Implementing an Organizational Ethics Program in an Academic Environment: The Challenges and...

Implementing an Organizational Ethics

Program in an Academic Environment:

the Challenges and Opportunities

for the Duquesne University Schools

of Business James Weber

ABSTRACT. This paper acknowledges the paucity of

attention regarding the development of ethics programs

within an academic environment and describes in a case

study how the Duquesne University schools of business

attempted to introduce, integrate and promote its own

ethics program. The paper traces the business school’s

attention to mission statements, curriculum development,

ethics policy, program oversight and outcome assessment.

Lessons learned are offered as suggestions for others

seeking to develop and implement an ethics program in

their school.

KEY WORDS: academic integrity, business schools,

case study, code of ethics, ethics course, ethics programs,

honor code, program assessment

Reoccurring ethics scandals, and the regulatory

backlashes that often follow, gave rise to identifiable

advances of organizational ethics initiatives. The

defense industry scandals of the 1970s led to the

creation of the Defense Industry Initiative that

modeled ethical pricing and purchasing systems.

Continued ethical breaches in the 1980s prompted

the Justice Department to develop the U.S. Sen-

tencing Guidelines for Corporations instructing

organizations on how to organize an ethics and

compliance program. The most recent examples of

fiduciary irresponsibility at Enron, Tyco and other

businesses facilitated the adoption of the Sarbanes-

Oxley Act and requirements enhancing ethical

reporting systems. In addition to these external

pressures or regulatory requirements, organizations

discovered that ‘‘ethics pays,’’ at least some of the

time. A strong ethical culture or set of values assists

managers in providing a clear organizational direc-

tion (Schmidt and Posner, 1983), are positively re-

lated to the organization’s productivity (Dobni et al.,

2000), and enhance the marketability of an organi-

zation’s products to its potential consumers (Gildea,

1994–1995). Verschoor (1998) found a statistically

significant relationship between an organizational

commitment to ethics and financial performance.

Others found that an ethical work environment

strongly affects employee decision-making, attitudes

and behavior (Dean, 1992; Fritzsche, 1987;

Reidenbach and Robin, 1991).

However, seemingly forgotten in business orga-

nizations’ attention to ethics initiatives is the role

that academic institutions might play, specifically the

role for business schools. Absent of any serious

external regulatory incentives, save the expectations

by various accreditation bodies (for example, The

Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of

Business, AACSB), academic institutions, and busi-

ness schools in particular, generally ignore the call

for greater attention toward building an ethical

culture, creating ethics initiatives, or benefiting from

James Weber (Ph.D. University of Pittsburgh) is a Professor of

Business and Ethics and Management and Director of the

Beard Center for Leadership in Ethics at Duquesne Uni-

versity. His research interests include the assessment of values,

moral reasoning and ethical behavior on both the individual

and organizational levels. He has been published in numerous

academic journals and is the co-author of 11th edition of

Business and Society: Stakeholders, Ethics, Public Policy,

published by Irwin/McGraw-Hill, Inc.

Journal of Business Ethics (2006) 65: 23–42 � Springer 2006DOI 10.1007/s10551-005-3970-2

these ethics programs. This lack of attention may be

due to the lack of a major ethics scandal. None-

theless, business schools within our academic insti-

tutions could contribute to the creation or

maintenance of an ethical business culture since

‘‘institutions of higher education that live the ethics

and values contained in their mission statements

produce graduates who are highly valued and sought

by ethical organizations’’ (Procario-Foley and Bean,

2002: 101).

Despite their potential to positively influence

business organizations’ quest for supporting an

ethical environment, business schools have failed to

acknowledge the importance of creating ethics

initiatives. As mentioned above, the lack of external

regulatory pressure or the absence of widespread or

serious ethics scandals may be to blame. The

academic culture also provides many unique chal-

lenges in creating an ethical environment due to its

unique, complex internal environment and decen-

tralized power structure (Guelcher and Cahalane,

1999). Nonetheless, business schools are called to

meet the challenge of creating strong ethical cultures

and programs due to the role these institutions play

in benefiting business organizations by supplying

them with potential employees entrusted with an

ethical or moral character (Procario-Foley and Bean,

2002), as well as their own moral obligation to

embody strong ethical values as a leading institution

in our society, as articulated by the dean of a leading

business school and the new president of the AACSB

(Woo, 2003).

Contrary to these challenges, it appears that the

trend in the past few years has been to eliminate

business ethics courses and downgrade the impor-

tance of or attention to ethics within the business

schools (Kelly, 2002; Swanson, 2003, 2004; Swan-

son and Frederick, 2003). This paper counters this

trend by providing a case study describing the

Duquesne University schools of business’s attempt

to address the many challenges encountered when

seeking to create an ethical environment for its

students, faculty, staff and administrators. The au-

thor’s intention is to provide a blueprint for

business school faculty members and administrators

to learn from the mistakes made and successes

realized while seeking to build a strong organiza-

tional ethics program within a business school

environment.

Previous attention to ethics initiatives

by business schools

A review of the extant literature focusing on ethics

education and ethics initiatives in business schools

or academic institutions discovers a marginal

acknowledgement of the importance of ethics in

education but, in total, shows a paucity of research

examination or analysis regarding the normative

benefits of ethics courses or ethics initiatives in

business schools. Beyond a general review focusing

on the success of offering business ethics courses, few

studies investigate the presence or success of ethics

initiatives in an academic setting.

The justification for offering ethics courses has

received some attention as a field of study. Many

universities and colleges require students to complete

a course in ethics in the quest of a strong liberal arts

foundation for a professional career. Addressing the

questions of ‘‘How can I live the good life?’’ or

‘‘What is the right thing to do in this situation?’’

seem appropriate questions for young, collegiate

students to ponder. Reviews of studies investigating

the effects of business ethics or business and society

courses show that in general courses do aid in the

improvement of ethical awareness, reasoning skills

and resolution of cases or dilemmas, although it is

believed that this improvement is short-lived

(Glenn, 1992; Weber, 1990).

In addition, the development of ethics courses

within business school programs appears to be

desirable by the business community. In a 2004 Wall

Street Journal online poll asking the question: ‘‘How

much emphasis should MBA programs place on

business ethics?’’ 81% or 1466 of those weighing in

on the discussion voted: ‘‘Ethics courses should be

required for all students.’’ Another 11% (208 votes)

agreed that ‘‘Ethics courses should be offered as

electives’’ (Wall Street Journal online, 2004).

But the attention to building and maintaining a

strong ethical environment for an academic institu-

tion goes beyond curricular attention to ethics as a

philosophical discipline or single business ethics or

business and society course. As business organiza-

tions have discovered, creating an ethical environ-

ment requires the development of a series of

important ethics initiatives and the allocation of

resources to maintain these initiatives to support the

ethical culture and daily workplace environment,

24 James Weber

starting with a strong commitment to ethics found in

the organization’s mission.

Procario-Foley and Bean (2002) argue that one of

the strongest indicators of an ethical culture at an

academic institution is the organization’s mission

statement. They note that most institutions have

mission statements, as well as many schools and col-

leges within the university network of organizations.

Not surprisingly, as many business organizations dis-

cover, one must go beyond the lofty sounding words

of a mission statement to values-in-action. Some

academic institutions demonstrate their concern for

others and the community, for example, by devel-

oping service-learning courses. Others show their

attention to issues of social injustice though centers,

chairs or academic programs that explore how the

institution or its members might act to correct

injustice. Many religious-based institutions formally

organize around their mission and values through a

campus ministry or student volunteer office. Clearly,

at the core of an ethics initiative program must be a

strong value-based mission statement that gives rise to

various manifestations of these values.

