opponents and hope that the people will forget. The engineer simply cannot deny that he did it” [1, p. 215]. Because the decisions that engineers make regarding infrastructure and consumer products involve us all, even students enrolled in nonengineering curricula can benefit from examining issues in engineering ethics. This article explores methodologies and topics for acquainting non-engineering students with engineering ethics, including a short background of a professional ethics course.

BACKGROUND Oregon Institute of Technology, a small, south-central Oregon public college that graduates students with degrees in engineering, engineering technology, business, and allied health fields, offers just one stand-alone course in professional ethics, which is required only by the Civil Engineering Department. Each quarter, however, the class fills and I usually have a waiting list. Typically, my class includes students in engineering and technology majors — civil (about 25% of the class), mechanical, manufacturing, computer hardware, software, and an occasional electronics student — as well as non-engineering majors: applied psychology, nursing, dental hygiene, medical imaging, business, and education. Virtually none of these students has taken a prior class in ethics or philosophy. To serve the needs of these disparate groups, I organize the class thematically, with issues that cut across disciplinary lines, and include major cases in medical, business, and engineering ethics. Course requirements include reflection papers, a memo analyzing a professional code, progress reports, and a multidisciplinary

Because the decisions that engineers make regarding infrastructure and consumer products involve us all, even students enrolled in nonengineering curricula can benefit from examining issues in engineering ethics.

group project examining a high-profile ethics case; winter term cases included Love Canal, Umatilla Chemical Depot, Hyatt Regency walkways collapse, ValuJet Flight 592, Exxon Valdez, Karen Silkwood, and People’s Temple. The project yields both a written report and an oral presentation. Students find engineering ethics particularly interesting, compared to business and medicine. In fact, many indicate that this is the most interesting portion of the course because, as Jennifer, an applied psychology major, states, “Engineers are ultimately responsible for the safety of many people. Therefore, they must work in a respectable, moral, and ethical manner.”

METHODOLOGIES Pedagogical techniques useful in a discussion-based class are appropriate for examining engineering ethics. I have found three particularly helpful: small group discussions, narratives, and the suggestion box. Small group discussions. Ethics, I believe, requires discussion. It is the most versatile and successful pedagogical technique that I know, energizing the classroom and enfranchising students. Small groups, in particular, allow every student a voice and foster multidisciplinary interaction. While there is an enormous variety in the ways one can employ small groups in class, I use them in two ways. First, if I ask the class a question and no one responds, I have students quickly huddle in small groups for 3 or 4 minutes to brainstorm an answer. While this may seem to be logistically challenging, students actually respond


quickly and efficiently. Second, I may give groups a small project to work on for 20-30 minutes. Each group then reports back to the entire class. I have two basic ground rules for small groups: they must be multidisciplinary, and they must appoint both a scribe and a spokesperson. In addition to moving the discussion along, small groups allow students to practice critical thinking and interpersonal communication skills. The best group mix is three or four students from different fields; they approach the project from very different perspectives and exhibit creativity in problem-solving skills, exercising their moral imaginations [2]. Narratives. Narratives are compelling rhetorical devices, perhaps even inherent to the human condition. As Rita Charon, writing on medical ethics, explains, “all participants in an ethical deliberation ... require that which only narrative knowledge can give: the coherence, the resonance, and the singular meaning of particular human events” [3, p. 261]. Writing and examining narratives offers students

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a chance to engage in self-reflection, which, as John Ladd suggests, is endemic to ethics itself [4]. The in-class narrative activity varies, depending on class composition; its current iteration is as follows: Describe, via narrative, an ethical situation which you have faced in the workplace: ● What were the circumstances? ● Who were the key players? ● What did you do? In retrospect, are you happy with this decision? What would you do differently now? Students typically recount an assortment of rather appalling activities including cheating, lying, stealing, substance abuse (drinking and drug use on the job), pirating software, illegally dumping toxic waste, and cutting corners on maintenance. In one particularly alarming piece, a student described how his boss was receiving stolen equipment, and the student’s job was to file off identifying serial numbers. When queried about his rationale, the reply was, “It was my job.” Discussing engineering narratives can be eye-opening for students in other curricula and lead into discussions of broader subjects. The narrative mentioned above, for example, allows for discussion of issues central to engineering ethics, such as loyalty to employer, honesty, and, of course, the implications of such a rationale, which was the primary defense position at the Nuremberg Trials. Narratives, then, can provide opportunities for both selfreflection and consideration of larger issues. Suggestion box. This is a technique that I have used in my communications classes to solicit immediate feedback and one that I find even more useful in teaching ethics. Students may freely — and anonymously —comment about course content, teaching methodology, or anything else they feel per-

