www.icheme.org/ece doi: 10.1205/ece.

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17497728/06/$30.00+0.00 # 2006 Institution of Chemical Engineers Trans IChemE, Part D, 2006 Education for Chemical Engineers, 1: 49 54

TEACHING ETHICS TO CHEMICAL ENGINEERS Some Class Room Scenarios

D. C. SHALLCROSS and M. J. PARKINSON
Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

hree ctional scenarios are presented which pose ethical dilemmas set against industrial chemical engineering environments. These scenarios are designed for use in the undergraduate chemical engineering curriculum and present the participating students with a range of ethical dilemmas. The ethical situations considered include levels of professional honesty and integrity, whistle-blowing, loyalty to ones company and client, and conict of interest. Their simple nature allows vigorous discussions between students working in groups and between the students and the class facilitator. The scenarios are designed to confront undergraduate chemical engineering students with the sort of challenging situations that they might be faced with as graduate engineers. The use of the scenarios has proven to be very popular with the students with nearly all being actively engaged in the discussions. Keywords: ethics; case study; class room activity; structured controversy.

INTRODUCTION While it is agreed that engineering ethics is an essential aspect of the education of professional engineers there is still disagreement amongst educators as to how the topic is best incorporated into the undergraduate curriculum. Most engineering educators would agree with the comments of Harris et al. (1996) that engineering ethics is as much a part of what engineers in particular know as factors of safety, testing procedures, or ways to design for reliability, durability, or economy. Yet unlike the other topics in an undergraduate engineering programme such as uid mechanics or thermodynamics the teaching of ethics builds upon, not so much the prior knowledge that students bring to their studies, but their own personal morals and sets of values. While universities and other institutions can set entrance requirements relating to standards of mathematics, language and science knowledge and abilities, the students will enter the course with a diverse range of personal morals and sets of values. This is particularly true for classes and courses which draw students from a range of diverse countries. This paper presents three ethical scenarios which have been used at the University of Melbourne in the teaching of ethics in the undergraduate chemical engineering programme. While workers such as Bucknam (1999, 2000, 2002, 2003a, b) have developed ethical scenarios for civil
Correspondence to: Professor D. C. Shallcross, Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia. E-mail: dcshal@unimelb.edu.au

and construction engineers for use in the engineering class room, few examples have been developed for chemical engineers. In the early 1990s a series of four scenarios were developed and published jointly by the IChemE and the AIChE (Mascone et al., 1991; Rosenzweig and Butcher, 1992). These have been successfully used by the authors over a decade in teaching chemical engineering ethics. Herreid (1998) discussed the attributes of a successful case study for use in the classroom. After many years of use however the authors felt that it was time to develop a series of additional scenarios. The three that follow were developed by the authors and have been successfully used for the past 2 years at the third year of the 4-year undergraduate degree programme at the University of Melbourne. Use is also made of additional scenarios adapted from other sources, but not presented here. The aim of these sessions is not to teach the students ethics in depth or what denes ethical behaviour. This is because it is not proper or appropriate to try to force ones own moral values onto others particularly when they will be returning to their own countries within 18 months. One can seek to present what is or is not appropriate behaviour in the Australian industry and society, and by extension industry in the Western World. The aim of the sessions is to expose the students to the concepts and theories of ethical behaviour irrespective of their cultural background. The sessions attempt to alert students to the types of ethical issues that may arise during their professional careers by presenting them with a series of up to ve different scenarios. The Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Melbourne draws more than 49