Some academic institutions or business schools

have attempted to create an ethical environment by

drafting a code of ethics or honor code. (There are

importance differences between a code of ethics and

an honor code, but in this work the two ethics ini-

tiatives are used interchangeably.) A series of research

conducted by McCabe, Trevino and Butterfield

investigated the role of honor codes in an academic

setting. In general, they found that honor codes en-

able students to better frame their ethical reasoning

and students in institutions that have honor codes are

less likely to cheat (McCabe et al., 1999). These

authors also found that an honor code alone may be

insufficient to guarantee that students will not cheat

in their professional lives, but did find a strong

interaction effect when the existence of an honor

code is coupled with a strong organizational ethics

code (McCabe et al., 1996). Finally, McCabe and

Trevino (1993) compared students at institutions

where there was an honor code and where there was

not and found support for their hypothesis that honor

codes generally are effective in creating an ethical

environment dissuading students from cheating due

to peer pressure, a governance mechanism inherent

to an honor code system. The challenges of creating

an honor code in an academic environment are sig-

nificant but the work conducted by McCabe,

Trevino and Butterfield does show that ethics codes

undoubtedly play a significant role in creating and

maintaining an ethical environment in a business

school or academic institution.

Following the establishment of proper conduct

articulated in a code of ethics or honor code, many

business schools turn toward ethics training in the

form of offering its students a course in ethics or

business ethics. Recently the debate between a stand-

alone course versus integrating ethics across all

courses in the school has raged (for example, see

Lopez et al., 2005). The purpose of this paper is not

to wage into or resolve this debate. However, it is

worth noting that others have attempted to offer

various examples of how ethics can be introduced

into the business school curriculum. Capitalizing on

their school’s strong mission and culture, Hazen et al.

(2004) describe an innovative, gateway MBA course

entitled Personal Development and Social Respon-

sibility. Within the structure of this course, the values

found at the University of Detroit-Mercy, an insti-

tution rooted in the Catholic traditions of faith and

justice and the values of its two founding religion

orders, the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) and Sisters of

Mercy, are clearly evident and promulgated.

Other faculty and institutions have taken the

‘‘integration across the curriculum’’ approach. Sup-

ported by a grant from the James S. Kemper

Foundation, faculty members in the College of

Business at Northern Illinois University developed

ethics materials for courses in Managerial Account-

ing, Financial Analysis, Business Policy, Marketing

Management, and Operations Management and

Information System to integrate ethics across their

business school (Gowen et al., 1996). Others have

found similar success when integrating ethics across

the curriculum (Borowski and Ugras, 1998; Sims,

2002). Both approaches, the one taken at the Uni-

versity of Detroit-Mercy and the one taken

at Northern Illinois University, report excellent

assessment success and continue to fuel the debate

regarding a stand-alone course versus integration of

ethics across many courses.

Another promising exploration of ethics initia-

tives in an academic setting comes from Guelcher

and Cahalane (1999) when they posit that an ethical

environment is more successful when coordinated

through a centralized office. They argue that

Organizational Ethics Program in academic Environment 25

‘‘the program should have a central ethics office, and

not be scattered around across campus or dispersed

among various constituencies. ... [This centralization]

offers the organization the opportunity to present a

clear and coordinated message surrounding ethics. It

enables concise communications regarding where

ethics advice can be found and how to utilize it’’

(Guelcher and Cahalane, 1999: 341).

Finally, as most business organizations have discov-

ered, the importance of developing metrics or clear

measures to determine the success of the ethics ini-

tiative program or to uncover weaknesses with the

intention of addressing any shortcomings is para-

mount. Hazen et al. (2004) report extensive out-

come measures to demonstrate the significant impact

that their gateway MBA course had on their stu-

dents. For example, one of the course objectives was

to introduce students to the mission of the Univer-

sity and College of Business. Using a five-point

Likert-scale, students reported that their awareness

of the mission was 2.63 prior to taking the course

and 4.19 after the course. Additional significant

benefits attributed to the course are documented by

the authors in their article. Spurgin describes an

MBA competency exam as a method to assess

whether graduate business students ‘‘can demon-

strate several abilities that are indicative of

competency in business ethics’’ (2004: 279). The

competency exam assessment tool might be used

appropriately when taking the ‘‘ethics across the

curriculum’’ approach.

In review, some scholars have attempted to

investigate and report on the effectiveness of ethics

initiatives in business schools and academic institu-

tions, but the exceptional thinness of this body of

literature must be noted. Little has been reported

possibly due to the fact that there is little in exis-

tence to study. What is reported are five essential

elements for building an effective organizational

ethics initiative in a university setting: mission

statement, code, course, centralized office, and

assessment. Therefore, a case study of how the

Duquesne University schools of business attempted

to develop a comprehensive series of ethics initia-

tives to build and maintain an ethical environment

for its students, faculty members, staff and admin-

istrators follows.

Building and maintaining an ethical

environment at the Duquesne University

schools of business

The various organizational ethics initiatives found in

the business school case study are grounded in the

Organization’smission statement

Leadership’scommitment

to ethics

Centralizedoffice

Ethics courses Ethics codes

Assessment

Figure 1. Elements in the Duquesne University schools of business’s ethics initiative program.

26 James Weber

extant literature discussed in the previous sections.

The presentation of the case study follows the

framework shown in Figure 1 as each step in the

overall ethics initiative project is explained and

illustrated.

Duquesne University and schools of business’s mission

statement

As Procario-Foley and Bean (2002) strongly argue,

the essential foundation for an ethics initiative

program rests with the institution’s mission statement

and basic values. In addition, many business

organizations discover that the importance of top

management’s support or the leadership of senior

executives within the organization are critical to the

prominence attributed to their ethics initiatives pro-

grams. The Duquesne University schools of business

were fortunate to have a strong ethical value set

grounded in the religious tradition of Duquesne

University, as indicated in the University’s mission

statement:

Duquesne University serves God by serving students

through commitment to excellence in liberal and

professional education, through profound concern

for moral and spiritual values, through the mainte-

nance of an ecumenical atmosphere open to diver-

sity, and through service to the Church, the

community, the nation and the world (Duquesne

University mission statement).

In addition, the University’s strategic plan 2003–

2008 espouses as its goal: ‘‘to weave the mission ...

throughout the fabric of the university to assure that

the values expressed in the mission are given

prominence in all the goals of the strategic plan’’ and

‘‘the University will place special emphasis on ethics

... ’’. To this end, the strategic plan further mandates

that ‘‘members of the Duquesne University com-

munity will pursue the moral and ethical truth

through an ecumenical dialog ... [and] ... establish

activities, programs and courses where discipline-

specific issues are discussed in the context of their

moral, ethical and spiritual context.’’

This attention to ethics and moral values continues

in the business schools’ undergraduate and graduate

mission statements. A key guiding principle for the

A.J. Palumbo (undergraduate) School of Business

Administration is to ‘‘espouse ethics as a winning

characteristic of organizations that are successful over

the long term and promote a commitment to high

standards and values among the A.J. Palumbo School

of Business Administration community’’ (Duquesne

University Undergraduate Catalog, 2002–2003:

114). This commitment is echoed in the graduate

business school’s catalog as well.

