Running head: DEPAUL UNIVERSITY

Crystal McField
International College of the Cayman Islands
Seminar on Business and Society

Reflection Paper DePaul University

BE 425
LECTURER: Dr. David Marshall
Date: May 19, 2016

INCLUSION & DIVERSITY

On Thursday, May 19, 2016, the seminar class visited DePaul University in Chicago
Illinois. The university was founded in 1972 and has 10 locations throughout the state of
Chicago. The dean of the university Ms. Marixsa Alicea introduced the university as a school
focused on how an individual learns. She stated that the university founding board wanted to
ensure adult learners had access to higher learning.
DePauls mission is to foster in higher education through a deep respect for the Godgiven dignity of all persons, especially the materially, culturally, and spiritually deprived, and to
instill in educated person a dedication to the service of others. DePaul is a non-traditional
college who only accepts students aged 24 and above. The college also focuses on students, who
are financially independent, single caregivers, and are working full time. The average age of a
student attending the university is 39.
There are seven undergraduate programs and three graduate programs which are tailored
specifically to each student based on their individual characteristics. One highlight by Ms. Alicea
was the confidence based programs, early childhood, business, and computers. These programs
offer a professional mentor already on the field to help guide and direct the students path until
the end of their tenure. The university has developed a program which demonstrates confidences
of each student. It has divided them into three main groups, lifelong area, liberal learning, and
focus area.
Concentrating on these areas develop skills, knowledge and abilities to demonstrate
understanding which allow the student to garner experience. By having this correlation between
mentors and students shows and enables success. There were two other presenters for the
morning who spoke about Ethics and whistleblowing. Summer Brown, executive director, and

INCLUSION & DIVERSITY

professor of business law and business communication defined ethics and described how
individuals conducted themselves socially, personally, and professionally. Ms. Brown highlighted
issues why a person would behave in an unethical way. She reasoned that there were four causes
of misconduct, fear, pressure, greed, and convenience. Ms. Brown expanded on governments
implementation of regulation and various acts such as Sarbanes-Oxley and Dodd-Frank Act
which are a few used to curtail unethical behavior.
According to text, one of the oldest forms of regulation is economic regulations which
aim to modify normal operations of the market and force supply and demand. (Lawrence, A. pg.
170) The US Congress passed the Dodd Frank Act in 2010, which focused on financial
regulatory, implementing and enforcing compliance while changing corporate governance.
(Lawrence, A. pg. 171) Todays world has seen many ethical issues over the years such as civil
rights, environmental issues, and employee militancy, discrimination and gender inequalities to
name a few.
Another important highlight and presentation were done by Dr. Daryl Koehen Chair in
business ethics and managing director at DePaul University. Dr. Koehen defined whistleblowing
as the obligation of a person to prevent serious harm to others if they are able to do so and can do
so with little harm to themselves. Many people do not understand and identify with
whistleblowing as they feel it is not accepted and others see it as a way for the creation of
perverse incentives.
In Dr. Koehens presentation, she showed nine individuals who decided to speak up on
issues within their workforces and out of nine cases only two had a satisfying and victorious
ending. With that being said, I would feel safe in saying that whistleblowing is not normally met

INCLUSION & DIVERSITY

with support and can create complex motivations to encourage behaviors. One question was key
to always asking in situations like this would be, why did that person choose to talk? Was there
and incentive?
In the Cayman Islands, we see that many organizations have policies and procedures that
employees should adhere to. As a civil servant, I am directed and governed by the public service
management law which sets the guidelines for all employees of the civil service. One implication
was recently in the news the government highlighted that they were protecting all whistleblowers
who came forward with information and they should not fear to lose their jobs. Many
international laws and rules are applicable to the Island but there are employees who fear reprisal
from their employers.

INCLUSION & DIVERSITY

References
Lawrence, A. & Weber, J., (2014). Business and society: Stakeholders, ethics, public
policy (14th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill