Spring, 2024
Melissa Brown, Assistant Professor, Communication, a $5000 grant to support the project "An Intervention Against Digital Violence Through Black Feminist Ethics." This grant supports the development of a digital platform and research exploring the ethical implications of online misinformation targeting Black women and girls, focusing on fostering a Black feminist ethics of care and personal accountability to combat digital violence and enhance digital equity. Grant funds will pay for a research assistant, benefits, incentives for community organizers, and the creation of a comprehensive multimedia platform that aims to educate and support Black women and girls in navigating and countering online misinformation and digital violence.
Meilin Chinn, Associate Professor, Philosophy, a $4000 grant to support the project "Fengshui and Ahupuaʻa: The Winds and Waters of Native Hawaiian and Chinese Environmental Practices." This project examines two traditional systems of practical environmental ethics undergoing contemporary revivals – the Chinese practice of fengshui and the Native Hawaiian practice of ahupuaʻa – and will contribute to comparative, cross-cultural environmental ethics. Grant funds will be used for an educational course on the application of fengshui to contemporary environmental ethics, research materials, undergraduate research assistants/web designers, and research travel, resulting in an article for publication, an interactive website, and a course module for teaching environmental ethics.
Tim Myers, Senior Lecturer, English, a $5000 grant to support the project "Kasia and the Snowdrops – A Musical." This musical is an updated fairy-tale for children and adults emphasizing how virtues of healthy family interaction, care for the planet, cultivation of peace in the face of war, and overall compassion can make the world a better place. This grant will create professional song recordings necessary for submission to regional theaters and Broadway, a crucial step in getting the play out into the world where it can wield ethical influence for the good of all.
Julia Scott, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Bioengineering,$2800 grant to support the project "Developing a Code of Conduct for Research Involving Human Subjects in Immersive Technologies." Because emerging technologies present novel risks in human subjects research, for which clear guidance on subject protections needs to be established, this project will develop a code of conduct suitable for these new technological circumstances. The funds will be used to develop and disseminate ethical guidance resources for researchers using immersive technology.
Fall, 2023
Brita Bookser, Assistant Professor, Child Studies, a $5000 grant for "Field Trip to Field Study: Ethical Experiential Education at Museums and Historic Sites." This project uses a critical qualitative research methodology to investigate the ethical and educational dimensions of children's engagement in experiential learning at museums and historic sites during field trips. This grant will be used for undergraduate student research assistants, participant incentives, and travel for data collection.
Brian Buckley, Senior Lecturer, Philosophy, a $1500 grant for "Creating Four Philosophy Courses to Fulfill Three University Core Requirements." This project will create four courses in philosophy that significantly address ethical issues and also satisfy three university core requirements. The money will be used to purchase research materials for these courses.
John Greanias, Lecturer-in-Law, School of Law, a $500 grant for "U. S. Legal History: Evolution of Moral and Ethical Principles." This project will create a model syllabus and a compendium of student readings for a course focusing on the evolution of the moral and ethical principles of United States law, from the drafting of the United States Constitution to the present day. Grant funds will be used for expenses related to books and research materials.
Haibing Lu, Professor, Information Systems and Analytics, a $5000 grant for "Identifying and mitigating algorithmic bias in opioid risk score for fair prescription drug access." This grant investigates and addresses the ethical concerns of algorithmic bias in the NarxCare system, a widely-used platform in opioid prescription monitoring, to ensure equitable healthcare practices and fair access to prescription drugs across all demographic groups. Grant funds will be used for hiring research assistants for data analysis.
Spring, 2023
Hallie Bodey, Program Director, Ciocca Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, a $450 grant for the project entitled "Student Perspectives on the Ethics of AI-Assisted and AI-based Academic Advising." This project will explore university student perspectives on the ethics of AI advising and assistance in academic advising, co-curricular advising, and experiential program advising. It will include gathering student perspectives on privacy, data gathering, and bias. Funds will be used for incentivizing participation in the research.
Pravin Jain, Adjunct Lecturer, Engineering Management & Leadership, a $3700 grant for the project entitled "Validation of Framework for Ethical Decision Making Follow-up and Course Correction." This project will seek information regarding the efficacy and validation of a framework for ethical decision making. Information gathered will then be shared, and used to update teaching materials. Funds will be used for student assistance for interviews of Silicon Valley technology leaders for ethical decision making practices.
Lawrence Nelson, Professor, Philosophy, a $3400 grant for the project entitled "A Professional Reading of ‘Cross My Heart’ and Educational Program." This project will create a recording of a dramatic play read by professional actors that explores the ethics of voluntary active euthanasia for persons with serious mental illnesses, which will be used for educational purposes. The grant funds will provide stipends to professional actors who will read the original script and to a director/manager of the recording project.
Thomas Plante, Professor, Psychology, a $1500 grant for the project entitled "Ethical Considerations in Working with Roman Catholic Seminarians and Men and Women in Religious Formation." This grant will explore the ethical and clinical best practices for mental health professionals working with Roman Catholic seminarians, applicants to religious life, and those in formation as it relates to psychological assessment, psychotherapy, and consulting. Funds will help to defray the costs of travel to and sabbatical at the School of Theology and Ministry at Boston College.
