Conference: Advanced Bioethics Institute, Lisbon, Portugal 2003 and 2004, England 2005

North Carolina State University, Raleigh NC

Investigators

Abstract

The Bioethics Institute is a faculty development workshop designed to assist participants in learning theoretical and applied ethics and effective classroom strategies for discussing them. It has educated over 500 life science faculty during the last decade. In 2000, with funding from the European Union and FLAD (a private Portuguese foundation) as well as NSF, the Bioethics Institute became a trans-Atlantic project as three joint US/EU workshops were held in Lisbon (summers of 2000, '01, and '02). The project is now responding to Europe's request for assistance in reaching science students in languages other than English and on line for students unable to access Europe's university campuses. This advanced institute will 1) Provide participants with education in moral philosophy; 2) Enrich participants' classrooms and research, including US participants' classrooms and research, with diverse international perspectives; 3) Assist participants in translating the Institute's text, "Life Science Ethics," and 4) Prepare participants to teach the Institute's on-line course, "Life Science Ethics." To attain these goals, twenty-one participants will gather annually at FLAD (the Foundation for Luso-American Development) in Lisbon, Portugal for three years. There they will discuss ethical theory; review the latest developments in ethics pedagogy; review drafts of translations of the Institute's text they have produced; and prepare on-line courses. The "translations" of the Institute's text, "Life Science Ethics," need not be straightforward translations, and may be modifications of the English text to suit students' particular interests and needs. Three European languages will be selected, and working groups will be formed by invitation. Each group will consist of seven people. For example, if Portuguese is one of the languages, that team might consist of two life scientists from Portugal and one from the US, one ethicist from Portugal and one from the US, a faculty member whose specialty is English/Portuguese translation (either from the US or Portugal), and one of the translator's graduate students. The team will be responsible for the Portuguese translation of "Life Science Ethics" and for offering at least one section of an online course based on the text.