April 14, 2013

April 14, 2013

Ethics and VEISHEA

I hope everyone had an enjoyable weekend.  I certainly did.  My family came to town yesterday evening and I got to go shopping and get some new outfits for work and summer (and I didn't have to pay!) and we celebrated my grandma, uncle, and mom's birthday with Hickory Park.  It was good seeing everyone and you can't go wrong with Hickory Park and ice cream.  So a special shout out to my mom as it is her birthday this week!  And to use her "newly coined" phrase: Hi-at-cha!

It's officially VEISHEA week and I can't believe it's actually here.  A little trivia here for you: If you don't know what VEISHEA stands for, it is an acronym for the colleges (at the time) of Iowa State - Veterinary, Engineering, Industrial Science, Home Economics, and Agriculture.  It is also the largest student-run festival in the nation, so there's that! :)

This past week, Cole and Haley did an excellent job bringing up potential ethical issues that we could face this fall in our sections.  These issues really got me thinking and I hope that I will be able to effectively navigate through them.  They posed the question: What are the five most important principles of ethics that are most important in your role as a peer educator?

This is a very good question.  The book lists twelve principles to enhance the quality of peer practice.  I believe that my personal top five would be:

1. Respond within the limits of your training and skill.
2. Show respect and dignity for other individuals.
3. Understand your own personal bias and avoid imposing this bias on others.
4. Knowing and managing your emotional response, while helping another, is crucial to your own well-being and to your ability to help.
5. Remember that as a peer educator, you are a role model!

These principles, to me, are very important as a peer educator.  To incoming freshmen, we will be one of the first contacts that they have with the general student population; people who, to them, are very knowledgeable to the ins and outs of Iowa State.  It will be imperative that we use that position to successfully guide our mentees through their first semester.  We must remember that we don't know everything and may have to refer them to people who do.  We must show respect for others.  This also goes for bias.  We all have bias in something (an example would be my prejudice against the University of Iowa) and we must be careful to not assert this bias when interacting with others. 

Again, props go to Cole and Haley in dealing with this difficult topic!  As Chelsee pointed out when going over additional situations, we may laugh at the prospect of what might come up, but these situations do come up and we need to deal with them appropriately.

I, for one, am looking forward to the etiquette dinner tonight.  It should be very interesting and I know for sure I will learn something (my etiquette is not always up to par...).  I hope everyone has a super fun and safe VEISHEA week - because you never know what will happen with VEISHEA! :)

Also, as another reminder, there's only three weeks left of classes, so we're finally in that final stretch!  Let the last minute paper writing, book reading, and test-taking commence!  We're almost there! :)
Katie