Class: Moral Dilemmas
Grade: 10th, 11th, 12th
Teacher: Kader Adjout

How does a student’s moral compass help them identify a situation and create a solution that makes sense?

In the Moral Dilemmas elective, students were tasked with researching a food-related ethical problem and then with designing an authentic real-world solution.  As part of their research, they connected with two outside organizations and partners:  Rescuing Leftover Cuisine, who talked about food waste, and Share Our Strength, who shared food-related dilemmas.  They presented their initial ideas to a panel of Beaver faculty and staff from various departments around the school, including Finance, Marketing, Hiatt Center, and Research + Tech.

The ideas:

Group 1: Labels
(informed by conversations with Rescuing Leftover Cuisine)
The team is creating more detailed labels to better process and distribute food, and to educate consumers on what “sell-by,” “best by,” “use by” means.

Group 2: Access food locally
(informed by conversations with Rescuing Leftover Cuisine)
The team is creating a map and website to allow people to access food locally and immediately rather than having to wait for a delivery.

Group 3: Better food insulation 
(informed by conversations with Rescuing Leftover Cuisine)
The team is creating a prototype for better insulation of the food being distributed by organizations like Rescuing Leftover Cuisine.

Group 4: Sustainable seedlings
(informed by conversations with Share Our Strength)
The team is creating a self-sustaining garden that will include an Instagram page to connect people to the product.

Students will use the feedback from the panel as well as their ongoing conversations with the organizations to iterate and evolve their solutions. They will present their refined solutions on Friday, October 29.

More about the BVR-X course, Moral Dilemmas
Have you ever wondered if a decision you made was the right one? Every day, we are faced with taking a stand on difficult moral questions. But, why do we think our opinion is morally right? In this course, you will get to critically analyze situations that affect us every day, from social media to gender and sexuality and from profiling to hating sports teams, among many topics. Be prepared to tackle challenging, real-life situations, collaborate to propose alternative solutions and perspectives, understand how our brain makes decisions, and rethink your notion of morality, right and wrong, and what we ought to do.

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