Ethics & Society Certificate

Program Code: U-ETHIC-C
Plan Type: Certificate
Department: Ethics & Society
Website: kenan.ethics.duke.edu/ethics-society-certificate 

Program Summary

The goal of the undergraduate Ethics & Society Certificate is to provide students with an opportunity to pursue a rigorous cross-disciplinary study of ethics. Such a course of study requires familiarity with systematic ethical theories and traditions of moral wisdom and reflection, an understanding of how ethical issues have been framed across history and cultures, experience delving into ethical issues through literature and the arts, and insights into how ethical challenges are being conceptualized and negotiated in practice by policymakers, researchers, doctors, journalists, and others. Ethics cannot be isolated within one or two disciplines. It is an inherently cross-disciplinary inquiry that needs to draw on tools, methods, and contexts from multiple disciplines.

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Academic Requirements

At least 4 units total to complete the certificate. At least 34 units total to earn a degree.

• Cornerstone Course (1 unit)

  • ETHICS 101

• Capstone Seminar (1 unit)

  • ETHICS 497S

• Electives (4 units)

  • At least 1 course in Philosophical Ethics

  • At least 1 course in Cross-Cultural Ethical Traditions

  • At least 1 course in either Ethics in Historical Perspective or Ethics in Literature and the Arts

  • A comprehensive list of elective courses is available to students in the degree audit system.

  • In the experiential pathway, students may replace 2 elective courses with experiences.

    • At least 1 faculty-mentored research experience amounting to at least 150 hours

    • At least 1 community-based field experience of at least 300 hours

See the ethics and society certificate program website for more information and additional certificate sequencing requirements and restrictions at kenan.ethics.duke.edu/ethics-society-certificate.