Students in KIE’s summer programs to set out on new projects

This year, in addition to Kenan Summer Fellows and a Duke Engage Dublin cohort, the Kenan Institute for Ethics is supporting a group of student interns in human rights through the Pathways of Change program offered by the Duke Human Rights Center at KIE.

Four Kenan Summer Fellows will undertake projects meant to explore answers to the question “what does it mean to live an ethical life?” Their topics include a documentary film on the Uyghur diaspora population, facilitating a non-profit initiative to subsidize the cost of travel for children of incarcerated parents in the Baltimore-Washington corridor; a deep look into jury selection to uncover racial, gender, and socioeconomic biases employed in criminal proceedings through interviews with prosecutors, defense attorneys, and judges; and an exploration of entrepreneurship and profiteering in countries neighboring areas of violent conflict. The students will be writing weekly reflections on their projects throughout the summer.

This will mark the ninth year of the Duke Engage Dublin program, as another eight undergraduates prepare for placements with local NGOs, community organizations, and government agencies that address issues of immigration and multiculturalism.  In the process students come to understand both the ethical challenges of global migration and the often profound impediments to sustainable community-based change, all while having more fun than they ever could have imagined. Each student will post a “letter home” describing their work during the course of the eight weeks that they are in Ireland.

Pathways of Change is a new program providing matched summer internships with partner organizations in the field of business and human rights (including private sector and NGO). In addition to working with the partner organizations, the students will work as a team on a project to examine the best ways of effecting change in corporate human rights practices.