Mukta Sharangpani, Lecturer, Women's and Gender Studies, a $2000 grant for the project entitled "When Milk Boils Over: Adult-Sibling Dynamics around Elderly Parent Care." When parents age, managing their care can become a source of great anxiety to them and their adult children. This project explores the moral imperatives around elder care in the South Asian diaspora, particularly as voiced by adult children in their interactions with their siblings around co-care. The project aims to highlight how the ethical dilemmas around "best care practice" are expressed and resolved through the moral vernacular of rights and individualism as well as Hindu moral frameworks of (vairagya) detachment and seva (service). Grants funds will be used for conference travel expenses.
Fall, 2022
Spring, 2022
Pedro Hernández-Ramos, Associate Professor, Education, a $4,250 grant to support his project “Creando Sus Historias/Creating Their Histories.” This project will center and focus on telling the stories of immigrant women. Funds will be used to compensate participants for their time and engagement and pay for research expenses.
Susan Kennedy, Assistant Professor, Philosophy, a $2990 grant for her project “Gender and Race Stereotypes in Voice Assistants: An Intersectional Analysis.” This project will investigate stereotypes of race and gender in digital voice assistants with the aim of providing recommendations for the ethical design and development of this technology. Project funds will be used for participant compensation and student research assistance.
Xiaochen Luo, Assistant Professor,Counseling Psychology,a $5000 grant for her project “Beliefs and Attitudes toward Technology Fantasies of the Future: Examining the Relationships between Preferences on Core Ethical Questions with Psychological and Psychopathological Correlates.” This study will examine how individuals' ethical decision making processes towards future technology fantasy scenarios may be understood through their psychological profiles.The money will be used to recruit participants and to pay for research assistants.
Fall, 2021
Matthew Newsom Kerr, Associate Professor, History, a $3202 grant for his project entitled “Pro-Vaccine Ethics: Lessons from History.” This project examines the history of vaccine promotion by doctors in Britain, ca. 1896-1914, including efforts to combat anti-vaccinationist misinformation. It will explore questions regarding the history of promoting vaccination, which also missed the mark of engendering public trust, leaving important lessons for today. Funds from this grant will support travel to specialized archives in the UK.
Hooria Jazaieri, Assistant Professor, Management, and Yuhong Liu, Associate Professor, Computer Science and Engineering, a $5000 grant for their project entitled “Increasing Ethical Decision-Making around Disinformation Propagation: Examining Emotion and Reputation of Engagers, Disputers, and Witnesses of Cyberbullying.” This project investigates the impact of emotion and reputation on various parties’ engagement in disinformation facilitated cyberbullying, and explores potential intervention strategies. Funds will be used to compensate a student research assistant, and participant compensation.
Matthew Yalch, Quarterly Adjunct Lecturer, and Cary Watson, Chair and Senior Lecturer, Counseling Psychology, a $1500 grant for their project entitled “Interpersonal Valence of Ethical Virtue.” This study will clarify the interpersonal nature of ethical virtue using several psychometric scales. Project funds will be used for participant compensation.
Spring, 2021
William Dohar, Senior Lecturer, Department of Religious Studies, a $1000 grant for “Where God Cannot Be: Searching for Grace in Same-Sex Relationships.” This interview-based project aims to explore with Catholic men and women in same-sex marriages their God-experience, individually and as a couple, and how what they share in their union manifests itself in other relationships and communities. The grant will fund expenses related to books and equipment to facilitate high-quality interviews.
Jesica S. Fernandez, Assistant Professor, Department of Ethnic Studies, a $3500 grant for “Youth for Justice Project: A Ethical Participatory Action Research Collaboration.” This project aims to expand upon the concept of sociopolitical citizenship by attending to the ethical nuances of developing, supporting and sustaining youth critical civic engagement in a moment of heightened racial awareness, anti-racist praxis, and diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. Project funds will be used for participant compensation and student research assistance.
Danielle Morgan, Assistant Professor, Department of English, a $1000 grant for “The Absurdly Real: The Satires of Jordan Peele.” This project investigates the satires of Jordan Peele to raise the question of what applied ethics might look like in the context of contemporary state-sanctioned violence and the popular satirization of real-life events. The funds will be used to support a student research assistant.
Laura Robinson, Associate Professor, Department of Sociology, a $2000 grant for “The Ethics of Collective Good: Identity and the Cultural Trauma from 9/11 to COVID-19.” This grant charts the ethical implications of cultural trauma, as well as how collective notions of ethical shared responsibilities have impacted notions of the collective good from the events of 9/11/01 to the COVID-19 pandemic across global case studies. This Hackworth Grant will fund student research assistance, computer equipment, and software.
Margaret Russell, Associate Professor, School of Law, a $3000 grant for “Ubuntu Ethics: Restorative Justice in Native American Tribal Courts and U.S. State Specialized Courts.” Drawing upon the sub-Saharan African moral philosophical framework of “Ubuntu,” this project applies these principles to two legal systems that seek to foster restorative justice within their respective communities: 1) long-standing Native American tribal courts; and 2) newer U.S. state problem-solving courts. These funds will be used to cover travel and accommodations for research, and student research assistants.