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tinent to the class, except remarks aimed at specific individuals. They simply write their comments on a 3” x 5” card and drop it in the box on their way out of class. From their cards, I discover important information: if I need to clarify concepts, if they understand the readings, if they find the class useful, given their future professions. Since the feedback is anonymous, students are quite honest with their comments. Sometimes, I will solicit specific information regarding a particular topic or idea introduced that class meeting (in preparing to write this paper, for example, I asked students to list two significant things that they have learned about engineering ethics). It is important, incidentally, to be specific in phrasing the question. Once I asked students to indicate something that they didn’t understand, assuming they would relate the question to that particular class meeting. To my surprise, I received questions such as “Why is America so immoral?” and “Why don’t businesses care more about their employees?”

TOPICS Technology, note Martin and Schinzinger, is a two-edged sword: “As it creates benefits, it raises new moral challenges” [5, p. 1]. Indeed, the literature of engineering ethics is littered with a host of topics ripe for discussion: risk, safety, and liability; rights and responsibilities; professionalism and codes; internationalism; environmentalism; integrity, honesty, and reliability (see [5]-[10]). For non-engineering students, engineering topics applicable to other fields as well seem most appropriate. I will briefly examine three: professionalism, whistleblowing, and the relationship between social responsibility and moral development. Professionalism. “Professional” is a term carelessly bandied about. Being a professional, according to readings in the course text, Joan

Callahan’s Ethical Issues in Professional Life, involves meeting a set of criteria that includes attaining advanced, specialized education and licensure as required by the field, providing a service to society, maintaining a consistent standard of professional judgment, actively participating in professional societies, and following an established code of ethics ([11], see especially Bayles, Hughes, Barber, May, and Kultgen). Yet even after discussing these criteria, students will often maintain that a hotel maid does her job ”professionally”; this response indicates the difficulty students have comprehending the components of professionalism. To help students understand that a profession is more a calling than a job, involving a high level of commitment over time, I ask them to analyze the ethics code for their particular field, write a memo detailing their findings, and then share their results in small groups that include at least one engineering or technology student. Students discover that while a number of items overlap various codes —such as maintaining confidentiality, being honest, avoiding conflicts of interest — engineers have the enormous responsibility of providing for the public safety, health, and welfare, the guiding principle of all engineering codes. Furthermore, the degree of autonomy in engineering differs markedly from that of other professions, since engineers typically work for corporations which may limit individual decisions and actions (see [6] - [8]). Other concepts must be considered, specifically loyalty to employer and client, conflict resolution between management and technical staff, and bottom line issues. This discussion of professionalism is another eye-opener for nonengineering students. In fact, many do not really know exactly what engineers do, let alone understand the responsibilities and ethics of


that profession. Sharing codes underscores the commonalities between professions and acquaints these students with the particular duties and responsibilities detailed in engineering codes. Whistleblowing. Regardless of the field, students in my class find whistleblowing to be the most provocative and disturbing of all the topics we discuss. While it is a subject that applies to virtually every profession, it is most apparent in engineering because of the public nature of that discipline. Since Roger Boisjoly has twice spoken at OIT and was videotaped each time, using the Challenger disaster to illustrate the benefits and pitfalls of whistleblowing is appropriate. In addition, many students have an emotional tie to this disaster, since they watched it happen in real time on television. And, occasionally, students can provide serendipitous moments: the woman who had attended Ellison Onizuku’s elementary school in Hawaii and the former Navy seaman who was part of the salvage operation offered emotional snapshots of the disaster’s impact unavailable in any textbook on the subject. Students are riveted by details of the Challenger case study and Roger Boisjoly’s situation, as suggestion box feedback indicates: “Before this course I had never ever heard the term whistleblowing. I was also unaware of the issues surrounding the Challenger. I enjoyed this section a lot and it made me aware of the issues regarding it.” “I think this section on whistleblowing is very interesting and beneficial. I feel that I have learned a lot about the repercussions of whistleblowing in the workplace.” “I liked it a lot. It is also very

