Hoffberger Center for Professional Ethics Announces Three New Staff Appointments
February 17, 2022
Contact: Office of Advancement and External Relations
Phone: 410.837.5739
The University of Baltimore's Hoffberger Center for Professional Ethics (HCPE) has announced an expansion of its personnel and programs. For the first time in its history, the Center now includes a Hoffberger Ethics Fellow through the spring 2022 semester. Rebeccah Leiby joins the Center from Boston University, where she is completing her doctorate in ethics and political philosophy, with a focus on transitional justice. As a fellow, Leiby will teach classes, including Ethical Issues in Business and Society, and develop programming for the Center.
"I'm thrilled to be working with the Hoffberger Center this spring,” says Leiby. "The Center's mission to bring ethical reasoning tools into everyday discussions about professional and civil conduct is a natural complement to the UBalt mission, and has the potential to effect widespread positive change in the city of Baltimore and beyond."
The Center also welcomes Daniel Gellasch, B.A. '21, as its coordinator of outreach and programming. A recent graduate of UBalt's Philosophy, Ethics, and Law program, Gellasch both participated in and coached the University's Ethics Bowl team the past several years to repeated successes and accomplishments, including another impressive showing last fall. Gellasch will oversee both the collegiate and high school ethics bowls this academic year, as well as help with programming for the Center.
"I continue to be thrilled at the opportunity to work with the Hoffberger Center, engaging in some of the most exciting and meaningful work of my career," says Gellasch. "The opportunity to stay immersed in philosophy and ethics content, while also getting to actually create and organize some of the programming that meant so much to me as a student fellow, has been an amazing privilege. I'm excited about the direction the Center is taking, and feel honored to be a part of it."
These new positions join UBalt Professors Steven Scalet, who was appointed as the HCPE's director in fall 2020, and Joshua Kassner, the director of the Research Fellows Program. Prof. Kassner stepped into this newly created role last year, increasing the research activities and scholarly impact of the Center through new initiatives such as an Author-Meets-Critics series, regular ethics-related conferences, and the appointment of research fellows from outside The University of Baltimore.
"The Hoffberger Center is unique to the University System of Maryland, as it is the only endowed center in the USM committed to practical, professional and applied ethics," says Prof. Kassner. "For decades, the HCPE has been a leader in implementing ethics across the curriculum. I am excited to be the inaugural director of research fellows, and look forward to making the HCPE an incubator for scholarship in practical, professional and applied ethics."
Learn more about the Hoffberger Center for Professional Ethics.