Adele Xing, Assistant Professor, Department of Management, a $2170 grant for “Reacting to spillovers: How misconduct at a peer institution affects organizational responses to consumer complaints in the financial services industry.” This project examines the spillover effects of organizational misconduct at one organization on routine organizational practices at peer institutions; and more specifically, how unethical behaviors (such as regulatory violations) at one banking institution change the way other banks respond to consumer complaints. Funds will be used for student research assistants.
Fall, 2019
Marie Bertola, Lecturer, Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, Irene Bubula-Phillips, Senior Lecturer, Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, Evelyn Ferraro, Assistant Professor, Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, Erika French-Arnold, Director, Center for Food Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Carol Kelly, interim Director, Center for Food Innovation and Entrepreneurship, and Theresa Conefrey, Lecturer, English, $1500 for "Is It Just Food? Sustainability, Civic Engagement, and Food Justice." Funds will support an event on food justice and sustainability on campus. Money will cover guest speaker’s traveling expenses and a working lunch with invited faculty.
Zsea Bowmani, Graduate Fellow for Global Law and Policy, Center for Global Law and Policy, $850 for ""Cold War, Hot Planet": The Ethical Dilemma of Continued Cold War-era Resentment towards Cuba in the Face of a Global Climate Crisis." This project will examine the ethical issues surrounding the U.S. decision to continue the decades-long Cuban embargo, and the impact that America’s policy has had on Cuba’s attempts at fighting climate change. Grant funds will cover travel expenses related to conducting research in Cuba.
Di Di, Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, $3000 for "A Capital-Driven Science: Religion and Ethics in For-Profit Tech Companies." Relying on interviews with high-tech professionals, this study will attempt to understand how capitalist high-tech companies relate to the intersection of ethics, science, and religion. The grant will be used to collect data, transcribe interviews, and deliver the research findings to academic and general audiences.
Matthew Kroot, Lecturer, Department of Anthropology, $1800 for "The Ethics of Speaking for Others in the Classroom." The proposed applied ethics project will develop instructional materials on Native histories at Mission Santa Clara through a collaboration between members of San Francisco Bay Area Ohlone and Santa Clara University communities. This grant will fund Santa Clara University student interns.
Takeshi Moro, Associate Professor, Department of Art & Art History, $2500 for "Living with asylum seekers in Finland." This project will create short narrative films with asylum seekers in Mänttä, Finland, utilizing ethical concepts. Grant funds will be used to pay for travel to Finland, transportation within Finland, and translation fees.
Erick Ramirez, Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy, $3500 for "Pilot Episode: 'Three Ethical Issues for VR Designers.'" Funds will be used to produce a video aimed at a general audience focusing on ethical issues in the design and use of virtual reality (VR) technologies. Funds will pay SCU student filmmakers, and cover costs for storyboarding, editing, and miscellaneous filming supplies.
Iris Stewart-Frey, Associate Professor, Department of Environmental Studies and Sciences, $3700 for "Incorporating Environmental Justice in the City of Modesto General Plan." This collaboration with the Modesto Office of the Tuolumne River Trust (TRT) will seek to develop an ethical framework on how to minimize, mitigate, and distribute environmental risks in the city of Modesto, with the goal of incorporating environmental justice principles into the upcoming general plan process. Funds will be used to pay student research assistants, to support the community partner in organizing focus groups and interviews, and to support travel between SCU and Modesto.
Spring, 2019
Christopher Kulp, Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, a $650 grant to support his project entitled "Varieties of Moral Knowledge." This book develops a large-scale theory of moral knowledge and is based on the theoretical commitment to moral realism, namely, the view that there are objective moral truths and moral facts. The grant will be used primarily for research materials, and to pay for student research assistance.
William A. Sundstrom, Professor, Department of Economics, a $4000 grant for his project entitled "Second Chances: Criminal Record Clearance, Big Data, and Social Justice." Like mass incarceration, "mass criminalization" adversely affects the life chances of a large number of Americans. By employing big data and legal analysis, this grant will study the extent to which policies that facilitate criminal record clearance can serve the interests of forgiveness and justice by providing individuals a second chance. The grant funds will pay the wages of SCU student research assistants to help with the extensive data analysis component of the project.
Michael Whalen, Professor, Department of Communication, a $5000 grant to his project entitled "A Day with Benton." A Day with Benton is a short film about the moral dilemma that two adult siblings struggle with as they decide whether or not to institutionalize their aging father who suffers from early onset Alzheimer’s disease. The grant will be used to pay for the production costs of making the film.
Fall, 2018
Marie Bertola, Lecturer, Modern Languages and Literatures, Irene Bubula-Phillips, Senior Lecturer, Modern Languages and Literatures, Evelyn Ferraro, Assistant Professor, Modern Languages and Literatures, and Erika French-Arnold, Director, Center for Food Innovation and Entrepreneurship, a $2000 grant to support their project entitled “The Ethics of Food Annual Speaker Series.” This project initiates a speaker series discussing current food issues; the first event will be screening the movie “No Food Left Behind!” followed by a panel discussion. The grant will fund speaker honoraria and the movie screening fee.
