11/7/96 Contacts: Ralph Izard, 614/593-2590, or Donald Borchert, 614/593-4590

ATHENS, Ohio -- Ohio University's E.W. Scripps School of Journalism and Philosophy Department will join forces beginning next fall to offer an interdisciplinary Ph.D. program in mass communication and applied and professional ethics.

Sponsors say the degree program will seek to increase the number of specialized journalists who can play significant roles in newsroom and classroom ethical debate and decision-making.

Graduates of the program are expected to specialize in journalism ethics for careers in professional journalism, either as teachers in schools of journalism or as practicing journalists in the mass communication industries. They will hold a master's degree in philosophy, a Ph.D. in mass communication and a certificate in applied and professional ethics. The first degree candidate in the three-year program will be enrolled in the fall of 1997. One person will be appointed per year to the program, and each will receive a full tuition scholarship plus a stipend.

"Few subjects stir debate in American journalism more than ethics. But too often this debate is based on little more than the experience of the debaters," said Ralph Izard, director of the Scripps School of Journalism. "We at Ohio University look forward to providing opportunities for journalists to develop a broader background.

"The goal of Ohio University's Institute for Applied and Professional Ethics since its inception has been to stimulate better teaching and better research about applied ethics. To provide journalists with the opportunity to earn an enhanced master's degree in philosophy and a Ph.D. in mass communication clearly is a major step in that direction."

The Board of Trustees approved creation of the Institute in June 1995; a program in applied and professional ethics has existed at Ohio University since 1988. Faculty in journalism, philosophy and business currently sit on the Institute's executive board.

Coursework for the interdisciplinary program will include core journalism writing, editing, design, law and ethics classes as well courses in theory and research methods. On the philosophy side, courses will include applied ethics and ethical theory and additional selections ranging from Aristotle and Kant to the philosophy of law and metaphysics.

The linking of journalism and philosophy, though uncommon in higher education institutions across the nation, is not new to Ohio University.

"We in the Philosophy Department and the School of Journalism have an unusual level of collegial cooperation and productive interfacing of our curricula, a level brought about by years of working together as colleagues in the Institute for Applied and Professional Ethics," said Donald Borchert, chair of the Philosophy Department.

Borchert said modern applied and professional ethics stems from the Nuremberg Trial revelations of Nazi medical experimentation on human beings. The whole point of such ethics, he said, was to help people in health-care professions initially, and later in virtually every occupation, to be able to identify moral problems that they encounter in their work, and to critically examine alternative solutions to those problems.

"The perceived need for applied and professional ethics burgeoned in America after the Watergate scandal. It soon became evident that the best people to pursue applied and professional ethics were the professionals themselves. Hence, the need for professionals trained in the art and science of ethics. Hence, the need for highly trained journalists who are also competent ethicists," Borchert said.