Since its founding in 1878, Duquesne University has

been steadfast in developing an ethical perspective

within student’s professional and private lives. The John

F. Donahue Graduate School of Business strives to per-

petuate that unique commitment through the required

course in ‘Applied Business Ethics’ and the integration

of ethical dimensions of decision-making throughout

the curriculum’’ (John F. Donahue Graduate School of

Business Brochure, A Distinctive Experience: 9).

The strong statements emphasizing ethics at

Duquesne University and business schools are not

mere rhetoric. The academic leadership clearly

espouses the importance of ethics and builds upon

these words with clear actions of financial support

and commitments of personal and professional time.

In conjunction with the University President and

Academic Vice President/Provost, the business

schools’ dean was able to create and financially sustain

three full-time, tenure-track faculty lines in the area

of business ethics within the Leadership and Change

Management Division of the business schools in or-

der to staff the growing number of ethics courses, as

discussed later.

In addition, the University President, Provost and

business schools’ dean repeatedly offer their time and

energy to various projects affiliated with the ethics

initiative program. Their commitment is seen

through their support of various business school–

sponsored ethics events by attending these events, by

purchasing a table or paying the registration fees so

that University administrators or business school

faculty members could attend these events, or by

participating in these programs as speakers, panelists

or discussants. It is clear that at the core of the ethics

initiatives program rests the unswerving commit-

ment to ethics by the academic institution’s senior

leadership, which is clearly evident during the

development and implementation of the initiatives.


Based on the foundation of the organization’s

commitment to ethics, as seen in the various mission

statements, and the organization leadership’s dedi-

cation to ethics, as seen in their financial and time

allocation, the ethics initiative program at the busi-

ness schools turned toward specific initiatives in the

form of ethics courses, ethics code, and a centralized

office to administer and coordinate the ethics

initiatives, as shown in Figure 1.

Curriculum development – stand-alone

courses – undergraduate

Grounded in the mission and values of Duquesne

University and business schools, the business schools’

ethics initiative program focused on developing

business ethics courses offered in both its under-

graduate and graduate schools. Trevino and McCabe

(1994) suggest that the business ethics course be

introduced early in the curriculum to set the foun-

dation for ethical decision-making skills to be used

throughout the business school curriculum. Consis-

tent with this suggestion, the required undergraduate

Business Ethics course is available to students in the

fall or spring semester of their junior year, a time

when business students begin in earnest their business

school core courses (see the course description and

general objectives for this course in Appendix A).1

Curriculum development – stand-alone courses – graduate

(MBA)

At the graduate level, an elective course in business

ethics was available to MBA students and was one of

the most heavily enrolled elective courses in the MBA

program. With the development of the business

schools’ ethics program, the new Applied Business

Ethics course became a required ‘‘toolbox’’ course for

all MBA students. Significant changes were made

when converting the elective into the required,

toolbox course (see the course description and general

objectives for this course in Appendix A). A toolbox

course is taken by students in their first or second

semester of graduate business studies, as opposed to an

elective which is typically taken toward the end of the

students’ academic program. In addition, a toolbox

course introduces decision-making skills and tools to

be used again in subsequent graduate business courses.

Specifically the Applied Business Ethics course

introduces to the students an ‘‘ethical decision-

making framework’’ to understand, analyze and re-

solve an ethical dilemma. This framework consists of

three steps: (1) the identification of key ethical prin-

ciples found in the ethical dilemma, (2) the application

of ethics theories or stages of moral development to

weigh and filter information pertinent to the ethical

dilemma, and (3) the development of ethically

defensible resolutions to the ethical dilemma.

Curriculum development – masters program in leadership

and business ethics

An unexpected development for the business schools’

ethics initiatives program occurred when the gradu-

ate business school was asked to join the School of

Leadership and Professional Advancement at

Duquesne University in offering a Masters of Science

in Leadership and Business Ethics. The John F.

Donahue Graduate School of Business faculty

members developed and offered a sequence of six

graduate-level ethics courses.2 The six courses

developed for this program include: Business Ethics,

Information Ethics, Ethics Elective (in Accounting,

Finance, Marketing, Environment, etc.), Organiza-

tional Ethics and Government Interventions, Global

Ethics, and Ethics Capstone – A Field-based Project.

The course description and general objectives for

many of these courses can be found in Appendix B.

Thus, the next element of the ethics initiative

program – curriculum development – consisted of a

combination of utilizing the existing undergraduate

Business Ethics course, enhancing the delivery and

focus of a graduate Applied Business Ethics course,

and the opportunity to develop a sequence of six

ethics courses on the graduate level.

Curriculum development – integration across the curriculum

Rather than taking a side in the ‘‘stand-alone course

versus integrate ethics across the entire curriculum’’

debate, the business schools decided to do both

when implementing its ethics initiative program.

This approach follows the recommendations set

forth by Trevino and McCabe (1994) who argue

28 James Weber

that once the stand-alone course is introduced early

in the curriculum, this should be followed up with

an integration or inclusion of ethics across all sub-

sequent courses.

In addition to the aforementioned stand-alone

courses, the business schools conducted formal

workshops and informal tutoring among its faculty

members to integrate ethics into as many business

courses as possible. The ethics initiative project

emphasizes the traditional, business school case study

approach using classic cases from the ‘‘Arthur

Andersen ethics project’’ (ca. 1980s), as well as

numerous ethics cases included in most business

course textbooks. Other material aiding in the

integration of ethics into business courses came from

a quick review of the headlines of business or pop-

ular newspapers or periodicals. The business schools

already had a partnership with Business Week, where

students received the weekly periodical. Thus, it was

easy to have faculty members and students scour the

current issue of Business Week (or The New York

Times or The Wall Street Journal) for stories where

ethics was relevant to the specific material to be

covered in the various business courses.

Curriculum development – assessment of integration

An interview survey of full-time business school

faculty members was conducted during the imple-

mentation of the ethics initiative program. Semi-

structured interviews were conducted by a graduate

student as part of her graduate assistantship duties.

This was done to avoid any bias from having the

interviews conducted by a faculty member who was

spearheading this ethics initiative program. In total,

37 of the 43 full-time faculty members were inter-

viewed, with five faculty members unavailable

during the 2-week interview period. Numerous

methods used to integrate ethics into various business

courses were discovered. Many of the faculty mem-

bers (81%) reported a general or occasional discussion of

ethics or a current ethical issue in their classes. Half of the

faculty members used a chapter devoted to ethical

issues from their required course’s textbook as the

basis to frame or begin the discussion.

Thirty-five percent of the faculty members

interviewed described their courses as incorporating

an in-depth attention to ethics by using multiple ethics cases

for discussion. These cases were either provided in

the course textbook or the faculty member

supplemented the textbook with prepared ethics

cases or current ethical issues found in the news.

This subgroup of integration of ethics indicated a

more extensive coverage of ethics or attention to

ethics rather than a general or occasional discussion

of ethics or ethical issues related to the course. A few

faculty members decided to present their discipline’s

professional code of ethics as a starter for an ethics

discussion among the students.

The second most common group of activities for

integrating ethics into the business curricula by fac-

ulty members was through encouraging students to

attend an ethics speaker presentation or become involved in

a community service activity. More than one out of

every four faculty members mentioned one of these

activities as part of their business courses.

Each semester the business schools’ ethics center

hosts a distinguished ethics speaker. Seven faculty

members indicated that they require, assign extra

credit, or simply encourage their students to attend

this presentation to learn more about ethics and/or

as a professional development activity. Occasionally

the ethics speaker’s presentation was discussed in

class or students attending the presentation prepared

a written report. In addition, three faculty members

indicated that they emphasize ethics in their class-

room by having their students engage in community

service. This activity is a requirement for two of the

faculty member’s business courses, for students in the

other business course it is an extra credit opportu-

nity.