Mythri Jegathesan, Assistant Professor, Anthropology, a $4998 grant to support her project entitled "A Common Ground for Exchange: Establishing an Ethics of International Research Collaboration in Sri Lanka." This project examines ethical questions of intellectual labor, relationality, and exchange between international and local collaborators and researchers in Sri Lanka with the purpose of establishing an ethics statement to disseminate as a resource for conducting social science research in Sri Lanka. The funds for this grant will support research assistance, a workshop, and ethnographic research.
Sonja MacKenzie, Assistant Professor, Public Health, a $5000 grant to support her project entitled "The Ethics of Gender Justice: Building Educational Inclusion for Gender Expansive and Transgender Children in Elementary School." This projects will develop a training and educational tool to build gender inclusion at the elementary school level. Funds will be used for student researcher wages, compensation for curriculum consultants, and curriculum printing.
Jaime Wright, Lecturer, Religious Studies, a $1037 grant to support his project entitled "A Symbolic Interactionist Approach to the Construction of Ethical Arguments at the Intersection of Medicine and Religion." This project examines how the personal understandings of self among doctors and chaplains influence their ethical approaches to medical emergencies and end-of-life decisions when religion is a factor. Funds will be used for transportation costs associated with research, gift card tokens of appreciation for interviewees, and conference registration and travel.
Tseming Yang, Professor, Law, a $4000 grant to support his project entitled "Ethical Obligations and Legal Requirements in Environmental Regulation: Identifying Constraints and Opportunities for Vindicating the Equality Norm in EPA's Civil Rights Program." This project examines the ethical and legal aspects of how the US EPA works to enforce the equality norm in the context of Title VI discrimination complaints. The grant will fund travel & lodging, a research assistant, and workshop expenses.
Spring, 2018
Theresa Conefrey, Lecturer, English, $4980 to support her project “Ethics and Equity in College Access for First-Generation Students.” This project responds to the call to more fully understand the reasons for the higher attrition rates of first-generation students and considers the ethical implications for institutions that admit these at-risk students. The grant will provide compensation for survey and interview participants, transcription expenses, and conference travel.
Angela Holzmeister, Lecturer, Classics, $2500 to support her project “The Art and Ethics Podcast.” This grant will contribute to the production of a podcast which considers the ethics of the production, collection, and preservation of works of visual art. The podcast may interview museum curators and administrators, and well as academics and others involved in the ethical issues found in the world of visual art. Funds will be used for student research assistance and travel expenses.
Fall, 2017
Amy Lueck, Assistant Professor, English, and Maura Tarnoff, Lecturer, English, $2000 to support their project “The Ethics of Virtual Reality.” This project will promote conversations about the ethical considerations of teaching and using VR technologies in a Jesuit context. The grant will cover speaker expenses including airfare, room and board, honoraria, and event expenses.
Vikram Bhargava, Assistant Professor, Management, $1700 to support his project "The Role of Off-Duty Laudatory Conduct in Employment Decisions." This project will consider the proper business response to the good conduct of employees while not on the job. Funds will be used for transportation and other expenses for attending academic conferences.
Rohit Chopra, Associate Professor, Communication, $1500 to support his project "Free Speech and Uncivil Discourse on Indian and American Political Twitter: Implications for Global Discourse Ethics." The project will examine how unresolved tensions between free speech and uncivil discourse in political conversations on Twitter are impact broader, global ethical norms of speech and conversation. Funds will help pay for data storage and summer support.
Teresia Hinga, Associate Professor, Religious Studies, $3650 to support her project "Globalization, the Global Village, and the Moral Imperative of Bridge Making: Diagnosing (Asset Mapping) and Responding to the Paradox of Living in One Yet Palpably Divided World." This project will apply insights from the community asset mapping approach to community development. It intends to explore and analytically make the case for the moral imperative of bridge making, and will spotlight best practices and efforts by those who have embraced bridge making. The grant will be used to support travel to and participation in a conference to be held in July 2018 in Sarajevo for the Catholic Ethics in the World Church Initiative.
Hoje Jo, Professor, Finance, $2500 to support his project "Pray Local and Act Global: Religiosity and Human Rights." This project will examine the relationship between community religiosity and a firm’s human rights initiatives in order to ascertain whether and how religion might influence these programs. The grant will cover purchases of access to databases.
Katia Moles, Lecturer, Sociology, $2000 to support her project "A Feminist Ethical Framework for Incorporating Child Sexual Abuse Prevention in Catholic Institutions as Part of Comprehensive Sexuality Education." This project proposes finding empirically-grounded criteria to develop a sexual ethic to assist Catholic institutions in implementing comprehensive sexuality education that promotes lifelong ethical reflection on sexuality. Grant funds will cover travel expenses related to research as well as bringing speakers to campus to discuss related topics.
