ETHICS AND PERSONAL TUTORING

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ETHICS AND PERSONAL TUTORING

• Amanda Rose
• University of Westminster

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Overview

• Intro Can a focus on ethics help personal
  tutors in their work?
• Examples of problems and issues.
• Codes of Conduct- Examples from education and
  from other areas.
• Advantages and disadvantages of codes of conduct
  for personal tutors.
• Conclusions and recommendations.

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Ethical Issues

• Examples of issues
• A first year students mother rings me and asks
  me to help her to convince her son he ought to
  take a paid job in the summer.

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Ethical Issues

• A student has failed an exam and has been
  excluded from their course. She comes to me and
  explains that she is the victim of domestic
  violence and because the perpetrator is her
  father she cannot disclose any details.

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Ethical Issues

• A student has a very poor academic profile She
  tells me she is struggling with her work. She is
  in danger of being excluded from her programme.
  She hands me a letter from her consultant which
  explains that she is being treated for a
  psychotic condition.The consultant suggests that
  if at all possible she be allowed to continue her
  studies as they are very helpful focus in the
  management of her condition.

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Codes of conduct

• professional counsellors, doctors and clergy
  operate under a professional code there is no
  such code for academics (University of Exeter
  Code of Good Practice)
• Advantages of codes?
• Provide a guide for action make rights and
  roles explicit.
• Facilitate management of process.

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Exeter Code

• The responsibilities of the School
• To train tutors, allocate tutors and monitor the
  system.
• The responsibilities of tutors
• To develop their skills, to arrange meetings, to
  be aware of confidentiality requirements, to keep
  records.
• Responsibilities of students
• To attend meetings and read email

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Lessons from other professional areas.

• Content
• The British Association for Counselling and
  Psychotherapy 2002.
• Values integrity,impartiality and respect for
  the client.
• Anti-discriminatory practice
• Confidentiality
• Competence
• Integration with other professional codes.

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The Institute of Business Ethics Effective Codes

• Practice and process
• Root the code in core ethical values.
• Train staff.
• Give a copy of code to all staff.
• Set up a monitoring committee.
• Make conformity to the code part of a contract of
  employment.

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Do Codes improve standards?

• Equivocal evidence.
• In both public and private sectors, Doig and
  Wilson (1998) suggest that successful codes need
  to be underpinned by a development process that
  includes
• Inculcation
• Reinforcement
• Measurement.

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Problems with application of Codes

• Complexities arise when trying to apply to real
  contexts e.gInstitutional demands and culture.
  ( Davies 2000)
• Multiple stakeholdersCompeting interests and
  competing rights( Kendra Garrett 1994)
• Multiplicity of ethical approaches.

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Conclusions

• Advantages of codes
• Clarify roles, rights and responsibilities
  offer a guide to behaviour.
• Effective as a management tool.
• Limits of codesMay give false sense of control
  and management.

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Recommendations

• Fostering ethical discussion and debate by
• Mentoring new tutors
• System of tutor support Senior tutor role and
  Tutor support groups

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References

• Davies, L (2000) Private work in public places
  Confidentiality and role tensions in a university
  counselling service.Psychodynamic Counselling
  6(1) pp.65-78.
• Doig,A Wilson,J (1998) The effectiveness of
  codes of conduct Business Ethics A European
  review 7 (3) pp.140 149.
• Garrett,K.J (1994) Caught in a bind Ethical
  decision-making in schools. Social Work in
  education 16(2) pp.97 - 105

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References

• University of Exeter Code of Practice
• http//www.admin.ex.ac.uk/academic/tls/tqa/pts.03.
  htm
• Institute of Business Ethics
• http//ibe.org.uk/effective.html
• British Association for Counselling and
  Psychotherapy
• Http//www.bacp.co.uk/prof_conduct/skills_code.htm
  l