Demand Geology Majors be Required to Take an Ethics Course

I have heard many of my classmates and TA’s in Geology at the University of California, Los Angeles talking about seeking careers in the mining and oil industry when they graduate and the professors and others encouraging it. I haven’t heard any talk about the negative impacts that fossil fuels, green house gases and plundering the land for resources have had or will have on our planet. I have heard them say they do not care about the negative impacts their unethical work may have on the people, especially the indigenous, and that they only care about making money. A book I recently checked out from the Geology and Engineering library, called "Geology of California," written by Professor Robert M. Norris and Robert W. Webb from the University of California, Santa Barbara, referred to Native Americans as "hostiles" (Norris & Webb, 69). This concerns me deeply as a Native American myself.

Another thing that concerns me is the lack of importance put on cleaning up the field areas and/or keeping them clean. I nearly hurled after seeing used tampons littered all over near a closed bathroom at one of our campsites during the Winter 2019 Structural Geology course. Besides this, considering hikers have been spreading diseases by not cleaning their boots, we should really buy and use boot cleaner before and after going in to the field.

Something else that has been covered up by this department are the many brave women that go out and work in this male-dominant field and get sexually harassed, battered and assaulted. These matters need to be addressed.

One way we could address these matters is by educating the geology students by requiring they take an ethics course to receive a degree at the University of California, Los Angeles. Sign this petition today to demand the schools administrators require geology students take an ethics course to graduate. In this course, things such as historical oppression, environmental safety, and the socio-economic impact on minority groups from our work should be addressed. Teaching us to respect and protect the environment by cleaning up after ourselves in the field is critical. Respecting diversity, especially of the Native Americans land on which we research and extract resources from, should be a priority. This is in line with the True Bruin Code.

WORKS CITED

Norris, Robert & Webb, Robert. Geology of California. John Wiley and Sons, 1976.

“Read ‘Fungal Diseases: An Emerging Threat to Human, Animal, and Plant Health: Workshop Summary’ at NAP.edu.” National Academies Press: OpenBook, https://www.nap.edu/read/13147/chapter/2.

“Values.” UCLA, http://www.ucla.edu/campus-life/values.