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Contributing Writer
 

Wesleyan’s curriculum recently became stronger in ethics with the addition of Assistant Professor of Philosophy Lori Gruen.

Professor Gruen teaches PHIL150 "Man, Animals, and Nature" this semester and a will teach a seminar called "Animal Minds" in the spring semester. Also in the spring semester, she will teach workshops for faculty in other departments on how to incorporate discussions of ethics into their courses. 

There are several reasons why the University created this new position in ethical and political reasoning.

"[The position] was inspired by the 1998 Curricular Renewal legislation’s call for courses to teach ethical reasoning across the curriculum, and by the fact that any courses we offer dealing with ethical issues are highly in demand," said Steven Horst, head of the philosophy department.

After earning her Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Colorado at Boulder, Gruen was on the faculties of Stanford University, the University of North Carolina, and Lafayette College. At Lafayette, she designed a program to support people who teach ethics across the curriculum.

Gruen’s work incorporating discussion of ethics across the curriculum was an asset that made her particularly attractive to Wesleyan, according to Horst. 

"Since this is something Wesleyan has identified as one of its goals, we are really lucky to have hired one of the half-dozen or so people in the country who have already proven themselves on this front," he said.

Gruen is thrilled to be working with the "vibrant intellectual community" that she sees at Wesleyan, which in her opinion was often missing from the students she taught at other schools.

"I’m excited to see so many students [here at Wesleyan] who are trying to make their academic pursuits meaningful to their lives," she said. 

"Many of the students I have taught previously are ‘pre-professionals,’ in the sense that they see their undergraduate education as a mere stepping stone to their real careers. This makes them afraid to question or challenge professors and it causes them to worry inordinately about grades. They thus miss the opportunity to question and explore and grow as responsible people," she said.

So far, Gruen has already received praise for making a contribution to the intellectual community that impresses her. 

"She challenges her students. Any point we make, she gives the other side of it, so that we really have to make our point," said Jennifer Colker ’04, a student in Man, Animals, and Nature.

"I find her to be very personable. I feel like it [Philosophy] is a topic that can become very not personable. I also like the fact that she’s obviously very prejudiced about many of the views we discuss, but she’ll give time to the opposite view," said Emily Watts ’03, another student, who added that while Gruen has been vegetarian for 20 years she still enthusiastically engages in arguments both for and against vegetarianism.

In addition to facilitating intellectual growth in the courses she teaches, Gruen is also inspiring other discussions of ethics indirectly. 

"Her presence here seems to be acting as a catalyst for faculty interested in talking about how to engage applied ethical issues in the classroom," Horst said.