important. We (any one of us) may be faced with a situation like this or put in the position of Boisjoly — it’s something I didn’t know a lot about, but now I feel I have some knowledge — it is really scary to me — I hope I never have to be in this position.” “I think this subject on whistleblowing was great! There are a lot of eye opening things we talked about that really made me think.” Examining Challenger also leads into larger issues that impinge on engineering ethics, such as how professionals in various fields are trained to think. Introducing Michael Davis’ analysis of Robert Lund’s situation as Thiokol’s vicepresident of engineering is an effective way to illustrate the difference between how managers and engineers perceive acceptable risk, the former balancing risk and benefits, the latter focusing on safety [12]. Students are genuinely surprised by the distinction, as they tend to regard thinking as a generic activity (if, that is, they think about thinking at all!). Moral development and social responsibility. How engineering ethics is woven into the larger social tapestry is a third topic for consideration. However, before students can think in terms of society, they must be aware of their own personal moral level and their potential for moral, as well as intellectual, growth. Lawrence Kohlberg’s schema of cognitive moral development is a useful prelude to the issue of social responsibility (see [13, ch. 1], for an indepth discussion of Kohlberg). Incorporating popular media can be a useful pedagogical device. In recent years, several films have focused on ethical issues; for example, A Civil Action and Erin Brock-


ovich explore environmental issues; The Net examines the darker side of computer technology; Silkwood and The Insider detail whistleblowing. For our section on moral development, students watch Groundhog Day, a 1993 film examining the development of Phil Connors, an obnoxious, arrogant weatherman from Pittsburgh who is on assignment at Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, to cover the annual groundhog ceremony. During the course of the film, Phil awakens to February 2, day after day after day — one reviewer lists at least 34 iterations of the same time period [14] — the radio blaring Sonny and Cher’s “I’ve Got You, Babe,” an example of cinematic foreshadowing (Phil gets the girl at the end), followed by the newscasters’ annoying litany, “Rise and shine, campers! And don’t forget your booties because it’s coooold out there.” In his quest to escape this tedious cycle of daily rebirth, Phil experiences sexuality, gluttony, theft, and suicide in a number of forms: electrocuting himself in the bathtub, driving into a train, jumping from a tall building, driving into a quarry accompanied by groundhog Punxsutawney Phil. Each day, Phil awakens to February 2, but with a difference: he retains his knowledge of prior days whereas the residents of Punxsutawney reexperience the exact day. Finally, armed with a knowledge of death and dedicated to self-improvement and compassion, Phil awakens to a new day. After watching the video outside of class, students convene in small groups to discuss it in relation to Kohlberg’s hierarchy of moral development. They are asked to identify which stage Phil arrives at by the end of the film. Keeping in mind that very few attain level 6, an awareness and practice of universal ethical principles, most students peg him at a 4 or 5, when an individual is responding to the outer world: the law and, more importantly, the principles necessary to regulate and

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As an applied psychology major stated, “Engineers are ultimately responsible for the safety of many people, therefore they must work in a respectable, moral and ethical manner.” maintain a cooperative society. With Kohlberg’s schema firmly in mind, we progress to the final topic of the course, social responsibility, specifically in regards to engineering ethics and how engineering decisions affect us as social creatures. Inevitably, this leads to business ethics, since engineers tend to work in larger corporations. Milton Friedman’s battle cry, “There is one and only one social responsibility of business — to use its resources and engage in activities to increase its profits” [15], is a useful starting point for examining this huge issue of social responsibility. Students are generally appalled by this comment, as it seems to open the door for some of the illicit activities they have discovered in researching their term projects (during winter term, the Love Canal and Umatilla Chemical Depot groups were especially vocal on this issue). While it is possible to approach this topic only from the negative, examining such celebrated cases as Bhopal and other Union Carbide faux pas, the Ford Pinto and Lee Iacocca’s famous “Safety don’t sell” comment [16, p. 167], a focus on the positive seems more uplifting and appropriate at the end of the term. The case of William LeMessurier and the Manhattan Citicorp Tow-

