Journalists confront ethical dilemmas frequently in their daily professional lives. Sometimes these dilemmas fall into a gray area and it can be difficult to determine the right course of action. These sorts of ethical dilemmas will be studied as well as the more obvious journalistic breaches, such as journalistic fraud, including plagiarism. This course will closely examine the cases of such notorious journalists as Janet Cooke, Jayson Blair, and Stephen Glass. The role of the journalist in society, the professional code of ethics, and the history of journalistic integrity and accepted practices will be considered. Course topics include:

• what are the ethical standards in today's media world
• are there really more unethical journalists today or are they just getting caught more frequently because of the ubiquity and speed of the electronic media
• what can a journalist do to protect him or herself from committing an ethical breach