The third activity group for emphasizing ethics

across the business curricula is testing students on their

ability to recognize an ethical issue in a business case or

analyze a business case using ethical principles or tools.

Nine faculty members (or 24% of the activities

mentioned in the interviews) described a course

assignment (either an examination or essay paper)

where the ability to use an ethical decision-making

tool was used as part of the overall assignment’s

grade. In some cases it was a matter of recognizing

an ethical issue embedded in a business situation or

case. In other course assignments, the students were

required to reason to an ethically defensible solution

in resolving the ethics case or evaluate the ethical

defensibility of a business manager’s actions when

facing with an ethical dilemma.


The fourth activity group described in the fac-

ulty members’ interviews involved emphasizing the

importance of ethics as students began their business careers

or internships. While employment or an internship is

often beyond the scope of the classroom, two faculty

members reported a discussion in class focusing on

the ethical challenges likely encountered by students

during their school-sponsored internships or during

the students’ early work experience.

Given the multiplicity of techniques used by

business school faculty members, the business schools

appear to have reached a significant level of inte-

gration of ethics across the many divisions and

courses within the schools. A more complete assess-

ment of this element of the ethics initiative program

will be discussed later in this paper.

Drafting a code of ethical behavior

Despite the relative success of developing stand-

alone ethics courses and integrating ethics across the

business schools’ curricula at the undergraduate and

graduate levels, business students asked the faculty

and administration for another direct initiative to

build and maintain an ethical environment – a code

of ethics.

The students voiced a number of reasons for their

suggestion. Many students were aware of other

universities that already had codes governing stu-

dent behavior and felt that Duquesne University’s

schools of business should emulate these institutions.

Others felt that Duquesne University’s schools of

business should reflect the business organizations

modeled in the business ethics courses where codes

of conduct were introduced and critiqued. Finally,

some students expressed their concern over the

growing public awareness of a cheating epidemic at

universities as reported by the media. The students

believed that adopting a code within the business

schools would counter this negative image among

the business organizations’ college student recruit-

ers.

Since this initiative was at the insistence of

numerous undergraduate and graduate students, they

made up a majority of the student-faculty committee

charged with drafting a code of ethics. This approach

is similar to the course project described by Kidwell

(2001) where she found excellent success when

having her students at Niagara University write their

own ethics code. Kidwell found her students’ codes

thoughtfully considered the ethical challenges they

face as students, as well as later in their business

careers.

Initially the student-faculty committee intended

to develop a code that would instruct and govern

both student and faculty behavior, but that charge

proved to be too complex and contained too many

conflicting behavioral and governance issues. The

committee turned its attention to drafting a student

code, called the Code of Ethical Behavior (Code).

The committee met once or twice monthly during

an academic year for lively and constructive discus-

sions leading to the writing and re-writing of mul-

tiple drafts before a final version of the Code was

achieved (see Appendix C).

As shown in the appendix, the primary foci of the

committee were on the example-driven descriptions

of cheating and plagiarism (determined as the two

most common ethical challenges or breaches of

ethical conduct at the business schools), a clear pro-

cedure to follow if cheating or plagiarism was de-

tected, the enforcement of sanctions against students

who committed breaches of ethical conduct, and the

creation of a ‘‘human assist line’’ (the Ethics Advo-

cates program) to provide students with confidential

resources to discuss concerns over ethical conduct.

Accompanying the Code was a pledge card, de-

signed by the student-faculty committee. The card

was modeled after the common managerial sign-off

procedure. In the business organization, the manager

is asked to read the organization’s code of ethics and

then sign a statement saying that she has read the code

and pledges to report any violations of the code that

she discovers. Similarly, the pledge card states:

Please sign this pledge attesting to your agreement

with the Duquesne business schools’ core principles

and commitment to ethical behavior. I have read and

understand the Code of Ethical Behavior and agree

to comply with Duquesne business schools’ expecta-

tions of its members to act in accordance with the

core principles and ethical behaviors described in the

Code.

The students are asked to sign their name, print their

name (for easier verification) and date the card.

Surprisingly, the drafting of the Code was an

easier challenge compared with the approval process.

30 James Weber

The Code was presented to the undergraduate and

graduate student bodies through the student

organization network (in the absence of any type of

all-student organization or meeting format). Stu-

dents provided various constructive suggestions, for

example the inclusion of a statement explaining

plagiarism of computer code in addition to the

typical plagiarism of written work. Other students

raised concerns about student self-governance and

the composition of the Integrity Standards Com-

mittee (discussed later) and the Code was modified

to address these concerns. Once their suggestions

were received, discussed by the student-faculty

committee and incorporated into the Code if war-

ranted, the revised code was resubmitted to the

students for approval.

Next the Code was presented to the business

schools’ faculty for their review, suggestions and

eventual approval. Many of their suggestions were

cosmetic or grammatical since the substance of the

Code was perceived to be relevant and compre-

hensive. It was not surprising that the faculty were

most interested in the procedures that would be

invoked upon the discovery of a cheating or pla-

giarism incident. This section of the Code was

consistent with the existing procedures adopted by

the business schools’ faculty many years earlier.

The next group to scrutinize the Code was the

business schools’ administration, who like the faculty

overwhelmingly supported the ethics initiative pro-

gram and made minor suggestions to improve the

Code before providing their unanimous approval.

Finally the Code was taken to the Duquesne

University Academic Council, a committee com-

prised of the University Provost, General Counsel,

Faculty Senate President and deans of all the

University’s schools. Discussions at the Academic

Council focused on why the business schools

should have their own Code. Deans of other

schools, particular in the health sciences areas, in-

formed the Council that their schools have had a

student code for years. Finally, the discussion

turned toward legal consistency with the Univer-

sity’s Academic Integrity Policy. A careful review

of both ethics statements, already undertaken by the

business schools’ student-faculty code committee,

showed no inconsistencies or conflicts between the

two codes, thus the Academic Council provided

their unanimous approval. After a year of approval

seeking, the Code of Ethical Behavior was ready

for dissemination.

Oversight of the code of ethical behavior – the integrity

standards committee

It was evident to those on the student-faculty com-

mittee charged with drafting the Code that the

administration of the Code was a critical component

for the success of this element of the ethics initiative

program. As recommended by Guelcher and Caha-

lane (1999), a centralized administrative body was

needed to ensure the coordination of efforts and

communication of the importance of ethics to the

business schools’ community. This recommendation

was coupled with Kidwell’s finding when assigning

her students to draft an honor code – student

involvement in enforcement is essential. Therefore,

the Integrity Standards Committee (ISC) was formed

and its membership and duties were articulated in the

Code of Ethical Behavior.

Students make up a majority of the ISC mem-

bership, with two undergraduate students and one

graduate student comprising three members of the

five-member committee. Students are selected from

the student leadership groups, the Dean’s Student

Advisory Council (consisting of the presidents of

the various undergraduate business school student

organizations) and the Graduate Student’s Advisory

Board (the elected leaders of the full-time and part-

time MBA student body). These students are elected

by their peers based on their personal integrity and

leadership skills to participate in the ISC, whose

primary duties involved promulgating the Code and

investigating any alleged ethical violations. The

remainder of the ISC is made up of a faculty member

elected by the business schools’ faculty and an

administrator appointed by the Dean of the business

schools. In its first year of operations, the ISC met

quarterly to evaluate the distribution of the Code

and to review the Code for possible revisions for the

following year. Currently, the ISC meets at least

twice a year and more often as needed.

