Skip to main content
Markkula Center for Applied Ethics

Annual Report 2023-24

BUILDING ETHICS IN COMMUNITY  |  BY THE NUMBERS  |  FINANCIALS  |  DONORS  |  PROGRAM AREAS  |  ADVISORY BOARD

By the Numbers

  1. Home
  2. Markkula Center for Applied Ethics
  3. About the Center
  4. Annual Report 2023-24
  5. By the Numbers

By the Numbers

The efforts of the Center’s marketing and communications team are designed to deliver materials created by our program leaders, ethicists, and student fellows to the widest possible audience and increase visibility for the Markkula Center. Below is an overview of the various channels used to reach our audiences.

 

Globe with microphones, cameras and media tools. Text reads: 2,651 media mentions representing a 51 percent increase over 2023.
Media Coverage: 

Publications around the world turn to the Center’s leaders and scholars for their insight on various ethical issues through columns and opinion pieces including David DeCosse’s monthly column in the National Catholic Reporter and Subbu Vincent’s column in Forbes. Other outlets, including The New York Times, Politico, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Scientific American and many others, reach out to us directly each day seeking ethical perspectives on their leading stories.

In the past year, the center has been cited both internationally and domestically 2,651 times, a 51% increase over the previous year. This spike in interest from the media was driven largely by continued interest in the Institute for Technology, Ethics, and Culture (ITEC) and the  ITEC Handbook.

 

3,452,300 pageviews and 1,711,294 website users in 2023-24.
Website Traffic:

Our continued goal is to reach audiences beyond just the Santa Clara University community to more broadly promote the value and news of ethics. The Ethics Center website welcomed 1,711,294 visitors in 2023-24 generating 3,452,300 pageviews. Of that traffic, 48% of visitors came from outside the United States, with visitors from the Philippines, India, Canada, and Australia representing the next largest global populations to access Markkula Center website materials. Visitors from California represent 14% of the overall demographic of U.S. visitors to our website – an indication that we are continuing to reach communities far beyond our local, state, regional, and country boundaries. 

 

Black and white drawing of a world globe. Text overlay reads,

 

 

18,194 Social media followers. 10,000+ eNews subscribers. 47% email open rate
Social Media:

Our online community reached via integration with five social media platforms is our most direct way to engage with wider audiences. In utilizing these communication platforms, we strive to engage with both our student body to encourage younger audiences to participate in the discussion of ethics, as well as reach alumni, industry professionals, media, and academic constituents. The Markkula Center’s five social media platforms reached 18,194 followers, an increase of about 1,000 connections from the previous year. In 2023-24 we published 1,072 posts across these platforms and saw an increase in followership and post engagement via LinkedIn (+25%), and Instagram (+6%), while incurring a decrease of participation compared to last year on X (formerly Twitter) and Facebook, aligning with a shift in overall usage on those platforms from previous years.

Newsletters:

The Center produces and sends a monthly Center Newsletter, as well as focus-area specific blog posts, RSS content notifications, and e-newsletters to over 10,000 mailing list subscribers with an open rate of 47%. A significant increase from the previous year and mostly driven by users subscribing to receive information from ITEC and downloads of the ITEC Handbook.

 

Online video screen and a red arrow
Video:

Ethics Center video content including replays of previous year’s events and focus-area-related content received over 288,000 views in 2023-24. For the fourth year running, In His Own Words: The Theranos Whistleblower remains the most watched video on our YouTube channel, and continues to be utilized within higher education as a business and leadership ethics teaching module.

 

Podcasts:

The Ethics Center and Miller Center continued their collaboration with the Line of Sight podcast, and produced and promoted 4 new episodes.

 

Computer screen displaying a person presenting while an audience watches. Text reads: 15 events hosted, sponsored, moderated, or featured Ethics Center staff in 2023-24.
Virtual and On-Campus Events:

Virtual and on-campus events are one among many forms of outreach that the Markkula Center offers to engage our community in discussions about ethics. Our staff conducted, co-sponsored, and promoted 15 events and webinars. Many of these were recorded and continue to attract new viewers, with the recordings of AI-Powered Brain Implants: Novel Ethical Challenges, What it Means to be Human in the Time of AI, and Are you Smarter Than ChatGPT? attracting ongoing attention from our YouTube audience.

 

 

 

 

100 articles, blogs, cases and web content in 2023-24. Icons representing different types of web-based content.
Ethics Spotlights:

Released in June, 2024, our Ethics Spotlight this year focused on Ethics and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: Here and in the Middle East, with a particular view to student protests happening on college campuses across the United States. Previously produced spotlight content on a wide array of important and timely ethical considerations continues to generate interest. Our combined spotlight-related content across all topics was viewed over 94,000 times in 2023-24.

Articles/Blog Posts:

Ethics Center staff and students produced nearly 100 new essays, articles, and case studies for the Ethics Center website in 2023-2024.