My Bioethics Education at Georgetown

Introduction

In 1992 I enrolled in Georgetown University's J.D.-Ph.D. joint-degree program. In 1997 I earned both a juris doctor and a master's in philosophy (bioethics concentration). In the summer of 2002 I successfully defended my Ph.D. in philosophy (bioethics concentration). ¹ After clerking for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, I joined the Los Angeles office of the law firm Arnold and Porter. Today, I litigate mass tort and securities actions, present papers at academic bioethics conferences, and participate on the Bioethics Committee of the Los Angeles County Bar Association.

Georgetown's Graduate Bioethics Programs Exceeded My Expectations

Georgetown's bioethics programs not only met but exceeded my expectations. This is a result of at least three factors. First, Georgetown expanded and strengthened its programs during the time in which I was enrolled. Second, Georgetown's law and philosophy programs worked synergistically. Third, Georgetown's Washington, D.C. location offered many opportunities for off-campus research and learning.

When I began my studies at Georgetown, there were several established bioethics programs. The Department of Philosophy offered both an M.A. and a Ph.D. in philosophy with a concentration in bioethics. Many of the relevant courses were taught by scholars at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics and at the Center for Clinical Bioethics. These two centers also offered a wide variety of additional opportunities to graduate students, including lecture series, clinical practica, and ethics rounds.

During my time at Georgetown the number and variety of bioethics programs grew with alacrity. The law school, for example, expanded the number of full-time and adjunct faculty teaching and writing in bioethics and began offering an L.L.M. in health law. ² The law school also established the Greenwall Fellowship program and other joint-degree programs, such as a J.D.-M.P.H., with Johns Hopkins University. The increased number of bioethics activities in all of Georgetown's schools ensured part-time jobs and other preprofessional opportunities for the graduate students. Many, for example, helped edit publications such as the second edition of the Encyclopedia of Bioethics, worked as research assistants for bioethics scholars, or taught introductory classes in the philosophy department or in the medical school.

While I cannot, in this space, describe all of Georgetown's bioethics programs, I can at least describe the one in which I participated. In 1992 I had just completed the undergraduate honors program in philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh. I was torn between pursuing graduate studies in philosophy and going to law school. I ultimately decided to do both. I chose Georgetown because I expected that bioethics, which was a great strength of Georgetown's philosophy department, would "fit" with my legal studies better than more traditional areas of philosophical inquiry.

I was right. While no bioethicist has, or may ever have, formal education in all the disciplines upon which bioethics draws, it is increasingly common to have formal education in at least two of them. Multidisciplinary training both permits the bioethicist to view other perspectives more clearly and conditions him or her to be more circumspect in his or her analysis. My legal training enables me to understand how policies relating to bioethics are and might be implemented. My philosophy training, on the other hand, gives me the analytic skills and theoretical grounding to draw upon a sophisticated scholarship to clarify and help solve conceptual and normative problems in bioethics (Pope 1999; 2000).

Finally, in describing and assessing my bioethics education at Georgetown, I must discuss the off-campus research and learning opportunities surrounding Georgetown University in and around the nation's capital.

Washington, D.C., is an ideal place to conduct bioethics research. Georgetown has excellent medical, law, and humanities libraries, and it has the National Reference Center for Bioethics Literature. Moreover, Georgetown students have ready access to the National Library of Medicine, the Library of Congress...