Implementing the code of ethical behavior

In the fall of 2003, the Code of Ethical Behavior was

introduced to all undergraduate and graduate


business schools’ students through a dissemination

strategy that was intended to saturate the business

schools’ student body and thus attempt to quickly

influence the business schools’ culture. This strategy

involved a procedure where students in every busi-

ness course received the Code and an accompanying

pledge card. In the business schools’ program,

freshman take one business course per term, whereas

sophomores, juniors and seniors often are enrolled in

as many as four or five business courses in one

semester. Thus, in the fall and spring term, some

students received the Code and pledge cards 10

times during the year.

Faculty members were asked to distribute the

Code and pledge cards during the first week of the

semester. For the fall term, faculty members returned

the signed pledge cards to the ISC, but this proce-

dure was changed for the spring term. We found that

faculty members wanted access to the pledge cards to

see if a student they suspected of cheating or pla-

giarizing a paper had signed a pledge card. Having

the faculty members retain these signed cards was

more expedient than having them contact the ISC to

locate the pledge card. Therefore, in the spring term

faculty members kept the pledge cards signed by

their students.

At the end of the first year of distributing the

Code and pledge cards in every business course, a

feedback survey was circulated to all full-time busi-

ness schools’ faculty members. The detailed results of

this survey are reported later, but in general it con-

firmed the Integrity Standards Committee’s belief:

they had saturated the business schools’ student body

with the current procedure of distributing the Codes

and pledge cards to all students in every business

school class. The survey also confirmed the ISC’s

belief of the necessity of such a strategy to be suc-

cessful in its first year of implementation since the

surveys indicated that the awareness of and impor-

tance given to the Code and pledge cards were

widespread across the business schools’ faculty and

students.

In preparation for the second year of the Code

distribution, minor editing was performed on the

Code (e.g., adding a short sentence indicating the

ethical expectation that only students attending a

course or event should sign the attendance sheet,

addressing the concern that students were signing in

the names of other, non-attending students). More

significant was the change in the distribution of the

Code and pledge cards. The ISC identified eight,

key business courses where the Code and pledge

cards would be distributed – one course typically

taken by freshman, one by sophomores, one by ju-

niors, one by seniors, two courses in the MBA

toolbox group, and two MBA core courses. They

believed that targeting specific courses would draw

attention to the Code and the signing of pledge cards

without the potentially negative backlash of over-

saturation of the student body. Faculty members

teaching courses not designated for Code and pledge

cards distribution were asked to

(1) Make the Code available to students via the

course syllabus or website.

(2) Require the following statement on all

examinations/quizzes: ‘‘In accordance with

the business schools’ Code of Ethical Behav-

ior, I attest that I neither received nor of-

fered unauthorized assistance in answering

the questions on this examination (quiz).’’

Also require that the students sign this state-

ment before submitting their examination or

quiz for evaluation.

(3) Require the following statement on all writ-

ten assignments: ‘‘In accordance with the

business schools’ Code of Ethical Behavior,

I attest that I have not engaged in any acts

of plagiarism in completing this assign-

ment.’’ Also require that the students sign

this statement before submitting their writ-

ten work for evaluation.

(4) Emphasize the availability of Ethics Advo-

cates for students to confidentially discuss

any ethical issue pertaining to their business

school classes.

The ISC continues to monitor the dissemination of

the Code and signing of pledge cards in the spirit of

continuous improvement and to lessen the potential

for breaches of ethical conduct by business school

students.

Assessing the impact of the ethics initiative

As discussed earlier, assessing the impact of an ethics

course is an important function since it may confirm

32 James Weber

whether the intended objectives are met or if addi-

tional work is warranted. The impact of the ethics

initiative program for the business school is assessed

at various specific junctures, as well as reviewed by

third-party organizations.

The interview survey of the full-time business

schools’ faculty members regarding the integration

of ethics across the curriculum was briefly discussed

earlier. The executive summary of this report pro-

vides a clear overview of what was found:

These interviews revealed a strong emphasis on eth-

ics and ethical issues across most of the business

schools’ divisions (departments). Attention to ethics

across the curriculum was evident in four general

areas: (1) discussing ethics by utilizing material from

a textbook chapter, ethics-oriented case study, cur-

rent ethical issue drawn from business periodicals, or

professional code of ethics; (2) encouraging students

to attend an ethics speaker or become involved in

community service; (3) testing students on their abil-

ity to recognize an ethical issue in a business case or

analyze a business case using ethical principles or

tools; and (4) stressing the importance of ethical

behavior while employed or completing an intern-

ship. In general, significant progress was discovered

in emphasizing ethics across the business schools’

curricula, but a number of recommendations are of-

fered to continue this effort.

The recommendations emanating from this report

focused on the fact that ethics was not integrated

into every business course. There was one division

where the integration of ethics was particularly low.

Specifically, it was recommended that a number of

additional supportive programs could be launched:

• Developing ethics case material for each

business school discipline, as well as integra-

tive cross-discipline ethics cases.

• Distributing and encouraging the discussion

of professional codes of conduct relevant to

the faculty member’s particular business

school discipline.

• Sponsoring speaker programs, administered

by the business schools’ ethics center, that

emphasize ethical challenges facing specific

business disciplines, enabling students in

Finance or Information Technology, for

example, to attend the presentation and then

discuss the presentation when returning to

class.

• Supporting faculty members by placing

students in community service opportunities

related to their discipline, such as accounting

students helping the elderly complete their

tax forms, or marketing students educating

at-risk consumers.

• Conducting faculty workshops on how to

introduce or analyze ethical issues in the

classroom, utilizing the ethical decision-mak-

ing framework presented in both the under-

graduate and graduate required business

ethics courses.

• Offering professional development work-

shops for students, utilizing exemplary ethical

leaders from the business community, to

emphasize the importance of ethical behavior

as employees or interns at business organiza-

tions.

Each of these recommendations could enhance any

business schools’ ethics initiative program.

The second assessment undertaken was conducted

after the first year of the distribution of the Code of

Ethical Behavior and pledge cards. In total, 31 of the

44 full-time business schools’ faculty members

(70.5%) returned the feedback survey that was

emailed to them and placed in their mailboxes.

Unfortunately the feedback survey was conducted

during finals week of the spring term which may

have reduced the response rate. Some of the more

enlightening findings from this assessment survey

were

• Nearly every faculty member reported dis-

tributing the Code in each of their business

classes.

• Twenty-three faculty members reported

going beyond merely distributing the Code in

their classes by discussing the Code, its impor-

tance and its contents with their students.

• Nearly half of the faculty members placed

the Code on their course website, periodi-

cally discussed the Code during the semester,

and/or reminded the students of the Code

when papers were due or examinations given

in class.


• Only four of the faculty members reported a

negative or blase reaction by their students

when presenting the code in class, with 40%

reporting a positive or enthusiastic response

from their students in class.

• Only four incidences of cheating or plagia-

rism were reported during this academic year

and each faculty member involved was aware

of and followed the procedures as outlined

in the Code.

Numerous suggestions were made by faculty mem-

bers regarding the continuous improvement of the

distribution of the Code and pledge cards. Many of

these suggestions were the catalyst for the changes in

the procedures taken during the second year of

distributing the Code in the business school.