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SHALLCROSS and PARKINSON (6) SummaryThe instructor closes the discussion by calling on selected groups to present their consensus positions. The discussions are then summarized. The structured controversy technique described above is readily adapted to working with groups of four students. In the application of the technique to chemical engineering ethics described here, the students are divided into groups of four based upon where they are seated in the classroom. Each student in the group is then assigned one of the courses of action proposed to resolve the ethical dilemma and required to argue that course of action amongst the group. The students have to argue the particular course of action assigned to them whether they believe it or not. After 10 15 min of discussion and rebuttal the students are assigned an alternative course of action to argue. After a further 5 10 min of discussion each group is asked to develop a consensus statement. Groups selected at random are then called upon to present their opinions to the class. In earlier years the structured controversy technique was not employed when similar ethical scenarios were discussed in class. Instead the class was given a scenario to read and then they were called upon at random to express an opinion. Few students were willing to address the class with their thoughts on the matter and discussion was generally dominated by a handful of assertive individuals. As a generalization nearly all those students who engaged in the class discourse were from English-speaking backgrounds, who had the condence to express their opinions. The use of the structured controversy technique with the ethical scenarios has led to increased engagement in the class. Now when students are asked to comment on the ethical scenarios, they are giving the considered opinions not just of themselves but of the group of four. They are observed to give their opinions with increased condence. THE SCENARIOS Three scenarios have been developed which present the students with realistically difcult ethical dilemmas. In all cases there are no clear-cut, obvious solutions. The students must consider a range of actions, along with their consequences. It should be noted that the scenarios as given here are as they have been presented to the students in Australia. They contain colloquial expressions and phrases that might be best modied before use elsewhere. Scenario 1: Product Testing Sarah is a process engineer for Tonmon, a large manufacturing company which makes a paper-like product for the building industry. Sarah is responsible for the most of the upstream end of the process in which the feed stock is processed to produce an intermediate product. This product is then formed into sheets of a material very similar to paper which become Tonmons nal product. This product is in turn sold to another company, Zaser Sheeting which bonds the sheets to its own product to form re-resistant wall sheets. In order to meet the demands of Zaser, Tonmons process runs 24 h a day, 7 days a week.

25% of its students from outside Australia. Most of the international students come from countries including India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Peoples Republic of China, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam, with others also coming from North America and Europe. These students bring with them different sets of educational and life experiences. The undergraduate chemical engineering degree programme at the University of Melbourne is a 4-year full time programme which is fully accredited by the Institution of Engineers Australia, and by the UK-based Institution of Chemical Engineers at the MEng level. At the University of Melbourne professional ethics are addressed in two 300-level (i.e., third year) subjects. In the rst subject which considers broader chemical engineering management issues a single 2-h class or module is devoted to ethics. The class begins with an introduction to the theories of morals, ethics and codes of ethics. For illustrative purposes the Code of Ethics of Engineers Australia is used. The students are then presented with a scenario which allows the students to consider the ethical responsibilities of a chemical engineer. The second subject run later in the year is devoted to considering a range of case studies. Topics covered include engineering decision making, engineering practice, safety, the environment, sustainable development and ethics. A single 3-h class is devoted to the ethics scenarios presented here.

STRUCTURED CONTROVERSY The structured controversy technique is used in the class to engage the students. Typically between 80 and 90% of students are seen to be actively engaged discussing the scenarios and their possible solutions. Students are actively engaged in the discussion of the ethical scenarios using the teaching technique of structured controversy. This technique begins by using the strengths of conventional debate and ends with the opposing sides seeking ways to resolve their conicting views. As a teaching technique, structured controversy has been championed by Johnson and Johnson (1988, 1993) over several years. Herreid (1996) has shown how the technique may be applied to students working in pairs. As proposed by Johnson and Johnson, students are separated into pairs and are then given a scenario having several opposing resolutions. The structured controversy technique then follows several steps: (1) Organizing InformationThe students are given a controversial topic or scenario having several possible but conicting courses of action. (2) Advocating a PositionThe students are each assigned one of two opposing views to argue in a persuasive and convincing manner. They then make their argument to their partner. (3) RebuttalThe students take it in turn to rebut the arguments of their partners. (4) Perspective TakingThe students reverse their roles and argue the opposing view. Again rebuttal follows. (5) CompromiseThe students abandon their advocacy roles and seek to develop a compromise or consensus statement.

