Ethics lesson from behind bars

Instead of spending Valentine’s Day at a romantic restaurant, spa or hotel, a group of Commerce students spent February 14 visiting two federal penitentiaries in Kingston. There they experienced first-hand what happens to those convicted of white-collar crime. Orchestrated by Business Ethics Professor Jim Ridler, the tour showed students the real-life consequences of unethical behaviour in the workplace. For the second year running, students in Jim’s third- and fourth-year ethics courses were able to meet prison officials, tour the facilities, and even speak to inmates convicted of white-collar crime.

The prison tours were reported in a Globe and Mail story on Canadian business schools’ innovative approaches to teaching ethics (“Lessons from the slippery slope” by Theresa Ebden,March 26, 2008) and in a May 18 Financial Times article. “We definitely got a picture of the consequences of making unethical decisions in business,” University of Dublin exchange student Ruth Gardner told the Globe.

Added Jim: “I wanted to make a point there (in the prisons), rather than in a nice cloistered class or in a textbook they’re reading in their rooms. By being more dramatic about it, I’m getting the point to sink in.”

This year’s visits to Frontenac and Pittsburgh Institutions (minimum security prisons) definitely made an impression on the students, Jim told the Globe. “The raft of scandals we’ve had has percolated through to the students. They don’t like it. There’s a feeling out there, among a sizable portion of the business students, that there’s a need to do better, not just out of fear of going to prison, but also for society.”