Cornell University has been awarded an $8.5 million interest-free, seven-year loan from The Pew Charitable Trusts, for the development of programs in ethical reasoning and information sciences.

The award will fund course development in ethical reasoning and information sciences; the position of director of ethics and public life; and a new faculty position to help oversee an interdisciplinary approach to developing courses and training graduate students in the ethics of information sciences, Cornell President Hunter Rawlings said.

"This is wonderful news," said Rawlings. "This award will help us take the first significant step in reshaping our undergraduate curriculum in these two areas that are so critical in the intellectual and ethical lives of our students."

Rawlings has made the strengthening of undergraduate education in a research university context a hallmark of his administration. His goal is "to create a more seamless living and learning environment on campus -- one in which our students' intellectual and social lives are more closely interwoven, both inside and outside the classroom, through shared values and principles."

"The development of interdisciplinary courses in ethical reasoning and in information sciences will help us achieve that goal," he said.

Cornell will invest the $8.5 million loan, use the income from that investment to finance development of the programs and repay the principal by 2007, according to Cornell Provost Don Randel.

The Pew Charitable Trusts support nonprofit activities in the areas of culture, education, the environment, health and human services, public policy and religion. In 1999, with approximately $4.7 billion in assets, the Pew Trusts granted $250 million to 206 nonprofit organizations.