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TEACHING ETHICS TO CHEMICAL ENGINEERS Quality control is vital to both Tonmon and Zaser Sheeting. If the sheets produced by Tonmon have the wrong moisture content or density then they will not bond properly to Zasers material resulting in the re-resistant wall sheets delaminating after installation. Because of the variable nature of the feedstock used by Tonmon, samples of the Tonmons nal product coming off the production line are tested every 20 min. If a sample fails the test then the entire batch is dumped. When operating normally one batch every 2 or 3 days has to be dumped, but occasionally several hours worth of production may be found to be off-specication. The quality control testing performed by Tonmon consists of three simple, yet reliable tests. These tests measure the moisture content, density and strength of the paper-like product. They are performed by the production technicians. The technicians report their results to the duty engineer who makes the nal decision as to whether to accept or reject a batch. One Friday morning Sarah is in the test room talking to Dan, the duty engineer, when the moisture content testing apparatus breaks down while being used by Tony, a young technician new to the job. There is no spare testing apparatus so Dan and Tony begin hurried efforts to repair the equipment. Dan decides to keep the plant running at full capacity. He reasons that as the plant product was on specication at the time the equipment broke it should still be okay for the next couple of hours. They can keep producing the sheets, taking samples as required every 20 min. Once the test equipment is xed all they will have to do is test the backlog of samples collected during the day, ensuring that the sheets meet specication. If any sample is off specication then that batch of sheets can be dumped. Dan is under pressure to get the equipment xed as Fridays production must be shipped off to Zaser Sheeting by early Friday evening. Just as she is leaving for home late on Friday afternoon, Sarah is stopped in the hallway by Dan. He tells her that Tonys just been on the phone to him about the testing equipment. Its xed and the samples show that Fridays batches are acceptable. Sarah is only at home for a couple hours before she is called back into work because of the apparent failure of a pump in the upstream end of the plant. As she arrives at the plant, she see the truck carrying the days production to Zaser Sheeting leaving the site. Sarahs pumping problem is quickly resolved and she prepares to return home. On her way out of the plant she learns that the moisture content testing unit has only just been xed in the last few minutes. She also notices that all the moisture content sample data sheets have been lled in for Friday including those for the batches produced while the testing equipment was out of operation. Her interest piqued, she passes through the dispatch ofce and nds that Dan authorized the shipment of the Fridays production to Zaser Sheeting, certifying that it meets specication. Sarah now is worried. Why was she told that the moisture content testing unit was xed in the afternoon when it was only xed in the evening, hours later? Is someone lying? Was the moisture content data falsied? If so, by whom? Should the shipment have been released to Zaser? Dans shift has ended and he has left for a long weekend out of town. Tonys shift team have also gone home for the day. Soe is now the shift engineer.

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Following a general discussion in the class when the main points of the scenario are claried the class is asked to suggest courses of action that Sarah could follow. In this scenario eight courses of action were suggested by members of the class. These suggestions are listed below in the order in which they were made in class: (A) Immediately advise the client that the shipment currently on its way to them may be off-specication and should not be used. Explain that the shipment was sent in error. (B) Recall the truck and conduct a series of spot tests on the paper rolls. This could take several hours as the paper rolls will have to be unloaded and unwrapped. (C) Retest the samples of the paper rolls taken earlier in the day. In order to get the current shift leader to agree to doing the retesting Sarah will probably need to share her concerns about what may have happened. (D) Contact Dan. Despite the fact that Dan has gone out of town on leave, Sarah owes it to him to try to contact him rst before sharing her concerns. Given however that Dan is probably in transit it may take hours to track him down. (E) Contact Tony, the technician who was using the equipment during the day. Tony should know what is happening but contacting him at home would be unusual. If it later turns out that nothing was wrong with the shipment, Tony might be very upset that he was brought into the situation. (F) Contact the plant General Manager. The General Manager is the Sarahs immediate superior and has the overall responsibility for the day-to-day operation of the plant. If there is a problem with the shipment then the GM will have to deal with the situation. If there is nothing wrong with the shipment then Sarah will have impugned the reputation of a fellow worker without good cause. (G) Do nothing. The quality control testing is not Sarahs responsibility and it was only by accident that she learnt that the equipment was broken. She need tell no one of her concerns and she can let others deal with the problem if there is one. Sarah is however a loyal employee of the company and knows that the shipment of any substandard product would damage the companys reputation. (H) Tell Soe, the current Duty Engineer. Let Soe make the decision about what to do. In the general discussion at this stage the point is made that the testing unit may have been xed in the afternoon as Sarah was advised by Dan. Because it may have failed again later in the day it is possible that on Sarahs return to work in evening, Sarah witnessed it being repaired for the second time that day. The students are then surveyed to determine which of the eight courses of action they believe to be the most appropriate for Sarah to take. The survey is conducted before the students are divided up into groups. The results of a survey from one of the classes of 70 students are summarized in Figure 1. Nearly a third of the class favoured option C, retesting the samples before taking any further action. Options A and B were also highly favoured.

