The search for a new director for DePauw University's Prindle Institute for Ethics is winding down.
The current director of the Prindle Center, Bob Steele '69, who has held the position since 2010, will retire in May. His announcement sparked the first national search for a Prindle director since the center began in 2007. Prindle's first director was former University president Robert Bottoms, followed by Steele.
"This is our first chance of actually looking anywhere," said Marcia McKelligan, a philosophy professor and a member of the search committee.
As the director search comes to an end, the three finalists will visit campus to mingle with students and faculty, get acquainted with the DePauw and Greencastle communities and hold an ethical discussion and Q&A. This week, the first finalist, Michael Cholbi, came to campus.
Cholbi currently teaches philosophy at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona (Cal Poly Pomona). He also served as co-director of Cal Poly's Institute for Ethics and Public Policy. Cholbi's research includes a variety of topics including suicide, punishment and moral psychology. His current research focuses on grief.
"I'm a philosopher on suffering," Cholbi said in the opening of his Q&A session, which roughly 50 people attended.
Cholbi claims that he was attracted to the Prindle Institute because it is directed primarily at undergraduate students. Ethics institutes at other universities focus on research and bringing programming in for faculty and graduate students, making DePauw's Prindle Institute unique in his eyes.
"This is one of the very few, indeed I think it's fair to say the only one, that directs its programs at undergraduate students," Cholbi said. "Furthermore, it does so in a liberal arts environment, which is, I think, an environment where ethics questions are taken more seriously by a wider scope of students and faculty."
Should Cholbi be chosen for the director position, he will lead Prindle to a more local scope and focus on issues the DePauw and Greencastle communities face without losing the global scope of current programming. In the past, Cholbi has worked on town/gown programming (the relationship between the University and the surrounding town) and found a "feeling of asymmetry" where the local community feels as if the academics will come in and try to tell them how to do things. In Greencastle, Cholbi would assuage those feelings by bringing programming off campus and into the community.
"Put it on their turf," Cholbi said. "Don't make them come to us, at least initially. Let's us go to them."
Senior Ethan Brauer was happy to hear that Cholbi would engage ethical issues faced locally.
"It's important in the study of ethics," Brauer said. "I think it's overlooked a lot."
DePauw University is currently engaging in conversation about issues of privilege and the experiences of minority groups within the community. Cholbi has done research on racial relations, specifically on race and capital punishment, and feels he could facilitate constructive conversations about the issues DePauw faces.
"I've thought about this," Cholbi said. "I think I could help get a conversation going that is thoughtful and fruitful."
For Cholbi, ethical education is broad.
"There's not a single path in ethical understanding," Cholbi said. "It's more like one path with many lanes."