Ethical and Professional Issues: Reading Responses

Based on the readings and from my own life experiences, I believe that there it is very difficult to find, and maintain, a proper work-life balance. While I do believe that is very possible to find the happy medium between the two, I understand that in our lives we are forced to make sacrifices. For example, in order to stand out at work, often times one must put in extra hours to be noticed and to be able to work one's way up the ladder of power and prestige in a corporation. These extra hours going into the office early or leaving the office late cut into family and leisure time and can create stress and friction between the individual and their loved ones. However, this sacrifice of time to get ahead in work frequently pays off in the end as increased benefits come alongside promotions. These promotions help individuals support their families, and ultimately help ensure that one can have a good work-life balance in the later stages of their career. Anand Ilyer’s article “The ...

For our code of ethics, Danny, Alex, and I focused on three main ethical topics: integrity, responsibility, and passion. We began our code by discussing integrity because as students, we are bombarded with Honor Code statements addressing academic dishonesty. As a prestigious university, we value our work and hold ourselves to the highest of standards. By establishing this culture at our university, we challenge ourselves and those around us, ultimately bettering ourselves as students and community members. By enforcing seemingly strict rules of integrity we build a community based on honesty and communication. Students are encouraged to reach out to professors when they are stuck on assignments resulting in an atmosphere of trust. By violating our standards for integrity, we not only dishonestly represent ourselves but also the entire Notre Dame community. The second section of our code is based upon responsibility and what actions Notre Dame CSE students should and should not take...

I began my internship/career search during my sophomore year here at Notre Dame. Through the career center and the online Job Search portal, Go IRISH , I was able to find job opportunities that sparked my interest. The use of resources has made the application process relatively easy and through that process I did receive requests for several interviews, received offers from a couple of those companies, and was outright rejected for even an interview by one company. I think the process was ethical and efficient, but it was frustrating and surprising to be turned down for an interview when my qualifications meet the stated criteria, and I was not given a specific explanation for being turned away. Nevertheless, the past two summers I was hired after going through the formal process that Notre Dame recommends and I have had the opportunity to work in the IT department at a global professional resources firm. The first year internship job title was officially Business Analyst/Informa...

I believe that there are two distinct definitions of the word hacker, one that applies to those within the computer science community and one used by those who are not. While, as mentioned in the article “The Word ‘Hacker',” individuals in the programming community generally have a positive outlook on the word “hacker,” while members of the general public have a more sinister understanding of the word. Those not familiar with computer science and with the role programmers or hackers play typically view hackers as only being those who are committing crimes, violating privacy, lack ethics, and are harming our world in the end. While it is certainly true that there are many programmers who use their skills in a detrimental and adverse way, many of those within the technology community aspire to use their hacking to enable our world to be more efficient, secure, and productive. It is often over-looked by the general public that in order to stop a criminal hacker, often times someone m...