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SHALLCROSS and PARKINSON more to install it. Warren also knew that if he had done his job properly in the rst place then he would have picked up the error before construction had begun. What should Warren do? Again following a general discussion in the class when the main points of the scenario are claried the class is asked to suggest courses of action that Warren could follow. In this scenario seven courses of action were suggested by members of the class. These suggestions are listed below in the order in which they were made in class: (A) Do nothing. The fault in the design is not Warrens fault after all. Warren could argue that he did not pick up the error. The unit will still be an improvement over the existing unit but the opportunity for a signicant improvement as originally hoped for will be lost. (B) Tell Anton and let him sort it out. The project is Antons, and he made the mistake. (C) Tell Susan immediately before work on the installation begins. Warren should admit to what he did, and advise Susan that the unit should not be installed. This action might at best cost Warren chances for further promotion and at worst his job. (D) Resign from the company. Warren should not tell anyone or admit his mistake, but should leave the company before the mistake is discovered. (E) Cost an alternative design. Warren should not tell anyone and spend his time trying to cost an alternative design. Now the unit has been built Warren should determine how much rectifying the situation will cost before he tells anyone. (F) Improve the design. Warren should not tell anyone for the moment and work on how the unit may be improved with little cost before nal installation. (G) Falsify the paperwork. Hide his guilt by doctoring the paperwork in an effort to hide his own responsibility. The students were then surveyed to determine which of the eight courses of action they believed to be the most appropriate for Warren to take. The results of the survey of 126 students are summarized in Figure 2. No student suggested that resigning was the best of the options for

Figure 1. Distribution of the courses of actions favoured by 70 students for the rst scenario.

The students were broken up into groups of four and the structured controversy technique used to facilitate discussion. Scenario 2: A Flawed Design Anton works as a process engineer in a manufacturing plant. He has a reputation in the company as a sound and reliable engineer, but also as someone who can be a little disorganized. His latest major assignment has been to design a new air extraction system which is soon to be installed. The system will extract moist air from the plants drying section, discharging it to the atmosphere above the roof. The old system that had been installed two decades before had stopped working efciently long ago. What parts of it that had not be corroded by the moist air had be fouled by scale. As Antons immediate supervisor Susan had remarked, Any new system must be better than what we have now. Company policy as well as good engineering practice required that a second engineer check Antons designs and calculations. Unfortunately Anton had been running behind with his work for some weeks and he only completed the design for the new system just the day before the plans had to be approved and signed off. He hastily gave his les to Warren to check, but Warren too was busy trying to clear his desk before he went on leave. He accepted the le from Anton, gave the papers a cursory examination and then signed that he had checked the calculations and design. After all, Warren reasoned, Anton is very reliable and I can check the calculations when Im back from leave in three weeks. With the paperwork showing that Antons design for the new extraction system had been checked by a second engineer, they went off to the fabrication workshop for construction. On Warrens return after 3 weeks leave and with the new system nally complete and ready for installation, Warren decided to check the design calculations. While the actual calculations were correct and appropriate, Anton had made a simple mistake transposing two digits in an early calculation. Warren saw that this simple error meant that the system as designed would work only slightly better than the existing system. The company had already spent nearly $80 000 building the unit, and would spend still

Figure 2. Distribution of the courses of actions favoured by 126 students for the second scenario.

