Pretend that you are writing a short guide to the “Five Focal Virtues” of caring for new employees at a hospital. It is your job to clearly and accurately describe each of the virtues (using your own words), and then to say what this means of their job. This will require that you give detailed, specific examples showing how each of the five focal virtues can be followed or not followed.

Here are the guidelines for Exam 1. Please read these CAREFULLY!

  1. The exam consists of SIX questions. However, you should only answer THREE of them.
  2. Each essay should be between 500 and 1000 words. I won’t penalize you for going over, though please make an effort to be as concise as possible, given the material.
  3. References to the book or handouts can be cited simply as (page number or handout name). If you choose to use outside resources, please use a standard citation style (such as APA, MLA, or Chicago), and provide a full citation.
    • If you are aiming for an A or B, my expectation is that you should have specific, detailed references to course material, and that these references are accompanied by thorough, accurate explanations of what this means in your own words, and why/how it is relevant to the question or problem you are addressing. (Generally, you should be referencing course material around every paragraph or so, though this will depend on the question).
    • As a rule, no more than 15% of your paper should be quotes.
  4. Please don’t use the words or ideas of others without proper attribution. Please see the syllabus for details on the policy regarding plagiarism and academic integrity. I regularly use turnitin.com to check for plagiarism or related issues.
  5. Since the goal of the exam is to demonstrate how well you understand the class material, you should try to use your own words and examples to explain what you’ve learned. Essays that simply reproduce the handouts will not receive good grades. Nor will essays that simply “give your opinion” on an issue.
  6. Please submit your exam as a SINGLE MS WORD file to the D2L assignment folder. Each essay should start on a new page. I will grade exams on a first-submitted, first-graded

The Questions

Answer THREE of the following questions. Please don’t “reuse” material from one essay to answer another (so, for example, while the idea of moral status might come up in a few different contexts, you should do something new with it in each case).

  1. Pretend that you are writing a short guide to the “Five Focal Virtues” of caring for new employees at a hospital. It is your job to clearly and accurately describe each of the virtues (using your own words), and then to say what this means of their job. This will require that you give detailed, specific examples showing how each of the five focal virtues can be followed or not followed.
  2. In class, we discussed Roe v Wade. This is a chance to expand on that. First, please describe (in your own words) what Blackmun ended up ruling about abortion, and then carefully explain why he ruled this way. Then, analyze how successful his argument was, in terms of B-C’s four principles. While you are free to look up the full ruling online, I would stay away from the pro-life or pro-choice sources that purport to “summarize” it (since these are often biased).
  3. Write a detailed response to one of case studies in “Case Studies 01” (you can find this file on D2L). In your response, you should make sure to clearly identify relevant ethical concepts/arguments, and explain why/how they apply to the case in question. You should also make an argument for your proposed solution to the case, and carefully consider potential objections/alternatives.
  4. Write a mock “debate” between advocates of two different theories of moral status. Both debates should take the time to clearly explain their view, and give plenty of examples illustrating where the areas of agreement/disagreement between their views are. (Examples: fetuses, animals, etc.) They should also do their best to persuade the other person of the accuracy of their view.
  5. What does it mean for a patient to provide “informed consent”? Use all the material we’ve learned so far (especially from chapter 4) to defend as answer to this question. Be sure to provide detailed examples, and to try to anticipate potential problems or misunderstandings with your account.
  6. Conduct a 20- to 30-minute conversation about bioethics with someone (not in this class) who works in medicine, biological research, or related areas. In this interview, you should choose one or two ideas that you’ve found especially interesting in class (such as a theory of moral status, or the virtue of caring, or informed consent), and carefully explain what these ideas to the person (it’s your job to “teach” these ideas). Now, talk to the person about the applicability of these principles/ideas to their own line of work. Write up a transcript of the conversation, together with some reflections on what you learned while doing it.

Exam Grading Rubric

Each essay is worth TEN points, and the whole exam is worth 30 points. Your grade will depend on how well you do each of the following:

  1. How well are you able to explain and apply the relevant course material? By the end of the essay, the reader should come away with a clear idea of what you’ve learned in the class, and how it applies to this sort of case.
  2. To what extent does your essay offer a coherent and creative response to the problem/question? In an argumentative essay, for example, you should make an (evidence-based) argument for a thesis, and make sure to fully consider any potential

Factors such as your paper’s structure (e.g. intro/body paragraphs/conclusion) and language (e.g. grammar, style) are important to the extent they influence the above.

The grading criteria are as follows:

Grade Description
0 No answer submitted, or evidence of plagiarism.
1-4 Significantly below minimal requirements, in terms of content (e.g., doesn’t address the question at all), word count, or both.
5-6 Fails to meet minimal requirements in terms of content (e.g., addresses a related question) or word count. Common reasons for receiving this grade.
7 Meets minimal requirements in terms of both content (it offers an answer the assigned question, and attempts to defend this answer) and word count. However, there may be some significant errors or omissions when it comes to the explanation of relevant class material, or providing a detailed, complete response to the question. Essays that don’t make specific and relevant references to course material may receive this grade.
8 Fully meets both content and word count requirements, and provides satisfactory explanations of relevant arguments and concepts from class, with at least some specific references to course materials. There are no major errors in argumentation or explanatory gaps. However, explanations/examples/arguments may suffer from lack of clarity or completeness in comparison to A essays.
9-10 Goes significantly above the minimal requirements. The essay’s treatment of course material shows a full mastery of the relevant content, and provides a creative, well-thought out response to it. In order to get an A, an essay should do ALL of the following:

1.       Fully answer all parts of the essay question.

2.       Make specific, detailed references to course material, and clearly explain WHY this material is relevant to the question you are addressing.

3.       Offer a creative, well-thought solution to problem or question you are addressing. A essays are often distinguished by the way in which they address objections or counterexamples.

4.       Meet and exceed the minimum word count. For many essay questions (in order to meet the above requirements) this may require that you write closer to 1,000 than to 500 words.