122.1 Professional Ethics and Responsibilities

122.1 Professional Ethics and Responsibilities

A. Background

Membership in an academic faculty involves professional responsibilities and ethical standards. The AAUP outlines these responsibilities and standards in its Statement on Professional Ethics. (See the 2006 edition of the AAUP Policy Documents and Reports, pp. 171-72, from which the Guidelines below are in part derived.)

B. Policy

Furman faculty are expected to meet the ethical standards and responsibilities of their academic profession.

C. Guidelines

1. Faculty are expected "to seek and to state the truth as they see it." They are expected to continue developing their scholarly competence, to practice intellectual honesty, to exercise critical self-discipline, and to avoid subsidiary interests that would "seriously hamper or compromise their freedom of inquiry." (See policies on Political Activity, File 137.3, and Individual Rights and Responsibilities, File 137.8.)

2. Faculty are expected to demonstrate respect for students as persons, to foster their honest academic conduct, to protect their academic freedom, to hold them to the professional standards of their discipline, to evaluate their performance according to its merit, and to acknowledge significant scholarly assistance from them. Faculty are expected to avoid exploitation of students for institutional or personal gain.

3. Whereas the university encourages close faculty-student relationships, at the same time it expects faculty to maintain their professional role and to refrain from dating and/or sexual relations with any student enrolled at Furman, except when the student and faculty member involved are married to each other. (See policies on Due Process, File 131.5, and Individual Rights and Responsibilities, File 137.8.)

4. Faculty are expected to acknowledge their membership in an academic community: they are expected to defend the free inquiry of associates, to exchange scholarly criticism, and to show due respect for the opinions of others.

5. Faculty are expected to be responsible citizens of the university: they are expected to accept their share of faculty governance, to observe regulations and work for needed revisions, to give due notice of anticipated interruptions or termination of service, and to guard against encroachment upon their contractual responsibilities by work or activities beyond the university.

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