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TEACHING ETHICS TO CHEMICAL ENGINEERS Warren to follow. The majority of the students suggested that Warren should tell either Anton (Option B) or Susan (Option C). Only one student recommended that Warren should falsify the data. As before, the students were broken up into groups of four based upon where they were seated. Each student in the group was then assigned one of the courses of action and required to argue that course of action amongst the group. The students were assigned options A, B, C or E depending upon where they were sitting in the group. Again this assignment of an option to a student was arbitrary and was done whether or not the student agreed with the particular course of action was the correct one to take. The structured controversy technique was again employed. Scenario 3: Conict of Interest Polyvals is a medium-sized speciality chemical manufacturer. Tony is a senior process engineer who has worked for Polyvals for the last 12 years. Some 8 years ago the company asked Tony to take on the responsibility for community liaison. In that role he has become the human face of the company with the local community, meeting with the local council and community groups whenever concerns were raised regarding the company and its operations. At his suggestion, 7 years ago the company began sponsoring the local football team, and for the last 4 years it has been one of the two major sponsors of the club. At the end of the last football season the club approached Tony and asked him to join its committee. With the approval of his company Tony joined the clubs committee. The football club is effectively a not-for-prot organization, and the committee members are legally considered to be directors of its board. Tony receives no payment for his work on the committee but as an avid supporter he enjoys the work. All the committee meetings are held after working hours or on weekends. Polyvals agreement with the club to be a major sponsor is up for renewal and both the club and the company are keen to continue the relationship. Currently each of the major sponsors pays the club $9000 per year. The companys general manager, Alan, tells Tony to handle the sponsorship arrangements but to ensure that the company pays no more than $9000 per year for the coming 2 years. Alan instructs Tony to begin the negotiations at $8500 and try to keep it there. If you really have to go up to $9000, but absolutely no more. Theres another community group that has asked us to support them. If the football club doesnt accept our offer we can just drop them and support the other group. And as Alan says, The company should get some recognition for all your work on the committee. The club has had a difcult time nancially over the last few years and at a recent meeting decided to ask its two major sponsors to increase their level of support to $11 000. The other sponsor has agreed to pay the increased amount of $11 000. Tony believes that he could get the club to accept a lower amount from Polyval. Tony has a conict of interest. As a committee member he has an obligation to the club to help raise as much money as he can to support the clubs activities but as an

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employee of Polyval with responsibility for community relations he has an obligation to his employer to spend as little money as possible. What should Tony do? After general discussion the eight possible courses of action were selected by the class. These are listed below in the order in which they were made in class: (A) Advise both the football club board and Polyvals that there is a conict of interest and withdraw from any further negotiations. (B) Quit as a member of the football club board. Tonys involvement with the club through his membership of the board had just brought too many complications. (C) Agree with the football club for Polyvals to pay $11 000. The club needs the money and whats $2000 to the company? (D) Pay $2000 out of his own pocket to make up the difference. The club needs $11 000 but the company can only pay $9000. This way everyone is happy except Tony who is $2000 poorer. (E) Have Alan come to the club board meeting to negotiate with the club directly. Let Alan be the one to say that the company cannot afford the whole $11 000. (F) Convince Alan that $11 000 is the correct offer to make to the club. Tony should accept the clubs position that the sponsorship should be $11 000 and he should try to convince Alan that this amount of money is reasonable. (G) Tell the club that $9000 is the companys nal offer. Tony should accept the companys position that the sponsorship should be $9000. (H) Find another sponsor. Tony cannot be expected to get either the company or the club to budge from their positions. Tony should therefore try to identify another company to sponsor the club. The results of the survey of 56 students are presented in Figure 3. The most popular option was to admit a conict of interest existed and to withdraw from the negotiations (Option A). Only one student suggested that Tony should immediately agree to pay $11 000 against Alans advice. As before the students were broken up into groups of four based upon where they were seated.

Figure 3. Distribution of the courses of actions favoured by 56 students for the third scenario.