An indirect and third assessment of the ethics

initiative program was undertaken by the accounting

division at the business schools. As dictated by the

division’s strategic plan and in accordance with the

American Institute of Certified Public Accountants’

(AICPA) list of suggested core competencies, the

accounting faculty sought feedback from their

graduating accounting majors regarding various

assessment outcomes for the four-year baccalaureate

degree program. Due to the importance placed on

ethics by Duquesne University and the schools of

business and the current public attention to the lack

of ethics by business organizations regarding their

accounting practices, the accounting faculty at-

tempted to integrate ethics into their accounting

courses. In the fall of 2004 the data from the spring

and summer 2003 graduating class surveys were

analyzed and the accounting division reported that

the second highest mean score for any core com-

petency was ‘‘understanding of the importance of

ethical financial reporting’’ (a 4.65 on a 5.00 scale).

In addition to internal measures of success for the

ethics initiative program, some external organiza-

tions have reviewed the business schools’ program.

At an international meeting of the AACSB, the

international accreditation body for schools of

business, three universities were featured as having

exemplary ethics programs within the business

school: Kansas State University, Stanford University

and Duquesne University. At two consecutive

teaching business ethics conferences, a case study

presentation featuring Duquesne University schools

of business’s ethics program was offered. These

presentations emphasized the business schools’ ethics

center, Code of Ethical Behavior, required courses

and supplementary ethics activities for business stu-

dents (Ferrell, 2004; Weber, 2005).

Finally, the business schools annually participate

in the AACSB/EBI Business Exit Survey. The

results from the 2003–2004 and 2004–2005 exit

surveys showed that question 26: ‘‘Satisfaction with

business curriculum instructors presenting ethical

issues’’ had a mean of 5.58 and 5.57, respectively (on

a 7-point Likert-scale). In each year, this question

placed in the top 15 of the means score responses

provided by Duquesne University schools of busi-

ness’s graduating seniors for the 171 questions in the

survey. There appears to be significant evidence that

the ethics initiative program at the business schools is

having a positive impact on the business schools’

students.

Lessons learned from the Duquesne

University schools of business’s ethics

initiative program

There were many lessons to be learned from the

ethics initiative program undertaken by the business

schools. These lessons may not only be valuable to

those at the Duquesne University schools of business

who are seeking to improve upon the efforts

undertaken here but also important for those at

other academic institutions seeking to develop and

implement their own ethics initiatives.

The first lesson learned is the importance of a

commitment to ethics and ethics education embedded deeply

within the school, and possibly, the university’s cultures.

This is not to say that ethics programs can only

succeed in business schools residing in private, reli-

gious universities who typically have a long-standing

tradition of ethics education. While it may be more

likely that this type of university would encourage, if

not expect, an ethics program to be developed by

their business school, it is not the exclusive domain

of private education to teach ethics or promote

ethics programs. Any university and business school

can identify ethics as an explicit, key component to

the educational focus of the institution.

In the case study described here, significant

support for the ethics program developed by the

34 James Weber

business schools came from Duquesne University’s

mission statement and strategic plan grounded in

the university’s tradition. In addition, the Academic

Vice President/Provost of the university (who has

been involved in many different ethics programs

during his academic career), the business schools’

dean (who developed a strong commitment to

ethics and integrity after many decades of profes-

sional work in the public accounting industry) and

the business schools’ alumni (who reflected back on

their days as students and expressed their desire that

ethics would have been emphasized more in their

business classes and extracurricular activities) all

provided critical support of and commitment to the

business schools’ ethics program. If ethics is a core

educational component or competencies of the

business school or university, then the development

of an ethics program begins with a solid founda-

tion.

The second lesson learned is that there must be

widespread communication of the ethics initiatives, espe-

cially at the outset of the program. Meaning, it is

helpful to be as aggressive as possible when informing

others about the specific ethics initiatives within the

ethics program, whether it is through the direct

advertisement of the program’s initiatives or through

normal, casual communication of business school

activities.

For example, at every opportunity available, the

business schools’ ethics program was described or

discussed in university publications, business schools’

newsletters to the alumni, the schools’ ethics center

and its publicity channels, or through conversations

at the university faculty lunchroom. It was essential

to get the ‘‘word out’’ to the university and business

school communities. One significant opportunity

arose when the business schools’ administration was

required to present the Code of Ethical Behavior to

the University Council for their review and

approval. This gave notice to the university that the

business schools had developed a student code and

provided the opportunity to discuss other ethics

initiatives embedded in the business schools’ ethics

program during the Council’s deliberations before

approving the Code.

Another opportunity for widespread communi-

cation of an ethics initiatives came when deciding

how best to introduce the Code of Ethical Behavior

to the business schools’ students. The Integrity

Standards Committee decided that it would be

imperative to distribute the Code in every business

course. As mentioned earlier, this resulted in some

students receiving the Code and signing the pledge

card four or five times during a single semester. In

the second year of the ethics program this practice

was lessened somewhat, but at the outset of the

program it was believed that extensive distribution

of the Code was essential.

Finally, the comprehensive communication of

the ethics program is evident when considering

how pervasive is the coverage of ethical issue dis-

cussions and general ethics education when seeking

to integrate ethics across the business schools’

curricula. Rather than assigning this educational

task to a single, stand-alone business ethics course,

the business schools attempted to integrate ethics

education across all of their courses. The wide-

spread attention to ethical issues and the subsequent

in-depth exploration of ethical analysis was dele-

gated to all business schools’ faculty members and

their classes. It appears that this and the preceding

efforts at a widespread communication of the ethics

initiatives within the business schools’ ethics pro-

gram contributed to the apparent success of the

program.

Earlier in this paper, Guelcher and Cahalane

(1999) warn of particular challenges for business

schools in developing an ethics program due to its

unique, complex internal environment and decen-

tralized power structure. Thus, the third lesson

learned was the importance of centralized leadership

and coordination of the ethics initiative program. The

ethics program was organized through the business

schools’ ethics center administration, affording a

clear starting point for all communication about the

program and a focus for any concerns, suggestions

for improvements, or complaints involving the

program. The center’s staff assumed the leadership

for the program and was charged with seeing the

ethics program through to completion by the busi-

ness schools’ administration.

The local, centralized leadership assumed by the

ethics center staff was supplemented by the central-

ized leadership from the university and business

schools. As described earlier, Duquesne University’s

President and Provost and the business schools’ dean

all became personally involved in the business

schools’ ethics program. This leadership was evident


to the university’s employees as well as the students,

whether the faculty members or students were part

of the business schools or belonged to another school

at the university.

Throughout the development and implementa-

tion of the business schools’ ethics program is was

evident that there must be widespread student and

faculty member ownership and participation in the ethics

initiative program. At the outset, business school stu-

dents initiated the creation of a committee to draft

the student’s ethics code. Students served as the

majority on this committee, were involved through

the student extracurricular clubs and organizations

in making suggestions to early drafts of the Code,

and finally gave their approval of the Code. Students

also serve as the majority stakeholder on the

Integrity Standards Committee, charged with the

continued implementation of the Code and as an

oversight investigation team of any Code violations.

The business schools’ faculty, likewise, was in-

volved in every step of rolling out the ethics pro-

gram, from serving on the committee to draft the

Code to distributing the Code in their classes. Fac-

ulty members also were instrumental at efforts to

integrate ethics across the business schools’ curricula

through discussions of ethics cases or the testing of

their students’ ethical analysis skills. Faculty members

also serve on the Integrity Standards Committee.

Another important lesson learned was the absolute

essentiality of continuous improvement for the ethics pro-

gram. The program is in constant need of review,

reflection and modification as determined by various

committees and business schools’ administration.

