Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative

Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative

Bill Daniels, the founder of the Daniels Fund, had a high standard of ethics and integrity and firmly believed in the importance of absolute ethical principles.  As an honest and fair businessman, he always based his decisions on what he believed to be right.  This attitude and way of conducting business earned him incredible respect and loyalty throughout the business world. 

Reflecting Bill Daniels’ personal commitment to ethics and integrity, the Daniels Fund established the Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative in 2010.  The Ethics Initiative seeks to strengthen the teaching of principle-based ethics to foster a high standard of ethics in students, and ultimately beyond the campus and into the community.  The Ethics Initiative is a partnership with eight business schools in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming whose executive leadership makes ethics a high priority and who have a commitment to implement the Ethics Initiative in a manner that honors Bill Daniels’ reputation for ethics and integrity.  

Objectives

The primary objective of the Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative is active engagement of students – not research or publishing – that builds a solid principle-based ethical framework central to decision making in a complex business environment.  Drawing from the life of Bill Daniels, ethics instruction will convey that principles are a constant foundation – not relative to a specific situation – and that doing what’s right prevails over self interest on occasions when the two may appear to collide.  The Ethics Initiative works to integrate ethics instruction throughout the curriculum, include real-world practical applications, involve exposure to business practitioners, and maintain relevance to the ever-changing business environment. 

The Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative is anchored in the business school at each university.  Each university is responsible for designing and implementing the Ethics Initiative on their campus to advance these defined objectives:

• Student learning
• Involvement of the business community
• Collaboration through the Daniels Fund Ethics Consortium
• Outreach to other institutions of higher education and community constituents
• Outreach to non-business disciplines on campus
   

Participating Universities

The Daniels Fund’s partners in the Ethics Initiative include:

• Colorado State University
• New Mexico State University
• University of Colorado at Colorado Springs
• University of Denver
• University of New Mexico
• University of Utah
• University of Wyoming

Daniels Fund Ethics Consortium

Each participating university is a member of the Daniels Fund Ethics Consortium.  The Consortium leverages the achievements of the individual business schools through collaboration to further strengthen the impact of the Ethics Initiative.  Members share expertise and resources such as curriculum, case studies, instructional approaches, and co-curricular activities. 

During this pilot phase of the Daniels Fund Ethics Initiative, the Daniels Fund is not accepting grant proposals for additional participants.