I found last week’s presentation by Don Pohl, President of Ranken Technical College, to be very interesting and informative.  One aspect was Ranken’s three-pronged approach to 1) Educate in the fields of the current leading-edge technologies; 2) Provide a general education; and , 3) Instill a work ethic.

According to Don, it is the work ethic attributes of Ranken students that employers find that help to differentiate their graduates from other programs and result in Ranken’s 98% placement record.  

Work Ethic.

Several weeks ago, I attended the Rotary-UMSL Ethics Panel.  Club 11, through the initiative of Tom Teasdale, has been a participant in this program since 2008 because of Rotary’s commitment to business ethics exemplified by our Four-Way Test.

UMSL’s Executive Leadership Consortium hosts a panel of business and professional individuals, including at least one member of Club 11 – Teasdale, Roush, Wicks, Tinucci, Rubinelli, to name a few that have participated.  Tom Teasdale was again a panelist (and honored for his past service to the program). The panelists present “real life” ethical dilemmas that are discussed with students from the business school.  The students’ thoughts/opinions are solicited on how to resolve such conflicts before the panel reveals what happened.   

Business Ethics.

Ranken’s curriculum which includes the focus on the importance of work ethic is supported by Rotary Scholarships from our Endowment Fund.  UMSL’s forum on business ethics is supplemented by Club 11 Rotarians sharing their experiences guided by the Four-Way Test and Rotary’s Code of Conduct.

More than words on a page, here are two applications of Rotary as “People of Action”.

President Bob