SERMACS 2009 - Workshop Information

Professional Ethics Workshop

Puerto Rico Convention Center, Room: TBA; Wednesday, October 21, 2009; 1:30 PM

Professional ethics is:

1) common sense
2) a natural outcome of your upbringing
3) something that ACS should dictate
4) agreement with me, because of course I'm right

If you chose any of the above, you will want to attend the Professional Ethics workshop. It is still amazing to us (the facilitators) how deeply divided and polarized an audience can be over seemingly simple ethical issues. It is also interesting to see an entire audience change its attitude with the interjection of a single new piece of information into the scenario.

In our Professional Ethics workshop, ethical conundrums are presented that reveal the complexity of issues and the diversity of opinions among audience participants. Participants are invited to address ethical issues like the one included below. Response clickers will be used to provide anonymous initial responses, but audience members can expect to be drawn into a free-wheeling debate at any time.

Case Study #1

Professor L, a chemistry professor at an R-2 university (second tier research university), is overheard directing his graduate students to not waste their money by registering for the national ACS meeting, since ACS doesn't check registration credentials at the doors to the technical sessions anyway. The students are attending partially supported by departmental travel funds, since the professor has no travel funds to allocate. The professor is not attending, but extols the advantages of networking at ACS meetings and encourages these students to make contacts for future post-doc positions.

1) Is the advice of Professor L appropriate? Keep in mind that the students would have to pay their own registration fees.
2) Would it make a difference if the university were an R-1? Or if Professor L had travel funds that he decided not to allocate?
3) What are the obligations of Professor L's graduate students in this situation?
4) If you overheard this conversation, what would you do? If you were told of this conversation by one of the graduate students, what would you do?