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Ethics Week at UNF

Ethics Week 2025

Ethics Week is an annual event dedicated to raising awareness about ethical issues and fostering meaningful discussions across disciplines at UNF. Celebrated during the third week of October, Ethics Week features a series of events designed to highlight faculty and student research, promote constructive dialogue, and encourage critical examination of ethical questions.

2026 Schedule of Events

MONDAY (10/12)

TBD

TUESDAY (10/13)

TBD

WEDNESDAY (10/14) 10:00am - 1:00pm "Ask an Ethicist" (UNF Market Days)

“Ask an Ethicist” is a featured event during Ethics Week where you’ll find an ethicist ready to engage with you about your own, or general ethical quandaries at a booth during our very own Market Days! This event will provide a unique opportunity for open dialog on challenging moral dilemmas and ethical questions. Ethicists will be available to explore diverse topics like personal dilemmas (e.g., decision-making in relationships, work-life balance, or personal values and principles), professional challenges (e.g., corporate social responsibility, research integrity, or health care ethics), community concerns (e.g., environmental sustainability, social justice, or the ethical implications of emerging technologies), and so forth. Whether you have a specific question or just want to listen in, stop by the booth and be a part of the thoughtful discussions we’ll be having there. If you are less of an “off the cuff” kind of question asker, you can submit your question(s) in advance by email to UNFethicists@gmail.com.

WEDNESDAY (10/14) 5:30pm - 7:00pm “The Rent is Too Damn High! Debating the Ethics of Housing Policy.”

Public Policy Panel (Student Union Ballroom)

Since 2000, rents have risen faster than incomes in over 90% of U.S. counties. From rising rents and
homelessness to exclusionary zoning and housing shortages, the housing crisis looks different depending
on where you live—but its ethical stakes are national. Hear from experts and share your thoughts on the
debate over the ethics of housing policy.

WEDNESDAY (10/14) "The Mormon Giant" (TBD)

TBD "Research Ethics Trivia" (Building 2/Room 1202)

Many research projects require prior approval from the institution’s office of research integrity. These approvals may come from the Institutional Review Board (IRB), the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC), and/or the Institutional Biosafety Committee (IBC). Approval indicates to the research community that the project is being conducted following best practices for the field and in a way that allows others to be confident in the methods used and the results obtained. In this workshop, we will test your knowledge of research integrity through Research Integrity Trivia. Form teams and compete against each other to show who knows their stuff when it comes to ethical research practices! UNF Research Integrity staff can also answer questions related to your specific research project.

THURSDAY (10/15) 6:30pm - 7:30pm "Contrary to Popular Belief" (Multipurpose Room Osprey Ridge)

"Contrary to Popular Belief" is a speaker series hosted by the Hicks Honors College where faculty take on popular misconceptions about a field in micro-lectures. Dinner is catered for students, who are hosted in the multipurpose room of Osprey Ridge (the Hicks Honors residence hall). This intentionally interdisciplinary series spans a range of disciplines and interests, sparking conversation for the Q&A to get faculty and students talking beyond classrooms. Prior talks have focused on language death, tech in antiquity, and the unlikelihood of conception. To learn more, email clio.chazan-gabbard@unf.edu.

THURSDAY (10/15) "What Do We Owe Each Other in Shared Inquiry?" Dr. Emily McWilliams (TBD)

A student’s question exposes a gap in their instructor’s reasoning. Instead of pursuing it, she turns the discussion into a display of her expertise. A company holds a meeting to understand why women keep leaving its engineering team. Each time the discussion turns toward the company’s culture, an executive redirects it towards industry-wide ‘pipeline issues’. In both cases, people committed to pursuing a question together, and someone redirects that pursuit toward their own ends, yet the conversation carries on under the guise of shared inquiry. In each case, shared inquiry is hijacked, and the hijacker has wronged their co-inquirers. What does this wrong consist in? I argue that hijacking is a kind of betrayal. When we commit to inquiring together, we create distinctive obligations to each other and accept a vulnerability that comes with thinking aloud with others. The hijacker violates this commitment and capitalizes on the vulnerability. This vulnerability is also not evenly shared. Power determines who bears it and who is positioned to exploit it.

FRIDAY (10/16) TBD

Ethics Case Writing Competition

In celebration of Ethics Week at UNF, the Florida Blue Center for Ethics is sponsoring an ethics case writing competition.

WHO:

Entries can be made by current UNF undergraduates either as an individual, or as part of a group. In particular, UNF student organizations and clubs are encouraged to work together to submit an entry. Only one case can be submitted by any individual or group.

WHAT:

Cases should be 500-700 words long, and written in a way that is accessible to a general audience. Cases can be about any issue or dilemma concerning values, right/wrong, good/bad, what matters, how we should live our lives, what virtues are important, etc.

The goal of these cases is to encourage productive reasoning and discussion over disagreement, so cases should focus on issues about which reasonable (and even lively) disagreement is feasible (i.e., cases shouldn’t focus on those issues about which most students would agree).

Cases can concern real-life events, or purely fictional scenarios. In the case, the author(s) should set up the issue, giving all of the relevant background information, and lay out some of the moral reasons that may be relevant. The case should be written as objectively as possible, and reasons from multiple different perspectives on the issue should be included.

All submissions must be original materials, although appropriately cited excerpts may be used (a quote from a news source, for example).

Sample cases can be found in the NHSEB Case Library.

Cases can, but need not, include discussion questions.

WHEN:

Cases must be emailed to j.matheson@unf.edu as a WORD or PDF attachment with the subject line “UNF Case Competition” by October 18^th.

WHY:

Participation can highlight different ethical issues of interest, generate good discussion, and be lots of fun. All submissions will be reviewed by a panel, and the author(s) of the best written case will receive a prize of $500.