Rice offers ethics and society program for Houston-area high schoolers

Houston-area high school students recently took part in the Ethics and Society seminar.
Houston-area high school students recently took part in the Ethics and Society seminar. | File photo

Houston-area high school students recently took part in Ethics and Society, a three-week summer program at Rice University that taught them about justice and normative ethics and how ethics are applied in professional organizations.

“A lot of these concepts and ideas are not something that kids of this age are often exposed to,” Rice doctoral student Brandon Williams, who helped develop and lead the curriculum with fellow doctoral student Peter Zuk, said. “From my perspective, one of the major aims and goals for this program is to do just that, try to give them these tools such that they can then be disseminated in their own context, at their own schools.”

Offered to rising juniors, the tuition-free program encompassed roughly five hours per day and included classroom conceptualization as well as site visits to Baylor College of Medicine’s Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy, Anadarko Petroleum and Interfaith Ministries for Greater Houston’s Refugee Services department.

“It helps you consider…what’s right for you and what might be right for others,” program participant Kendall Jackson, who attends Harmony School of Advancement, said. “It helps you find a standpoint on how you’re going to make your own decisions in life.”