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The Ethics Resource Site

The Ethics Resource Site Logo - Delaware State University

THE ETHICS RESOURCE SITE was established at Delaware State University as an intrinsic part of the Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research(EPSCoR): Research Infrastructure Improvement (RII-1: 2005-2008) grant. Funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), with a 50% match from the State of Delaware, this program was designed to improve the scientific research infrastructure throughout the state of Delaware.

THE ETHICS RESOURCE SITE was maintained as a result of the EPSCoR:RII-2 (2008-2013) as well as the EPSCoR: RII-3 (2013-2018) collaborative agreements, which were also funded by the NSF (with a match from the State of Delaware). Administered by the Delaware Environmental Institute (DENIN), each of these programs was funded as a partnership of the following institutions of higher learning: the University of Delaware, Delaware State University, Wesley College, and Delaware Technical and Community College. Each of these partner institutions had its own unique, but complementary, projects that, when taken in conjunction, advanced the various strategic imperatives of each of these collaborative agreements.  Since 2018, THE ETHICS RESOURCE SITE remains unchanged in its purposes as well as in the activities through which its purposes are realized, while being sustained by the College of Agriculture, Science, and Technology (CAST) at Delaware State University.

Through the auspices of the EPSCoR: RII-2 collaborative agreement, the Center for Integrated Biological and Environmental Research (CIBER) was established at Delaware State University.  Housed in the College of Agriculture, Science, and Technology (CAST), CIBER serves as the hub of a network of natural science researchers from all four of the Delaware EPSCoR partner institutions of higher learning. The director and staff of CIBER help to conduct the day-to-day activities, with a group of interested faculty whose intent is to develop inter/intra-institutional and interdisciplinary collaboration of research faculty in their efforts to secure grants, to conduct cutting-edge natural scientific research, and to engage in educational and other outreach activities for the benefit of the citizens of the state of Delaware.  In addition, CIBER facilitates the hiring of both graduate and undergraduate student researchers at Delaware State University as well as contributing to the organizing of the annual Summer Research Symposium, which is held on the campus of Delaware State University every July.  THE ETHICS RESOURCE SITE operates through the auspices of CIBER.

THE ETHICS RESOURCE SITE was established at Delaware State University as a repository of expertise in normative ethical theory and in applied ethics, in areas that include (but are not limited to):

  • Environmental Ethics,
  • Bioethics (i.e., ethical issues that arise in the biological sciences as well as those that arise in the field of health care), 
  • Ethics in Technology, and
  • Business Ethics.

A main purpose of THE ETHICS RESOURCE SITE is to serve the citizens of the state of Delaware in, at least, two fundamental ways:

  • first, to raise awareness concerning ethical issues with which people are confronted in their daily lives (both public and private), and

  • second, to address the needs of a variety of groups of people with respect to the clarification of ethical concepts and the understanding of ethical issues, both of which are relevant to such groups of people (e.g., people who share the same occupational, social, or ethnic concerns).

Lectures, Forums and Panel Discussions

In an effort to raise the awareness of members of the community-at-large regarding social issues that impact our daily lives as well as to promote an understanding of the ethical concerns and a clarification of the ethical concepts that are inherent in such issues, public lectures, forums, and panel discussions have been sponsored by THE ETHICS RESOURCE SITE. 

Since 2010, THE ETHICS RESOURCE SITE has sponsored the annual Q.E.D.: Natural Science Symposia Series at Delaware State University.  This series provides a forum for natural science faculty researchers at Delaware State University to present their current research, informally and in an informal setting, to an audience of faculty, post-doctoral fellows, graduate students, and undergraduate students, also in the natural sciences.  In addition to faculty researchers at the University becoming aware of the current research of their peers, this series provides the opportunity for faculty researchers to recognize that one of their colleagues might be conducting research that is complementary to their own, resulting in the possibility to collaborate on both grant-writing and research in the future.  In fact, this main objective of this series has borne fruit more than a few times since the inception of this series.

Since 2014, THE ETHICS RESOURCE SITE has hosted The CAST Nobel Prize Event, which provides the opportunity for members of the Delaware State University faculty, with the appropriate expertise, to present the research/activity that garnered each of the Nobel Prizes for the current year.  This event is held annually approximately one month after the official announcements of the Nobel awards.  While the target audience is graduate and undergraduate students in CAST, this event is open to the public.

Ethics Seminars for Researchers, Faculty and Students as well as for Clinical medical staff and administrators

Another purpose of THE ETHICS RESOURCE SITE is to offer seminars and courses (on ethical issues that are relevant to researchers in the natural sciences) for faculty, post-doctoral research fellows, graduate students, and undergraduate students at Delaware State University and other institutions of higher learning in the region.  In addition, ethics seminars, on a number of different issues in bioethics, are provided for the clinical medical staff and administrators of a variety of medical facilities throughout the state of Delaware.

 

Contact:

Stephen C. Taylor, Ph.D., Director
Professor of Philosophy
The Ethics Resource Site
Delaware State University
1200 N. duPont  Highway
Dover, Delaware 19901
302.857.6634/6635 (Telephone)
302.857.7679 (Facsimile)
staylor [at] desu.edu