Although only a few years old, the Code of Ethical

Behavior was closely scrutinized for possible lan-

guage changes, inclusion of new issues, and the

presence of unnecessary material. Students and fac-

ulty members were petitioned for their input. The

distribution of the Code was changed after

the Integrity Standards Committee believed that the

system developed for year one had outlived its

effectiveness and needed to be revised for the second

year of the Code.

As described earlier, efforts at soliciting feedback

from faculty members regarding the integration of

ethics across the curriculum or how best to distribute

the Code of Ethical Behavior were important ele-

ments addressing the continuous improvement of

the program.

Finally, an important lesson learned involved the

need for continuous, new ‘‘add-ons’’ for the program.

In order for the program to remain fresh and

appealing, it is critical to think of new ways to pro-

mote attention to ethics within the business schools.

Efforts at integrating ethics across the curriculum are

in constant need of attention and new approaches.

For example, workshops are planned to further

introduce the business schools’ faculty members to

the ethical decision-making framework introduced

to MBA students in the Applied Business Ethics

course as a simple tool for all faculty members to

utilize in their courses, as well as the identification of

current ethics cases emerging from business and

popular newspapers and magazines for subsequent in-

class discussion.

The usefulness for students to hear of the inherent

presence and importance of business ethics in

everyday business operations has lead the business

schools to consider how to involve more students in

the ethics speakers program. Rather than primarily

targeting students in the business ethics courses by

requiring their attendance at the semi-annual

speaker’s program, the search for a larger venue to

hold these presentations is being sought, as well as

the possibility of bringing more speakers on campus

to speak to smaller groups of students. Programs

targeting accounting, finance, information technol-

ogy, or marketing majors, for example, are being

considered.

Unfortunately there is no magic formula. Simply

adhering to the six ‘‘lessons learned’’ described here

may not result in a successful ethics program at a

business school. But this paper describes the

Duquesne University’s schools of business’s efforts

toward creating an ethics program and its apparent

success to serve as a possible initial model for the

development and implementation of an ethics pro-

gram in other business schools.

Appendix A: Business course descriptions

MGMT 368 – Business Ethics

This course provides students with ethical decision-

making tools to assess and resolve various ethical

dilemmas commonly found in the students’ lives

and in many business organizations. Social and

36 James Weber

ethical problems, existing in societies where busi-

nesses must operate, also are investigated through a

community service volunteer project. Course

assignments seek to improve ethical decision-mak-

ing skills and develop basic communication com-

petency.

GRBUS 508 – Applied Business Ethics

This course introduces students to the school of

business’s policies on ethical behavior and provides

students with basic ethical decision-making skills

necessary to recognize, evaluate and resolve ethical

conflicts. Emphasis is on common ethical challenges

facing graduate students in the classroom and at

work. This course provides an analytical framework

for students to use when grappling with course-

specific, ethical dilemmas in subsequent core and

elective courses in the graduate program and in their

professional business careers.

Appendix B: Master-level business track

course descriptions

MSLBE 501 – Business Ethics

This course will emphasize the individual as deci-

sion-maker and focus upon ethical issues and

dilemmas facing managers in most business organi-

zations. The specific objectives of the course are to

raise students’ general awareness of ethical dilemmas

at work, to place ethical issues within a management

context subject to analysis and decision-making

action, and to enhance and improve the ability of

students to reason toward a satisfactory resolution of

an ethical dilemma.

MSLBE 502 – Information Ethics

This course deals with ethical issues in the new era of

the Information Society. The general objectives of

this course are to improve the student’s ability to

identify specific information ethics issues, to analyze

and resolve these information ethics issues within a

management context, and to improve the student’s

understanding of how information technology im-

pacts people’s lives.

MSLBE 507 – Organizational Ethics and Governmental

Interventions

This course provides students with an in-depth look

at the formal and informal initiatives, processes, and

structures developed by business organizations and

professional associations to address common ethical

problems at work. The applied focus of this course

will prepare students for a career in the ethics field or

enable them to participate in their organization’s

efforts to promote ethics at work. In addition, the

role of the government (primarily in the U.S.) to

promote ethical business conduct will be discussed.

MSLBE 508 – Global Ethics

This course identifies and discusses differences and

similarities in ethical values and principles found in

the practice of organizations conducting business

around the world. In particular, comparisons of

culture and religion, and their impact upon business

operations, will be explored. Strategic opportunities

emanating from cultural and/or religious differences

will be developed to guide organizations conducting

business in the global marketplace.

MSLBE 509 – Ethics Capstone – a field-based project

Individual or group study culminating in an applied

ethics research paper or case study is the focus for

this course. Students will be exposed to past and

promising streams of field-based, business ethics

research before selecting their particular area for

study. Analytical research techniques will be pre-

sented and guidance provided by the instructor in

how to use relevant data collection techniques on an

‘‘as needed basis’’ for each student in the course. The

content of the project is subject to mutual agreement

between the student(s) and the course instructor.

Appendix C: Duquesne university schools

of business’s code of ethical behavior, initial

version, 2003–2004

Code of Ethical Behavior

As students enrolled in courses offered by the A.J.

Palumbo School of Business Administration and the


John F. Donahue Graduate School of Business at

Duquesne University (hereafter, the Duquesne

business schools), you are expected to adhere to the

ethical principles and behavior described in this

Code, in addition to behavior required in the Uni-

versity’s Standards of Academic Integrity.

Underlying the Code of Ethical Behavior is the

expectation that as members of the Duquesne

business schools, which include administrators,

staff, faculty and students, we should behave in an

ethical manner. Guiding this expectation are the

following core principles: respect for others, indi-

vidual accountability, personal responsibility for

conducting oneself with integrity, and creating and

maintaining trust in all of our business school

relationships. Through its curricula and in extra-

curricular activities, the Duquesne business schools

strive to model ethical leadership since ethical

decision making and behavior are recognized as

successful business strategies and desirable employee

characteristics.

Please read the attached Code and sign this cover

page attesting to your agreement with the Duquesne

business schools’ core principles and commitment to

ethical behavior.

I have read and understand the Code of Ethical

Behavior and agree to comply with the Duquesne business

schools’ expectations of its members to act in accordance

with the core principles and ethical behaviors described in

the Code.

Guidelines

Based on the ethical principles of respect, account-

ability, personal responsibility and trust, a response to

the question: ‘‘What is ethical?’’ is modeled for the

Duquesne business school community. The princi-

ples must underlie and be evident in your behavior,

as well as in your relationships with the business

schools’ administration, faculty and staff.

Clarifying students’ responsibilities

Plagiarism: In many of the Duquesne business school

courses, you are assigned research projects or similar

assignments requiring the investigation of past works

or thoughts. This research develops your analytical

skills and/or expands your critical thinking on a

subject or current business issue. When engaged in

these learning exercises, the possibility of plagiarism

may arise.

Plagiarism is defined as the failure to acknowledge the

sources from where you borrow ideas, examples, words, and

the progressions of thought. For example:

• Your failure to report in a paper the discov-

ery and use of ideas from another source

constitutes plagiarism.

• Your direct copying of material from an ori-

ginal source without acknowledging the

source also is plagiarism.

• While you may not use another person’s

exact words or phrases in your paper, for

example, when you take the general pattern

of ideas or opinions from an original

source, you must acknowledge the original

source.

• Instances of plagiarism also include para-

phrasing another’s work; that is, taking the

basic ideas and re-phrasing them when pre-

sented in your work.

Any form of plagiarism results in the failure to

meet the expectations of ethical behavior since

it dishonestly presents another’s work as your

own, for which you intend to receive credit or

be evaluated.