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er serves to underscore the concept that some engineers, indeed most, are engaged in fruitful practices and are upholding the principles set forth in their professional codes. A call from a New Jersey engineering student prompted LeMessurier to reexamine his calculations and discover that his design, while creative, functional, and artistic, had not accounted for diagonal forces on the building’s corners; furthermore, the joints had been bolted, not welded, as called for in the original specifications. Indeed, were the building subjected to hurricane force winds, there was the very real possibility that the structure might fail, with all 59 stories cascading over mid-town Manhattan. LeMessurier considered his options, including silence, and made his decision: in meetings with other engineers, contractors, lawyers, architects, and city officials, he candidly admitted the construction errors and presented plans for remedying the potential catastrophe. Citibank, Citicorp’s chief subsidiary, initially paid for millions of dollars in repairs [17]. Eventually, part of the cost was assumed by LeMessurier’s liability insurance company, which, contrary to his expectations, actually lowered his premiums in recognition of his exemplary behavior [18]. The Citicorp case is a dramatic example of one engineer who risked his professional reputation to do the right thing, benefitting society as a whole. As LeMessurier tells his students at Harvard, “You have a social obligation. ... In return for getting a license and being regarded with respect, you’re supposed to be self-sacrificing and look beyond the interests to yourself and your client to society as a whole. And the most wonderful part of my story is that when I did it nothing bad happened” [17, p. 53].

Students are positively affected by this tale of moral triumph. As one noted on a suggestion box card, “He was awesome to go and fix the problem before there was an accident. It showed he has a lot of character to find fault in his own design and fix it.” Beyond the immediate lesson of righting a structural wrong, the Citicorp case also speaks to the issue of responsibility in design, a lesson not lost on my students. Bryan, an electronics major, articulately explains his perspective on engineering responsibility: “Engineers must take responsibility for what they design both before and after it is complete, meaning that they must try to foresee any possible dangers with their design and in the event of failure take steps to limit damage to the public.” Shannon, an applied psychology major, succinctly echoes his concern: “Decisions you make today will follow you for years.”

LESSONS LEARNED About one-third of my professional ethics class is devoted to engineering ethics, and, as student comments indicate, it seems to have a significant effect on how all students view the engineering content of their world. Studying engineering ethics gives engineering students a foretaste of the professional feast to come and allows them to interact, albeit on a student level, with non-engineering majors who may be their future clients and coworkers. Interacting with students in other fields requires engineering majors to examine material from a perspective other than the technical and to explain their ideas in layperson’s language, an important jobrelated skill. Besides developing pragmatic skills, this interaction leads engineering students to discover that the consequences of their decisions may extend far beyond their immediate work environment, impacting the safety and well-being of the general public. For non-engineering students,


studying engineering ethics is an enlightening experience, and they come to understand that while most engineers behave in accordance with their professional codes, a few loose cannons can debase the reputation of an entire field. After students examine cases in class, I’m confident that none will watch a space shuttle launch without thinking about Challenger or stroll along a hotel walkway without remembering the Kansas City Hyatt Regency. For instructors, having a multidisciplinary mix in class is advantageous, as it allows for exploration of the moral imagination in a way that a major-specific course cannot, since students bring varied perspectives to the class. In addition, instructors can unfurl their intellectual wings and extend research beyond their own professional field. In my case, I have advanced degrees in literature and have taught writing and speech for 20 years. After hearing a 1988 presentation by Roger Boisjoly, I began reading obsessively about engineering ethics and, in 1999, inherited an ethics class from a retiree. Researching and teaching ethics has infused all of my classes with energy and enthusiasm that have resulted in the highest student evaluations of my career. For instructors who have only taught engineering ethics to engineers, having other majors in the class allows them to downplay the technical and focus on broader issues. For example, while a technical explanation of the Challenger field joint design flaw or the unreliable cargo door latch in the DC-10 may be of interest to engineering students, it may not be to majors in medical imaging. An examination of the larger issue — why reputable companies consciously play Russian roulette with human lives — is enlightening for engineering majors and others alike; it is also an issue that transgresses artificial disciplinary boundaries.