Michelle Oberman, Professor, School of Law, $5000 to support her project "In Solomon’s Court: An Examination of the Nature and Function of Israel’s Abortion Committees." This research studies the nature and function of Israel’s Pregnancy Termination Committees both as an examination of how a limited abortion ban actually works, and also as a way of alerting those on all sides of the abortion war to the limited extent to which abortion’s legal status affects abortion rates. The funds for this grant will permit a research trip in order to understand how women in minority populations within and outside Israel gain proper access abortion, both culturally and legally.
David Pinault, Professor, Religious Studies, $2500 to support his project "Building Interfaith Solidarity to Counter Wildlife Trafficking and Environmental Depredation in Southeast Asia." the grant to cover airfare, lodging, surface transportation, food, visa expenses, translator and guide expenses, and volunteer compensation.
Spring, 2017
Alison Benders, Associate Dean, Jesuit School of Theology, and Margaret M. Russell, Professor, School of Law, $5000 to support their project entitled “Catholic Social Teaching as a Lever for Racial Justice.” This project will fund a series of events that will consider how to apply Catholic Social Teaching in the context of pursuing racial justice. Grant funds will go towards honoraria, symposium expenses, and publication expenses for the papers written for the project events.
Gilly Dosovitsky, Class of 2018, Psychology and Child Studies, $1100 to support her project “The Ethics of Parental Well-Being.” This project seeks to research how best to help support children in vulnerable families by supporting their parents via stress reduction and other means of promoting well-being. Funds will be used for research participant advertisement and compensation, translation expenses, and various supplies.
Angela Holzmeister, Lecturer, Classics, Carolynn Roncaglia, Assistant Professor, Classics, and Kathleen Maxwell, Professor, Art and Art History, $4850 to support their project “The Ethics of Collecting Art.” This project will consider some of the ethical aspects of art collecting and the positive and negative consequences of, for example, such activities as trading in antiquities. The grant will be used to bring expert speakers to campus to discuss various aspects of these subjects.
Denise Krane, Lecturer, English, Director of HUB Writing Center, $4835 to support her project “Teaching International Students in an Ethical and Just Way: Designing Teaching Resources Based on Student Experiences and Best Practices.” This project will interview international students on their experiences with writing in their coursework at Santa Clara University, with the goal of enhancing the learning environment for international students. Funds will go towards compensation of student interview participants, interview transcription expenses, student worker wages, and miscellaneous materials.
Jo-Ellen Pozner, Assistant Professor, Management, Leavey School of Business, $2500 to support her project “Reputation, Role-Conflict, and Scandal: The Impact of Ethical Breaches on Individual Reputations.” This project looks at how inconsistency between an individual's job function and the characteristics of the scandal in which they are involved affects their reputational penalties. Funds will be used to collect data from online subjects and to cover travel expenses related to writing and presenting the resulting paper.
Claudia Rodriguez-Mojica, Assistant Professor, Education, School of Education and Counseling Psychology, $5000 to support her project “We Are Here: Ethics Cases from Preservice Teachers of Color.” This grant seeks to create ethics case studies for preservice teachers to prepare them for dilemmas involving diversity they may face during their training. It will help tell the stories of those who have had unethical or unjust experiences, with the hope of working to correct or prevent these wrongs in the future. Project funds will go towards research participant compensation and transcription fees.
Fall, 2016
Christian Helmers, Assistant Professor, Department of Economic, $2000 to support his project entitled "The Ethics of Price Discrimination in Online Markets." This project will consider some of the ethical aspects of using consumer data for the purposes of price discrimination. Funds will be used for research assistance to analyze and transcribe data, and travel expenses.
Claudia Josi, Adjunct Professor, School of Law, a $2500 grant to support her project entitled "The ethical dilemma of the proposed accountability mechanisms for war crimes and grave human rights violations in the peace agreement in Colombia – retributive vs. restorative justice mechanisms and their compatibility with Colombia’s international human rights obligations." The grant will cover travel to Colombia in order to conduct research there, including airfare, hotel, and ground transportation costs.
Christopher Kulp, Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, a $600 grant to support his book project entitled "A Short Catechism on Moral Metaphysics" which argues for the value of “commonsense” moral thought. Grant funds will be used for the purchase of books and other scholarly materials, and for student research assistance.
Brian Love, Assistant Professor, School of Law, a $4000 grant to support his project entitled "Can Litigation Insurance Solve the Patent Troll Problem?" This project will study whether litigation insurance is a viable solution to the problem of nuisance value patent assertion. The funds will primarily be used to hire research assistants, who will help with data collection and analysis, and to pay for travel expenses.
Haibing Lu, Assistant Professor, Department of Operations Management & Information Systems, a $5000 grant to support his project entitled "Internet Ethics: A Machine Learning Solution to Fake News on Social Media." The project intends to detect and combat misinformation on social media by investigating machine learning/natural language processing techniques, with an attempt to develop an effective mechanism to filter out/degrade untrustworthy information and thereby to restore trust and harmony in online communities. The grant will pay for research assistance, conference registration, airfare, ground travel, food, and hotel.