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54 ASSESSMENT

SHALLCROSS and PARKINSON a welcome contrast to the drier, calculation-based activities found in other subjects. Some students comment that it gives them the opportunity to use the other side of their brain. Engagement of the class members is enhanced by the use of the structured controversy technique. Using the older technique of calling on students to voluntarily comment in class led to engagement levels of just 10 20%. This increased to between 80 and 90% when the structured controversy technique was applied. These scenarios and the structured controversy technique have been successfully applied by the authors in classes of up to 100 students. The scenarios presented here may be adapted to local circumstances and may be applied in modied form to almost any year level. The use of these types of scenarios alerts the students to the types of responsibilities that they will assume on graduation as professional chemical engineers. AUTHORS NOTE All characters and company names in the scenarios are entirely ctional and are not based on any actual persons or companies. REFERENCES
Bucknam, R.E., 1999, Ethics cases in professional practicethe fetid favor asco, Journal of Professional Issues in Engineering Education and Practice, 125: 25. Bucknam, R.E., 2000, Ethics cases in professional practicepriming the town pump, Journal of Professional Issues in Engineering Education and Practice, 126: 4547. Bucknam, R.E., 2002, Ethics cases in professional practicedont bank on it!, Journal of Professional Issues in Engineering Education and Practice, 128: 149151. Bucknam, R.E., 2003a, Ethics cases in professional practiceholey smoke, Journal of Professional Issues in Engineering Education and Practice, 129: 69. Bucknam, R.E., 2003b, Ethics cases in professional practiceone good turn deserves another, Journal of Professional Issues in Engineering Education and Practice, 129: 911. Harris, C.E., Davis, M., Pritchard, M.S. and Rabins, M.J., 1996, Engineering ethics: what? why? how? and when?, Journal of Engineering Education, 85(2): 9396. Herreid, C.F., 1996, Structured controversy: a case study strategyDNA ngerprinting in the courts, Journal of College Science Teaching, 26(2): 95101. Herreid, C.F., 1998, What makes a good case?, Journal of College Science Teaching, 27(3): 163165. Johnson, D.W. and Johnson, R.T., 1988, Critical thought through structured controversy, Educational Leadership, 45(8): 5864. Johnson, D.W. and Johnson, R.T., 1993, Creative and critical thinking through academic controversy, American Behavioral Scientist, 37(1): 4044. Mascone, C.F., Santaquilani, A.G. and Butcher, C., 1991, Engineering ethicswhat are the right choices?, Chemical Engineering Progress, 87(4): 6164. Rosenzweig, M. and Butcher, C., 1992, Can you use that knowledge?, Chemical Engineering Progress, 88(4): 7680. The manuscript was received 12 December 2005 and accepted for publication after revision 7 February 2006.

After the class has considered several scenarios, the students are presented with a nal scenario. After reading this scenario quietly in class, the students are required to write an essay outlining what they believe to be the best resolution to the situation posed. The students are asked to propose at least three possible courses of actions that the characters in the scenario could follow along with their comments on the relative merits of these actions. The students are advised that the courses of action they propose should not be ippant or too similar. The class is given 7 days to submit their assignment and limits of between 700 and 1000 words are specied for the essay. Students are advised that they may discuss the scenario with one another outside the classroom, using the structured controversy technique if they wish. They are warned however that the actual essay must be their own work. For many students it is the only opportunity that they have in an otherwise very technical course to write an argumentative essay. A handful of students over the years have written some imaginative essays which address the issues in clever and humorous, yet insightful ways. Many students however nd it difcult to write such an essay retaining as they often do the clearly dened structure of technical reports including headings such as introduction, discussion and conclusions. The essay is assessed partly in terms of a communication and partly with respect to how well the case being presented is argued. Little weight is given to the standards of ethics shown by the student. This is because the authors do not believe that it is either proper or appropriate to try to force ones own moral values onto others particularly when they come from a different cultural background. While we might hope that students might understand what is and is not considered appropriate ethical behaviour in Australian industry and society it is not proper to seek to force students thinking in this way. By having the students write an essay they are forced to carefully consider the options available to the characters in the particular scenario. Often a very useful, albeit brief, discussion follows 2 weeks after the 3-h session when the essays which have been assessed are returned to the class. Generally it is found that the class identies four to eight courses of action which are repeatedly identied by the students in their essays. The facilitator summarizes these main courses of actions and then moves to discuss what they believe to be an appropriate resolution to the problem. The ethics essay typically accounts for ten percent of the overall mark for the subject. CONCLUDING REMARKS Questionnaires completed by the students at the end of the semester identify the Professional Ethics session as one of the most enjoyable of their undergraduate career. Students enjoy the non-technical scenarios, nding them

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