Ethical conduct on campus doesn't occur in a vacuum.

A popular faculty member has developed positive faculty/student relationships over the past several years. During an advising session, he asks an undergraduate if she'd like to go for a walk to discuss an upcoming project.

Eventually they begin to date. Some students in the faculty member's class worry whether he's giving her preferential treatment on projects, assignments and grades.

If you were the faculty member, what would you do? What if you were the faculty member's supervisor? What's the ethical dilemma here? Are there competing ethical issues?

Ethical conduct doesn't occur in a vacuum, said Pamela Peter and Christopher Darcy. Personal values, professional codes, a school's human resources policies and cultures all play a role. Peter, assistant director in the office of residence life at Syracuse University NY and Darcy, assistant dean of student development at Boston College MA spoke at the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators (NASPA) conference in Washington DC in March.

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A lack of awareness

Ethical dilemmas have many dimensions. The case above posed problems for the faculty member, the student, the supervisor, the student's peers, the school, and depending upon the student's age, possibly her parents. And while the ethical issues in the above situation may be obvious, much unethical behavior is simply due to a person's lack of awareness or understanding of ethical standards.