Our graduate program is one-of-a-kind in the country in its focus on bioethics, tech ethics, and policy. We broaden your education by examining the ethical and policy implications of science and technology to prepare you to take on some of the most challenging issues of our time.

Our courses, programs, and experiential learning opportunities will help you:

• Understand the ethical, legal, and social implications of advances in research, medicine, and technology.
• Improve your ability to communicate your expertise to diverse audiences, including the public, policymakers, and the media.
• Examine existing frameworks and challenge normative assumptions and expectations.
• Engage legal and policymaking processes to balance innovation with responsible progress.
• Strengthen your critical thinking and writing skills to prepare you for myriad job opportunities in the public or private school, medical school, or law school.

A Graduate Program for Scientists or Technologists

Our program has always been unique in its multidisciplinary approach to bioethics. In 2019 we officially expanded our curriculum beyond the biosciences to include a focus on technology for those who are interested in the ethical and policy implications that arise as we transition into what some call a fourth industrial revolution.

In 2024 we renamed the program to the Master of Arts in Applied Ethics & Policy marking the strategic evolution of the program’s comprehensive approach to addressing ethical and policy challenges in science, technology, and medicine.The program remains one of the nation’s leading graduate programs for traditional bioethics. Renaming the program to “Applied Ethics & Policy” retains the unique value this program brings to the field while more accurately reflecting the wide range of specializations available scientists or technologists.

Why Ethics and Policy?

Reflect on the pressing social problems for which there may be technological solutions. What steps will promote just distribution of beneficial technologies?

Consider the immeasurable potential benefit of precision medicine or gene-editing technologies like CRISPR. What policy issues does such emerging science raise?

How can different stakeholders with widely varying value systems and professional vocabularies work together to promote good science and responsible technological progress?

As courts increasingly use neuroscience to determine outcomes in criminal trials and machine learning is used in everything from medical decisions to filtering what news you see in your news feed, how do we discern when science is ‘good enough’ to be used as the basis for legal and policy decision-making?

Rapid scientific and technological progress has created an increased demand for professionals with expertise in the ethical and policy implications of an increasingly broad range of topics. Knowing how to identify and frame ethical issues will strengthen your effort whether it be in research, education, advocacy, or any number of career goals. Whatever your aspirations the policymaking and regulatory landscape will govern your work. Understanding how to navigate and influence the process will provide opportunity to change your future and the course of society.

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