Sherry Wang, Assistant Professor, Department of Counseling Psychology, a $2500 grant to support her project entitled "Upholding ethical practice with multicultural competency: Struggles of school counselors in U.S. public school settings." This grant will support research into the experiences of school counsellors in multicultural schools, and what particular ethical problems they face. Grant money will pay for research-related expenses, such as participant compensation, and voice recorder and transcription costs.
Spring, 2016
Michelle Bezanson, Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology, $5000 for her project "The Ethics of Immersion." This project, with Gabriella Carne, ’17, and Chonsa Schmidt, ’17, will use anthropological techniques to investigate the community, economic, and environmental impact of international immersion programs. While on-site in Costa Rica, the team will conduct interviews and other research. Grant funds will cover airfare, lodging, food, ground transportation, and other costs.
Elizabeth Guneratne, Lecturer, School of Education, $2500 for her project entitled "RISK Conference: Laudato Si, Cultivating Sustainability in Our Teaching and in Our Communities." The RISK (Reflective Innovation for Sustainability & Knowledge) three-day summer conference will help high school educators promote sustainability in response to the call from Pope Francis in Laudato Si. The grant funds will be used to pay for conference costs, such as fees and scholarships for attendance.
Teresia Hinga, Associate Professor, Department of Religious Studies, a $3000 grant to support her project "Women, Religion and Transitional Justice: A Comparative Ethnographic Study of Two Case Studies: Rwanda and South Africa." This study will investigate the role of religion and gender in reconciliation and restorative justice movements in Rwanda and South Africa. Grant funds will support air fare and other travel-related expenses.
Erick Ramirez, Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy, and Scott LaBarge, Associate Professor, Departments of Philosophy and Classics, $4000 to support their project entitled "Virtual Thought Experiments and Philosophical Pedagogy: A Pilot Study." This study will investigate how virtual reality affects classroom learning outcomes when considering classic philosophical dilemmas. As such it has both the potential to contribute to better pedagogical outcomes and to the burgeoning field of empirical philosophy. Funds will be used for virtual reality equipment and student research assistants.
Michael Schermann, Assistant Professor, Department of Operations Management & Information Systems, $4000 for his project entitled "Mobile Ethics: An App to Investigate the Morning Morality Effect 'In the Wild.'" This project will adapt an existing ethics experiment on the “morning morality effect” from the lab environment to mobile devices, and the resulting app will be open-access and open-source. Funds will be used for app development and participant compensation.
Fall, 2015
María Del Socorro Castañeda-Liles, Assistant Professor, and Elizabeth Drescher, Adjunct Associate Professor, Department of Religious Studies, $3000 for their project "Resources for Exploring Applied Ethics in Classroom, Congregation & Media." This grant will support research into how students engage ethical questions in Religious Studies classrooms. Funds will be used for the support of student focus groups and to fund travel.
Laura Chyu, Adjunct Lecturer, Department of Public Health, $3000 for her project "Public Health Ethics and Implications of Elective Oocyte Cryopreservation." This grant will provide funds for investigating some of the ethical questions surrounding elective oocyte cryopreservation, including questions of informed consent, autonomy, and healthcare equity and justice. The grant will help in creating a learning module to be used in the Public Health Program curriculum, presenting findings at an academic conference, and publishing a peer-reviewed academic review article.
Samuel Lee, Assistant Professor, Leavey School of Business, Department of Finance, $2000 for his project "Optimal Regulation of Prostitution Markets: Protection of Sex Workers vs. Prevention of Sex Trafficking." This grant will research various strategies for the regulation of prostitution, with the intention to find which strategy best protects workers and prevents human trafficking. It will provide funds to travel to and present the findings at an academic conference.
Kris Mitchener, Professor, Department of Economics, $3000 for his project "Naming Names: the Reputational Cost of Cheating." This grant will investigate the reputational costs of cheating in sports. Funds will be used for research assistance and to build a unique database that will allow him to measure the costs of cheating to an individual athlete’s reputation.
Laura Robinson, Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, $542 for her project "Debating Ethical Responses to Terrorism: The Events of November 13, 2015 Paris France." This project will collect and analyze media-generated data provoked by the recent terrorist attacks in Paris in now stored in the digital public sphere from both formal media accounts and ordinary individuals participating in the digital commons. The funds will go towards paying a student research assistant.
Dan Sportiello, Lecturer, Department of Philosophy, Graeme Warren, Lecturer, Leavey School of Business, OMIS, and Shawn Vecellio, Adjunct Lecturer, Education Department, School of Education and Counseling Psychology, $2500 for their project “Easy Dialogues.” The project will launch a series of small breakfast events as a response to Laudato Si’s call for an integral ecology and healthy politics by inviting people (students, faculty, staff, and members of the public) with different voices and diverse perspectives to have breakfast, adapting the idea from permanentbreakfast.com.
Sally Vance-Trembath, Lecturer, Department of Religious Studies, $5000 for her project “The Planet and the Popes.” This grant will provide summer support for the development of an RTC3 course highlighting Vatican teaching that engages ethical issues involved with climate change and how technological innovations to address climate change should be attentive to global human suffering.
