Ethics Institute Hosts Two New Faculty Members for Spring 2018

The Institute Ethics in Public Life welcomes two new fellows into its ranks for the spring 2018 semester.

Dr. Karen Becker, professor, music, and Dr. Andreas Stamatis, assistant professor, sport and wellness, will take up residence in institute suite in Hawkins Hall where they will participate in a semester-long series of guided inquiry seminars and attend weekly institute colloquies. 

In addition, fellows pursue individual curricular and scholarly projects directly related to ethics in public life.

According to Dr. Jonathan Slater, director, Becker will be “examining some of the ethical issues confronting intellectual property rights in the digital age.”

Among Becker’s aims “is to develop more robust ways to think about artistic creation and integrate such approaches into curriculum within the new music management major currently under review.”

Stamatis will focus on the ethical and legal challenges surrounding psychological counseling in modern-day athletics.

“He hopes that his efforts will help to raise awareness about some of the moral questions current technologies appear to be introducing into the delivery of sports psychology,” Slater said.

Slater said that the guided inquiry seminars, at the heart of the fellows’ experiences, address “interdisciplinary conceptions of ethics based on social theory and focus on building civic engagement, engendering moral competence, and promoting diversity.”

Led by many of the institute’s past fellows, weekly lunch-hour colloquies deal with topics of relevance to ethics in contemporary public life.

Established in 1999 by Dr. E. Thomas Moran, retired director, the institute was founded on the idea that citizens should make sound choices based on free speech and that those in public life should lead in humility and govern for the public good. Guided by a belief in education’s role of fostering informed discourse, the institute has provided fellowship experiences to 86 faculty members from among 28 college departments. The institute is also the intellectual home of four current senior scholars.

For more information on the fellows program and activities of the institute, contact Slater at 518-564-3018 or email [email protected].