Role Playing Model

Topic area Whistle-blowing
Target audience Undergraduates and graduates in CE, CS, IS and other engineering disciplines in general.
Activity type Role playing, reading assignment, worksheet, class discussion.
Time required One 75-minute class meeting, and about 15 minutes of the previous class period. The students will require approximately 1.5 hours in preparation time, and in preparing the worksheet following the role playing.
Attachments Worksheet
Additional materials
  1. IEEE Ethics Committee, ÒGuidelines for Engineers Dissenting on Ethical Grounds, The Institute, January 1997.
  2. Scenario describing the background for the role playing.
  3. Individuals roles to be played (several students may be given the same role, and act as a team).
  4. Worksheet for analysis of the ethical dilemma.
Background needed to complete the assignment The students will be given a copy of the IEEE Ethics Committee "Guidelines for Engineers Dissenting on Ethical Grounds" (The Institute, January 1997). The students will be supplied, prior to the class with an outline of the scenario (attached), and a description of the role they will be playing. Normally, prior to this exercise the students will have explored ethical dissent within a context of their direct experience.
References IEEE Ethics Committee, "Guidelines for Engineers Dissenting on Ethical Grounds", The Institute, January, 1997.
Last modified August 1998
Abstract:
The nature of this exercise is to become involved in a realistic activity involving ethical dissent. A contrived example is used so as to insure that the various aspects of the approach to ethical dissent may be explored. Typically this exercise would be followed by an analysis of a variety of real examples. The scenario revolves around a professional becoming aware of fraud within the employing company, but not within the organizational unit of the engineer. The scenario explores how the issues interact with a variety of individuals, as well as affect the engineer.

Goals for the activity:
See behavioral objectives.

Knowledge / skills / attitudes to be developed (behavioral objectives):
The primary goal of this activity will be to recognize the levels to which ethical dissent may be taken. The student will learn that there are options at each level of dissent, and there are implications that follow from actions taken at each of these levels.

Procedure:
The material regarding ethical dissent will have been presented in the previous class, and the guidelines supplied for out of class readings. The students will have been supplied with a description of the background for the problem, and will be assigned a particular role to play in class. In the case of larger classes, several students may be given the same role and asked to function in teams. The assignment will be to prepare to act, when called upon, in their assigned role in this activity. In class, the instructor will review the background for the scenario, and the role playing will begin, with the instructor, as necessary, asking the various players to become involved. The students will be supplied with the a worksheet containing each of the steps of ethical dissent. They will be asked to submit, at the next class, a short description of how each of the levels were addressed, how they could have been more effectively addressed, and who was affected at each level.

Assessing outcomes:
The simplest assessment of outcome will be the instructorÕs evaluation of the quality of the role playing. Additionally, the students will be assessed based on their written responses to the role playing exercise.

Additional remarks:
The instructor will keep the role playing moving. It will be necessary to call on various individuals to be certain that they are included in the process as it proceeds. Similarly, as the role playing progresses, it may be necessary for the instructor to change the nature of the roles to be certain that additional aspects of the dissent process are covered. Name tags should be provided to indicate the role that each student is playing Though presented as a hypothetical example for the purposes of the class, it is based on an actual case discussed by the IEEE Ethics Committee. In the actual case the engineer who became aware of the fraud resigned, signing an agreement with the company that he would not reveal what he knew about the problem. Several years later he was arrested, and charged with not reporting fraud of the federal government. Criminal charges were also filed against the company.

Author contact information:
Gerald Engel
Computer Science and Engineering
University of Connecticut at Stamford
Stamford, CT06901-2315
Fax: (203) 251-8431
E-mail: g.engel@compmail.com

Dewey Rundus
Computer Science and Engineering
University of South Florida
Tampa, FL 33620-5399
Fax: (813) 974-5456
E-mail: rundus@csee.usf.edu

Elise Turner
Computer Science Department
University of Maine
Orono, ME 04469-5752
Fax: (207) 581-4977
E-mail: eht@bronte.umcs.maine.edu

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