Researchers, educators and policy makers are seeking innovative ways to address the subject of graduate training in research ethics. With this three year award, North Carolina State University will undertake a modular approach to phase in a research ethics infrastructure and related curricula throughout the graduate programs. The project will change campus culture by better preparing students and faculty to recognize ethical issues and how they differ from other kinds of issues; reason about ethical issues and apply appropriate concepts; act in a morally responsible manner; know the ethical responsibilities of research in a given field; and use critical thinking when faced with issues in research ethics. An interdisciplinary faculty Committee on Research Ethics, representing the sciences, engineering, and humanities, devised the plan and will oversee implementation, with help from faculty, graduate students, emeritus faculty and industry and public representatives. The infrastructure includes campus-wide development and distribution of resources for research ethics, including instructional modules, biennial institutes for faculty, and lectures by exemplary researchers and mentors. Each year, the Research Ethics Fellows Program will select ten graduate students who, with their faculty mentors, will participate in a wide variety of activities, including a formal seminar, that will prepare them to assume leadership in applying critical reasoning to ethical problems in their fields and to create new resources, course offerings, and other activities in the university, on its research Centennial Campus, and in the Research Triangle area. An evaluation plan will monitor the extent to which the program becomes part of the university's research infrastructure and influences the institutional culture as well as the students and faculty who participate. Development staff will begin to build private funding to ensure continuation, potentially in the form of a Centennial Center for Ethics.