Cheating on Examinations: In many Duquesne

business school courses, your learning is assessed

through examinations, with the type of questions

ranging from multiple choice to essays. When

engaged in these learning assessment activities, the

possibility of cheating may arise.

Cheating includes but is not limited to

• When you use, or attempt to use, unautho-

rized assistance, material, or study aids during

an examination or other academic work.

• Cheating also occurs when you prevent, or

attempt to prevent, another student from

using authorized assistance, material, or study

aids during an examination or other aca-

demic work.

38 James Weber

Cheating on examinations results in the failure

to meet the expectations of ethical behavior

since it enables you to unfairly gain an

advantage over another student during, or

in the evaluation of, an examination, or

deliberately denies another student an equal

opportunity to perform at her/his best ability

on an examination or other academic work.

Other unethical behavior: Other instances of

unethical behavior may arise during your member-

ship in the Duquesne business school community.

For example, when engaged in an authorized group

assignment, you take credit for work completed by

another group member or fail to contribute your fair

share to the group process or project. These actions

disrespect others and/or fail to assume personal

responsibility, such as accepting a lower grade than

your group members since you failed to contribute

equally to the group’s efforts.

No Code of Ethical Behavior could cover all pos-

sible instances of unethical actions. When in doubt,

refer back to the core principles of respect, account-

ability, personal responsibility and trust that govern all

members of the community and their actions.

In addition, the Integrity Standards Committee

and Ethical Advocates (described next) are available

to serve the members of the Duquesne business

community and help ensure that an ethical envi-

ronment is maintained in the business schools.

Enforcing the code

When violations of ethical behavior occur

Researchers have found that punishment of

wrongdoing and awareness of sanctions against

wrongdoers are significant positive influences when

promoting ethical behavior in a community. To this

end, violations of this Code are subject to sanctions

imposed by the faculty member governing the stu-

dent(s) or the Integrity Standards Committee

(described later). In addition, any Duquesne business

student may appeal a decision or action taken by a

faculty member regarding violations of the Code to

the Integrity Standards Committee.

When a faculty member discovers an alleged

student violation of the Code, the faculty mem-

ber should meet with the student(s) to discuss the

allegation. The faculty member should also notify

her/his department chair and the appropriate Asso-

ciate Dean. After the alleged violator has been heard,

the faculty member may impose the sanction for the

ethical violation upon the student, in accordance

with the penalties described later in the Code. If the

violator is a repeat offender, the Associate Dean may

determine if a more severe penalty should be im-

posed, as discussed later.

If you observe a violation of the Code, you

have a responsibility to bring the incident to the

attention of the student who violated the Code.

You should advise the student to admit the

wrongdoing to the appropriate faculty member

immediately. If the student does not do so, then you

have an obligation to report the incident to the

appropriate faculty member or to an Ethics Advo-

cate (described below).

The Integrity Standards Committee Students, faculty

and administrators from the Duquesne business

schools are represented on the Integrity Standards

Committee. The committee consists of five mem-

bers, with two undergraduate business students, a

graduate business student, a business faculty member

and a business school administrator.

The undergraduate student representatives are

selected by the student members of the Dean’s

Student Advisory Council, the graduate student

representative is selected by the student members of

the Graduate Students’ Advisory Board, the business

faculty representative is selected by the Duquesne

business schools’ faculty, and the business school

administrator is selected by the Dean of the

Duquesne business schools.

Each member of the Integrity Standards Com-

mittee shall serve a one-year term, with continuous

service by an individual permitted if duly selected by

his or her membership group.

All members of the Integrity Standards Com-

mittee have an equal voice and vote in committee

decisions. A faculty member, other than the faculty

representative to the Committee, will serve as an ex

officio member of the Committee and chair of the

Committee.

The Integrity Standards Committee’s duties

consist of

(1) Facilitating a wide distribution of the Code

of Ethical Behavior to all segments of the

Duquesne business school communities.


(2) Revising the Code periodically or as the

need arises.

(3) Investigating alleged claims of violations of

the Code.

(4) Providing a forum before which claims of

alleged violations of the Code can be heard.

(5) Ensuring that the confidentiality of the wit-

nesses appearing before the Committee with

alleged claims of ethical behavior violations

is maintained if possible.

(6) Deciding if the Code has been violated by a

majority vote by the Committee.

Sanctions for ethical violations The importance of

creating and enforcing sanctions against violators of

the Code of Ethical Behavior cannot be overem-

phasized. If the Code is violated, enforcement must

be fair and timely for the Code to continue to be a

viable factor in maintaining an ethical environment

at the Duquesne business schools.

In determining if a violation of the Code has

occurred, those assessing a student’s actions should

consider:

(1) The premeditation of the student in com-

mitting the alleged act.

(2) The apparent truthfulness of the student

when questioned by the faculty member or

the Committee in regards to the alleged

violation.

(3) The severity of the alleged violation.

In addition to the severity of the offense, the

frequency of the student violating the Code

affects the sanctions imposed. For example for a

first offense, the sanction or penalty might be an

‘‘F’’ on the assignment or examination, as

imposed by the faculty member involved in the

incident.

For a second or more severe offense, the violation

of the Code might warrant a stricter penalty, for

example an ‘‘F’’ for the course. If so, the faculty

member and faculty member’s department chair

should agree on the sanction. The student has the

right to appeal this decision to the School Standing

Committee. This committee reports to the Dean,

who has the final decision.

If the offense is so severe or the student has vio-

lated the Code so often, the appropriate sanction

could be expulsion from the university. If so, the

following actions must be taken. In accordance with

the University’s Academic Integrity Policy, if the

recommended offense is greater than failure of a

course, the matter is turned over to the University

Academic Integrity Committee. This committee

conducts a hearing and makes a recommendation to

the Provost. The Provost will implement the

Committee’s recommendation, unless the faculty

member or student involved in this situation appeals

the recommended action. After hearing any appeal,

the Provost must ratify, modify or suspend the rec-

ommended sanction.

To determine if there are repeated Code viola-

tions by the student, the faculty member should

inform the appropriate Associate Dean, who should

maintain records of all ethical violations by students

in his or her program.

Ethics Advocates In addition to the members of the

Integrity Standards Committee, a number of faculty

members and students are to be appointed by the

Dean of the Duquesne business schools to serve as

Ethics Advocates. Those who are Ethics Advocates

serve the Duquesne business schools’ community as

confidential resources. Students, faculty, staff or

administrators who have ethical issues they wish to

discuss may do so with an Ethics Advocate knowing

that their confidentiality will be protected to the

greatest extent possible.

Ethics Advocates are charged with the following

responsibilities:

• Providing confidential counsel to individuals

who believe they have witnessed an alleged

ethical violation.

• Discussing possible ethical violations

with members of the Integrity Standards

Committee as they deem warranted.

Notes

1 It is important to note that the required undergradu-

ate Business Ethics course pre-dates the launching of

the formal ethics initiative program since it was estab-

lished as a required course for all business students,

regardless of their major, in 1993; whereas, the ethics

initiative program was developed and introduced in

2002.

40 James Weber

2 As the program enters its fourth year of existence,

the projected enrollment of 90 students after five years

is surpassed by the more than 230 students already en-

rolled in the program after three years.

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James Weber

Beard Center for Leadership and Ethics

Duquesne University

600 Forbes Avenue/Rockwell Hall #813, Pittsburgh,

PA, 15282,

U.S.A.

E-mail: [email protected]

42 James Weber

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