Tseming Yang, Professor, School of Law, $2500 for his project “Cases on the Content and Limits of Environment Rights.” This grant will aid in the preparation of a chapter in a law school case book on global and comparative environmental law, particularly on the content and limits of environmental rights, and will include research and analysis of cases regarding rights-based approaches to protection of the environment and management of natural resources. The funds will pay for a research assistant.
Spring, 2015
Hoje Jo, Professor, Department of Finance, $2500 for his project "Seeking Legitimacy through CSR: Evidence from Controversial Industries." This grant will support research into the question of whether and how certain industries, e.g. alcohol, gambling, tobacco, and firearms, use ideas of "corporate social responsibility" to improve their public image and gain legitimacy. Funds will be used for travel and associated expenses with attending a conference where this research will be presented.
Jean Molesky-Poz, Lecturer, Department of Religious Studies, $3000 for her project "The Ethic of Reciprocity." This grant will provide funds for development of a research project and a new course on how the ethic of reciprocity exists in Native American culture. The funds will help pay for a research assistant, conference attendance, travel to field locations, materials purchases, summer stipend, and expenses related to bringing speakers to campus.
Karen Peterson-Iyer, Lecturer, Department of Religious Studies, $3000 for her project "Listening to the Voices of Survivors as Experts in Anti-Human Trafficking Work." This grant will provide funds to develop a course module for TESP 108 "Human Trafficking and Christian Ethics." It will help to bring the voices of human trafficking survivors into the course itself, and to that end will provide speaker fees, transportation, meals, hotel, and summer support.
Brett Solomon, Associate Professor, Department of Liberal Studies, $3000 for her project "Teacher Perceptions and the Pre-School to Prison Pipeline." This grant will assist in purchasing software licenses for the creation of an online survey which will measure various implicit biases among K-12 teachers, with the hope of illuminating these biases and thereby creating a more supportive learning environment and dismantling the pre-school to prison pipeline. The Office for Diversity and Inclusion contributed to this grant.
William Sundstrom, Professor, Department of Economics, $3600 for his project "Santa Clara Income and Poverty Studies (SCIPS) Initiative." This project will pay for student assistants who will do background research into data sources, analysis and preliminary construction of a website to act as a "digital clearinghouse" for data related to poverty, income inequality, and economic justice in Silicon Valley.
Fall, 2014
Theresa Conefrey, lecturer, Department of English, a $5000 grant to support her project entitled "Resources for Teaching Ethics in Applied Engineering Communications." This project is to create a bank of teaching materials on ethics in engineering for the course Applied Engineering Communications 1, and to present these materials to new instructors in a workshop.
Allia Ida Griffin, lecturer, Department of English, a $1700 grant for her project entitled "On Race and Gender, Freedom and Inheritance: A Staged Reading of Marcus Gardley's 'The House that Will Not Stand.'" This project will seek to engage students, staff, and faculty in critical conversations about race in the United States both in the past and the present. The primary focus will be a staged reading of Marcus Gardley's play "The House that will not Stand," followed by a discussion with the playwright. The Office of Diversity and Inclusion contributed to this grant.
Claudia Josi, adjunct professor, Law School, a $1960 grant to support her project entitled "What Ethical Dilemmas Are Involved when a Society Emerges from Violence and Conflict? Development of a Transitional Justice Course for SCU's Law School." This projects seeks to develop a law course titled "International Law: Transitional Justice in Post-Conflict Societies" that explores from an interdisciplinary perspective the difficult choices different societies have faced during their transition from violence and conflict towards peace and justice.
Kristin Kusanovich, senior lecturer, Department of Theater and Dance, a $2500 grant to support her project entitled "The Drama in Teacher Leadership: Engaging issues of justice and ethics in educational leadership formation using artistic processes and praxis." The purpose of this transdisciplinary research is to examine and disseminate new applications of the findings from the Drama in School Leadership project, which involves a series of one-act plays based on case studies, and presenting this data to an academic conference.
Michelle Oberman, professor, Law School, a $4500 grant for her project entitled "What's Law Got to Do with It? Travels through the Abortion War." This project is grounded in the comparative examination of distinct cultural/legal approaches to the regulation of abortion. The project will fund travel to El Salvador to perform research, support teaching on this subject at Santa Clara University, and ultimately result in a book.
Spring, 2014
James Bennett, Associate Professor, Department of Religious Studies, $4471.20 for his book chapter project "The Deprogramming Dilemma." This project examines the ethical issues at stake in the practice of "deprogramming," which forcibly removes individuals from cults and attempts to convince them not to go back. The ethical questions on deprogramming revolve around questions of human agency and freedom of conscience.
Stephen Lee, Associate Professor, Department of Communication, $4000 for the film project "An Extended Family." This grant will assist the production of a film considering "how ten moms, one dad, eight children and one sperm donor are re-imagining family."
Michael Meyer, Professor, Department of Philosophy, $1500 for the project "Good Humor: Comedy and Happiness at the Movies." This project will consider the diverse kinds of happiness found in various movies, and will investigate particularly how comedies can speak to the ethical side of happiness. The grant will pay for student labor and materials to assist the writing of an article and facilitate improvements of two courses.