CONCLUSIONS Teaching engineering ethics to non-engineering students is a very satisfying venture. As suggestion box cards indicate, students learned important lessons, which will hopefully guide them in the years ahead. Here is a sampling from students majoring in business, applied psychology, and education: “Always speak your mind about what you believe is right.” “I learned that the code of ethics was written for a reason. If engineers strive to follow the code of ethics, we might not have problems like the Challenger. . . .” “There are consequences for each and every decision you make as a professional.” “Each engineer is responsible for their own profession. This means that they must educate and promote strength within their specific profession.” “Engineers are held to a high standard because they are professionals in their field.” “Human lives are more important than money.” In addition to learning specifically about a profession that is part of our daily lives, my students also discover that ethics is a performing art, not something just to ponder in idle moments: ethics is something that we do. Raphael Sassower, in Technoscientific Angst, discusses economist Adam Smith and his concept of the “invisible hand,” an anonymous, undefined, and essential presence underlying free exchange in the marketplace [19]. If my students come to the realization that ethics always looms large in the background, an omnipresent invisi-


ble hand underlying their personal and professional interactions, then I have done my job.

REFERENCES [1] H. Petroski, To Engineer Is Human: The Role of Failure in Successful Design. New York, NY: St. Martin’s, 1985. [2] P.H. Werhane, Moral Imagination and Management Decision-Making. New York, NY: Oxford Univ. Press, 1999. [3] R. Charon, “Narrative contributions to medical ethics: Recognition, formulation, and validation in the practice of the ethicist,” in A Matter of Principles: Ferment in U.S. Bioethics?, E. R. DuBose et al., Eds. Valley Forge, PA: Trinity, 1994, pp. 260-83. [4] J. Ladd, “The quest for a code of professional ethics: An intellectual and moral confusion,” in Ethical Issues in Engineering, Deborah G. Johnson, Ed. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1991, pp. 130-136. [5] M.W. Martin and R. Schinzinger, Introduction to Engineering Ethics. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2000. [6] C.B. Fleddermann, Engineering Ethics. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1999. [7] C.E. Harris, Jr., M.S. Pritchard, and M.J. Rabins. Engineering Ethics: Concepts and Cases, 2nd ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2000. [8] M.W. Martin and R. Schinzinger, Ethics in Engineering, 3rd ed. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 1996. [9] E.G. Seebauer and R.L. Barry. Fundamentals of Ethics for Scientists and Engineers. New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2001. [10] S.H. Unger, Controlling Technology: Ethics and the Responsible Engineer, 2nd ed. New York, NY: Wiley, 1994. [11] J.C. Callahan, Ed. Ethical Issues in Professional Life. New York, NY: Oxford Univ. Press, 1988. [12] M. Davis, Thinking Like an Engineer: Studies in the Ethics of a Profession. New York, NY: Oxford Univ. Press, 1998. [13] J. Rest and D. Narváez, Eds. Moral Development in the Professions: Psychology and Applied Ethics. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Assoc., 1994. [14] E.L. Ellis, What Happened on Groundhog Day. Available: http://www. khoral.com/ staff/rele/play/movies/groundhog.htm. [15] M. Friedman, “Milton Friedman’s case against corporate social responsibility,” in Business Ethics, Tamara L. Roleff, Ed. San Diego, CA: Greenhaven, 1996, pp. 11-17. [16] R. Estes, Tyranny of the Bottom Line: Why Corporations Make Good People Do Bad Things. San Francisco, CA: BerrettKoehler, 1996. [17] J. Morgenstern, “The fifty-nine-story crisis,” New Yorker, May 29, 1995, pp. 45-53. [18] The Final Touch: LeMessurier’s Good Name. Available: http://onlineethics.org/ moral/LeMessurier/8.html. [19] R. Sassower, Technoscientific Angst: Ethics + Responsibility. Minneapolis, MN: Univ. of Minnesota Press, 1997.

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