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**Scientific discoveries and societal realities will force widespread ethical choices.**



 * Teaching is one of few professions that holds a great deal of responsibility by impacting future generation’s well being, yet does not have a universal code of ethics. The mere idea of it is mind-boggling. How could there be any opposition to having such a code? Education and learning are an essential aspects of intellectual growth. As an internal scan, there a few situations that could put educational leaders in an ethical dilemma.**

The Hills School
 * Special Education:** Public schools in NSW keep their most severe special needs children separated within the school student populations. These students have their own classroom with their own teachers. Also in NSW, there are special education specific schools. These schools are created for a single purpose: to help these students be as successful as possible. The ethical choice is making sure that there is equity of treatment for both special and non-special schools when it comes to making sure these schools have the needed resources to be successful. (//Ethics of care and justice//)

Moorefield Girls’ School
 * Single Sex Educational Learning Environments**: Some of the schools in NSW, both public and private, serve a single sex population. There are benefits and drawbacks to learning in each type of environment. The ethical dilemma here, similar to the dilemma for the special needs schools, is making sure that these schools receive fair treatment in the distribution of resources between co-ed and non co-ed schools. Another aspect to this dilemma will be guaranteeing no discrepancies between girls’ schools and boys’ schools. (//Ethic of care and critique)//

Moodle Edmodo
 * The Personal Computer:** Every student in NSW was given a personal laptop. The current federal administration promised them as a part of the campaign and fulfilled the promise once in office. The laptops have been a blessing and a curse. Some teachers have been early adopters, while a significant number have not. Schools have worked to create professional development to help these teachers adapt to their new reality at a quicker pace. However, learning is directly correlated to motivation. For many of these teachers they are close to retirement or are quite simply afraid of technology. These teachers have had their right of choice taken away from them. The politician did not consider the needs of the teachers in their attempt to make NSW schools more innovative. Now some teachers are in an ethical dilemma in regards to their profession: follow the mandates of incorporating technology and possibly put my students’ learning at risk or stick with what I am most comfortable with and help my students prosper. (//Ethics of profession//)

Twitter Wikispaces Blogger
 * Social Media:** The student-teacher relationship is rapidly evolving as social media steadily integrates itself into the lives of students and therefore their learning environments. This is an emerging issue in the study of ethics. Appropriate boundaries must be created by adults to guarantee the safety of the children in virtual reality, whether through state or federal legislation or school level technology policies. More and more students are identifying as digital natives. As the teaching population ages, more and more teachers are a part of this generation as well. The meaning of ethical behavior in virtual reality must evolve. (//Ethics of critique and profession//)


 * Turn to any news channel and you will** **quickly** **be overwhelmed with the lack of integrity of those in power and enough of the general population to make you uneasy. Looking at rising food and fuel prices, crime rates, and apathy among citizens, the lack of morals presented in these news stories becomes less and less shocking. As an external scan, there were a few situations that present ethical challenges to society as a whole.**

No Such Things as Business Ethics

News of the World phone tapping scandal
 * News International’s Telephone Scandal:** The news agencies seem to be in a race to see who can sensationalize the news the most. The recent scandal with one of the world's oldest print news companies sent shockwaves through the news community and the global society. Other news agencies reported on the unethical behavior of the reports at the paper with disdain. But what unethical behaviors had they engaged in to "get the story," but were not caught red-handed?

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 * Economic Crisis:** There is a global economic crisis. From unstable oil prices to the housing market’s failure and subsequent aftermath, the world is reeling. The gap between the Haves and the Have Nots is steadily becoming wider and wider. The middle class around the world is quickly becoming extinct. They are now the new upper lower class! A painful reality for adults, but more devastating for their children. These children are quickly adjusting to a new lifestyle which includes less material things for sure, but less necessities as well.

Orange County, California wins lawsuit against pharmaceutical company
 * The Business of Medicine:** The pharmaceutical companies have probably always walked the fine line between ethical and unethical behavior. As more medical discoveries are made, they each race to develop medications to address the issue and secure the patent on drugs to maintain high profits. This reality has become more and more prevalent as more and more pharmaceutical companies have taken to the airways to advertise their products, playing on the psyche of millions of patients. No longer are patients going to doctors and explaining their symptoms. They now visit their doctors with a commercial playing in their heads that has not only told them their symptoms, but what drug they should ask for to help these symptoms go away. Side effects be damned!