Peter Rozic, Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Political Science, $3000 for the project "Introducing the Lustration Index: The First Comprehensive Measure of Post-Communist Transitional Justice." This project reviews how far new governments go in their lustration laws, which restrict the government participation of the members of former regimes, and produces and index which quantifies how various nations have approached this problem.
Bruno Ruviaro, Assistant Professor, Department of Music, andChristina Zanfagna, Assistant Professor, Departments of Music and Ethnic Studies, $5000 for the project "Bay Area Sound Map: The Ethical Praxis of Sonic Mapping." This project will produce an interactive online sonic map of the Bay Area which includes various expressions of music, sounds, and voices, including the ethical concerns of diverse Bay Area residents. The Office for Diversity and Inclusion contributed to this grant.
Fall, 2013
Kevin Burke, Associate Professor, Jesuit School of Theology, $3500 for the book project “A Grammar of Justice: The Legacy of Ignacio Ellacuria Today.” This project will consider the lasting impact of Ignacio Ellacuria, S.J., 25 years after his assassination along with his companions at the University of Central America. The book will include contributions from many voices which consider the various ways that Ignacio Ellacuria’s work lives on.
Jonathan Fung, Adjunct Lecturer, Department of Communication, $2000 for the film project “Lawnmower Willy.” This film concerns the story of a man who loses his job due to technology and is forced to reinvent himself. It considers questions of integrity, courage, identity, work ethic, and other ethical questions surrounding contemporary working life.
Sharmila Lodhia, Assistant Professor, Department of Women’s and Gender Studies, $2500 for the project “Beyond Rescue: The Ethics of Advocacy and Why How We Frame the Anti-trafficking Movement Matters.” This project will investigate contemporary human trafficking in California and the rhetoric of “rescue” which is often used to frame discussions of that trafficking, and will critique that rhetoric and consider other ways to frame the discussion more helpfully.
David Pinault, Professor, Department of Religious Studies, $3600 for the project “Fostering Interfaith Solidarity to Counter Wildlife Trafficking and Deforestation in Southeast Asia.” This award supports fieldwork for a project which considers how interfaith interactions can help or harm efforts to protect wildlife and forests in Indonesia and other Southeast Asian nations.
Erick Jose Ramirez, Lecturer, Department of Philosophy, $863 for the project “Psychopathy, the PCL-R, and Responsibility.” This project considers the nature of psychopathy and the moral responsibility of psychopathic agents. It will involve designing a course on the philosophy of mental illness and preparing several articles for publication.
Hisham Said, Assistant Professor, Department of Civil Engineering, and Katerina Bezrukova, Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, $1000 for the project “Impact of Group Composition and Faultlines on Ethical and Technical Performance in Civil Engineering Projects.” This project will investigate how group dynamics can affect how engineering teams deal with ethical decision-making.
Shannon Vallor, Associate professor, Department of Philosophy,$3500 for the project “The Phenomenology of Moral Attention: A Foundation for Future Empirical Research.” This grant will support research on some of the philosophical and cognitive foundations of moral attention in order to better understand how contemporary multitasking habits may affect our moral attention and learning.
Spring, 2013
Hsin-I Cheng, Department of Communications, $4330 for the project "Crafting Ideal Citizens: A Critical Analysis on Taiwanese Immigration Discourses." This project seek to better understand the concept of Taiwanese citizenship, along with its salient values and ethics, by reviewing news sources and blogs, as well as through fieldwork and personal interviews conducted in Taiwan.
Rohit Chopra, Department of Communications, $2500 for the project "The Ethics of Memory on the Internet." This award goes towards the writing of a manuscript on the role of narratives and memory in ethics and especially memory as related to the internet, with its great variety of interpretations, voices, and even inaccuracies. Particular attention will be given to the way narratives, memory, and ethical lessons are constructed around traumatic events such as the September 11th attacks and other terrorist attacks and riots.
Christopher Kulp, Department of Philosophy, $600 for the project entitled "Knowing Moral Truth." This book project investigates foundational problems in ethical theory and seeks to defend the validity of ordinary moral thinking against those who claim that moral truth does not exist, that moral truths are relative, and other perspectives that generally deny the validity of the moral endeavor.
Peter Minowitz, Department of Political Science, $750 for the project entitled "To Forget about the End: Leo Strauss on Lucretius, Socialism, and the Mortality of the Human Race." This project seeks to better understand how the thinking of the influential political philosopher Leo Strauss was influenced by his awareness of human mortality.
Lawrence Nelson, Department of Philosophy, $5000 for a project called "Personhood and the Legal and Moral Status of Prenatal Humans." This project investigates the tension between the legal personhood of prenatal humans and the legal personhood of their pregnant mothers, how that relates to US constitutional law, and how those legal tensions relate to ethical considerations and state interests.
Michelle Oberman, School of Law, $4,320 for the project "Morality and the Purpose of Law-Making: An Examination of the Inspiration Behind Oklahoma's Abortion-Related Legislation from the Perspective of Legislators and Doctors." This project seeks to investigate more deeply the motivations and ethics behind how laws pertaining to abortion are enacted in Oklahoma. It is part of a larger project to investigate how morality and law relate to each other on the subject of abortion.