In this society where ethical misconduct is prevalent, faculty and staff can do a better job of providing training and encouragement to help students make ethical decisions. At the University of North Carolina Wilmington, a task force was created to develop a workshop for student leaders to enhance their awareness of ethical issues and the…

How have sociohistorical developments influenced the nature of the college experience over time? In what ways have these changes impacted the responsibilities of higher education relative to the moral and ethical development of students? This article reflects the thinking of a seasoned senior executive regarding these questions.

Mentally ill students are able to participate in higher education at unprecedented rates. While colleges and universities have been responsive to the therapeutic needs, we have failed to successfully create supportive campus climates. Campus leaders are challenged to demonstrate ethical leadership that breaks the silence and confronts the stigma…

In the late 19th century, faculty members on American college campuses turned their attention away from life outside the classroom, a responsibility they had assumed from the earliest days of the colonial college. The result was the establishment of a field known familiarly today as "student affairs", which focuses on the work of…

Most college faculty care about the characters of their students, especially when it comes to questions of honesty. But can students today be trusted not to cheat when completing papers and exams, and not to do so for the right reasons? In section one of this article, the author reviews some of the leading research on cheating behavior, and in…

As resources have become tighter, campus leaders must make tough decisions about priorities. Many people value the out-of-classroom experience, but there is a cost to staffing and providing these opportunities and resources. Some argue that technology will change education so completely that campuses as we know them today will become extinct.…

Honor codes have become increasingly popular at institutions of higher education as a means of reducing violations of academic integrity such as cheating and other academically dishonest acts. Previous research on honor code effectiveness has been limited to correlational research designs that preclude the examination of cause-and-effect…

The most important knowledge and skills a college education should develop in young people are those underlying good character, such as integrity, responsibility, work ethic, intellectual curiosity, mental flexibility, and wisdom. When leaders fail, most frequently it is because of issues of character, not lack of knowledge or intellectual…

Although most colleges strive to nurture a culture of integrity, incidents of dishonest behavior are on the rise. This article examines the role student development plays in students' perceptions of academic dishonesty and in their willingness to adhere to a code of conduct that may be in sharp contrast to traditional integrity policies.

As student affairs professionals, we are expected to meet students where they are developmentally and challenge and support them as they learn, develop, and grow into productive citizens. Since our institutions, and society as a whole, are becoming increasingly diverse, it is imperative that we acknowledge the numerous ways cultural background…

The Values, Ethics, and Social Action (VESA) minor at Allegheny College has been an academic program since 1999. This article describes the unique strengths of VESA and some of the institutional and conceptual challenges faced by the program and presents details of practices employed to meet these challenges in order to sustain this community…

Choosing a career is one of the most important decisions college students face. However, little academic work exists to help students evaluate the ethical implications of different career paths. This interview with Will Crouch, an Oxford University student, explores his controversial work on the ethics of career choice. He argues that to pursue a…

What is loyalty and why is it problematic in athletics? The author discusses the ethical lapses that can occur when a powerful social value, "loyalty," trumps individuals' ability to make moral decisions. She argues that education about morality should be a necessary part of sport education and explains how moral education programs can make a…

Colleges and universities are places where students are immersed in course work and planned activities outside the classroom, where habits based on values and character can be formed. Whether working with students to achieve learning outcomes specifically related to academic courses or helping them work through the consequences of a conduct issue,…

Faith-affiliated colleges and universities confront a special challenge in assessing students' development relative to dispositional learning goals. Since 2007, three New England Catholic colleges have collaborated to evaluate students' religious, spiritual, moral and ethical growth. A four-part mixed-method study resulted in qualitative as well…