Ethics

In any career, one may face a decision in which there is an ethical dilemma. The decision to be made always has an impact on many people, whether it seems to at the time or not. Making ethical decisions in education, therefore, is very important, since teachers are working with impressionable children. Ethics deals with the good and evil aspects of decision-making. Ethical standards are decided by society, but unfortunately are not always black and white. There are many gray areas in which the right choice to be made is not clear. This is where many people struggle. Ethics, like I said, is a very important factor in education. As a person, I hold myself to a standard of making good ethical decisions, because I want to be a person of good word and of trust. I will carry that into my teaching career. I will want to do what is best for my students, which will require me to make ethical decisions in their favor, even when the easier decision is to ignore what is right. The true difficulty will lie in making decisions regarding working with colleagues. Colleagues don't always see eye-to-eye, and how I approach these disagreements and how I carry myself will greatly impact the respect that is given me and the future interactions with my colleagues. Making good ethical decisions will allow me to have peace with myself, even when things are not going the way I want, because I will know that I have done the right thing. It may be easier to "work the system" by throwing ethics out the window, but I don't think that I can be proud of that. I prefer to be a person and a teacher above reproach, one that is able to honestly say that she did everything that she believed was the right thing to do.