Ethics education is reshaping high school science. Just ask Carla Calogero, a 10th grade biology teacher at Nathan Hale High School in Seattle.

Calogero used to consider ethics a "tag-along to the curriculum" or "icing on the cake" to capture student attention. Now, ethical inquiry is a substantive part of her five-week unit on genetics.

The class begins by playing a version of the game Scruples. Calogero presents scenarios. For example, a close friend wants to crib your answers on a test. Students must respond to questions such as, Do I help my friend cheat? How do I decide? Who is affected? A heated but enlightening discussion often ensues as they debate their answers.

The teacher then segues into science ethics. Students do assigned exercises that help them make connections between scientific advances—genetic testing, for example—and the dilemmas facing researchers, doctors and families. Finally, teams of students produce "magazines" about topics such as pharmacology or forensics. Each magazine must cover both scientific details and ethical implications, and also present conflicting points of view. "It's easy for students to catch on to the issues," Calogero says, "and as they learn more about the science, the technology and the ethical problems, their understanding really increases."

Calogero began to rethink her curriculum two summers ago, when she took a week-long workshop for teachers at the GENETICS Project, a University of Washington School of Medicine program supported by an HHMI grant. Workshop leaders encouraged the teachers to include bioethics instruction in their classrooms.

Some teachers found this "preposterous," Calogero recalls. "A few objected that bioethics is values-based instruction that has nothing to do with science." Most, however, had already begun discussing ethics informally in class—usually because students brought it up. "I was shooting in the dark, letting the kids take sides and argue," says Paul Ladniak, a biology teacher at Seattle's Chief Sealth High School.

In the workshop, teachers learned a more systematic approach. "They gave us a framework," says Ladniak. "You look at the scientific facts; you identify the stakeholders and their values; you discuss possible outcomes; you keep the discussion narrowly focused." Ladniak thinks that such structured ethics lessons will be more comfortable for him and more valuable to his students than freewheeling debates.
—FS

» For more: chroma.mbt.washington.edu/outreach/genetics/index.html

Download this story in Acrobat PDF format.
(requires Acrobat Reader)

Reprinted from the HHMI Bulletin,
March 2002, pages 30-33.
©2002 Howard Hughes Medical Institute