The ethics team recently competed in a regional competition.
Students on the ethics team competed at the Texas Regional Ethics Bowl on Nov. 16. The event was at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, Texas.
The debates cover cases from various fields such as medicine, law, engineering, the environment, research, animal rights, socio-economic policy, warfare, business, private life, and more. The top three or four teams of regionals are selected to compete in the national Intercollegiate Ethics Bowl.
The ethics team competed against the University of the Incarnate Word and the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley at the regional competition.
Cozy Cozart, acting junior and member of the ethics team, said the team did not end up qualifying for the national competition.
“We only won 1 out of 3 rounds, but we are really happy with our performance and feel like we had really solid presentations,” she said.
Justin Wareham, assistant professor of management and ethics team coach, also said the competition went well in terms of performance.
“Since I’ve been involved, I think this competition was one of the best overall performances for the team even though it wasn’t reflected in the outcome of the judging,” Wareham said. “It’s something we can’t control, but we were satisfied with our performance.”
Wareham has coached the ethics team since he began working at the university in 2015. While he’s been coach, the ethics team has qualified and competed at the national level in 2016 in Washington D.C. and 2018 in Chicago.
“My favorite part of coaching the team is to see the impact on the students,” Wareham said. “To have civic dialogue around issues and explore different perspectives is the most valuable part of the experience.”
Cozart said the team starts preparing their cases about six weeks before competitions.
“We get a set of around 10 cases that are specific situations relevant to today’s political, economic and social issues,” she said. “We meet once a week and go through each case and discuss the big ethical question the case presents, do research, decide our positions, and set it up with ethical frameworks.”
Cozart also said she was involved in ethics debate in high school and enjoys the academic challenge it presents.
“It’s nice to have a place to go that’s just for deeper, philosophical topics and to be with people interested in that stuff too,” she said.
Wareham said the regional competition was the end of this year’s season and the ethics team will begin meeting again next fall. The team meets for an hour each week at a time convenient for its members.
Wareham also said a lot of the time investment comes from researching cases outside of the team’s meetings.
“The students get to choose the cases they’re interested in and get to really take ownership of the team,” he said. “They’re responsible to hold themselves accountable, and the fact they can lead themselves develops them as future leaders.”
For more information about the ethics team, contact Wareham at jwareham@okcu.edu for more information.
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