Who Speaks for the Dead

One ethics review-board worksheet

Complete one ethics review-board worksheet: Parts A–E plus the position slip block. Use the supplied fictional scenario record printed in the worksheet. Your work explains a ruling and the strongest case against it; it does not claim that you attended, ordered or performed an examination, and it does not change our own case.

Complete one ethics review-board worksheet, Parts A–E plus the position slip block. Hand the paper worksheet to Mr. Mendoza before leaving, or submit one PDF to this section's assignment, Wk5 D11 · Who Speaks for the Dead (PLTW 1.2.1), by September 23, at the due time on the assignment. Use your period and investigator code, no names. Do not submit twice; the Day 11 Cornell page and the autopsy vocabulary entry stay in your notebook.

Supplied fictional scenario record plus the own-case authorization memo, available to all students including absent students. You are reasoning about a supplied fictional scenario record and your own case's one-line authorization memo. A record may give less than you would like; preserve that limit instead of filling the gap.

This is a reasoning exercise on a fictional scenario. Real cases involve real law, real faith, and real families; our ruling binds nobody.

Your Case A D11 assignment · Daily directions

Five steps

1. Open your own-case worksheet. Add your period and investigator code, no names. Label the header "Supplied fictional scenario record." Read R2 to R4, record autopsy, jurisdiction and accommodation, and answer A1, copying the first three words of the sentence you used, and A2.
2. Study the worked model, then read the scenario record. The track meet is a practice case, not ours. Walk its seven steps, then read the scenario record and start B1: three sides, each interest in one sentence, no arguments yet.
3. Argue both sides in pairs. Take your role (the family's advocate, the examiner, the public-interest representative, or the housemate's attorney), argue it with reasons you can point to, and swap sides at the signal. Finish B1's fair-argument and accommodation columns, then answer B2.
4. Rule and write. B3: your ruling in one sentence, the deciding principle in one sentence, and the strongest argument against your ruling stated the way its best defender would say it. C1: the five-to-seven-sentence decision memo, respectful of every person in the scenario.
5. Finish, copy the slip block and submit. Complete D1 and E1 to E3 from memory, then check. Copy your ruling with principle, the opposing argument and the accommodation ordered into the position slip block. Hand in the one worksheet on paper or as one PDF in your section's assignment.

The worked model, the optional check and the short check do not require another upload. Complete Parts A to E and the position slip block in the one worksheet.

The 80-minute plan

• 0–8 min (from 0:00), Teacher launch: Identify the one worksheet, your case and the paper-record boundary. Do the do-now. Hear the own-case authorization memo: examination ordered, next of kin consented, no findings released. Tasks do-now.
• 8–22 min (from 0:08), Read the briefing and answer from the text: Read R2 to R4, record autopsy, jurisdiction and accommodation, then answer A1, copying the first three words of the sentence you used, and A2. Tasks A1, A2.
• 22–34 min (from 0:22), One guided example, then the scenario record: Walk the track-meet worked model through its seven steps. Read the scenario record and start B1: name the three sides and write each interest in one sentence, no arguments yet. Tasks B1.
• 34–50 min (from 0:34), Argue both sides in pairs: Take your role and argue it with reasons you can point to. Swap sides at minute 42. Finish B1's fair-argument and accommodation columns as you listen, then answer B2. Tasks B1, B2.
• 50–70 min (from 0:50), Rule and write, individual work with teacher support: Write B3: your ruling, the deciding principle and the strongest argument against your ruling. Then write C1, the five-to-seven-sentence decision memo, respectful of every person in the scenario. Tasks B3, C1.
• 70–80 min (from 1:10), Vocabulary, self-check and submit: Complete D1 and E1 to E3 from memory, then check. Copy your ruling with principle, the opposing argument and the accommodation ordered into the position slip block. Hand in paper or one PDF. Tasks D1, E1, E2, E3, slip.

Check and hand in

Your worksheet needs A1 and A2 with their citations, B1's three-row interests table, B2's three accommodations and a reasoned choice, B3's ruling, principle and steelman, C1's memo with all five parts, D1 and E1 to E3, and the position slip block filled to match B3 and C1. No invented finding, no examination described as if it happened, no name for any real person, no fact beyond the scenario record.

Hand the paper worksheet to Mr. Mendoza before leaving, or submit one PDF in your section's assignment by the due time posted on it. Use your period and investigator code. Do not submit the same worksheet twice. Keep the Day 11 Cornell page and the autopsy vocabulary entry in your notebook.

If you were absent or need help

Use the same scenario record printed in your worksheet; it is the data set for everyone. Write "canned data set" at the top of Part B so it is scored as make-up work. Since you cannot argue in a pair, write the family's advocate's best argument and the examiner's best argument yourself in B1, then complete the same product through the slip block. Do not invent facts, findings or a family's words the record does not give.

Lost your place? Find the next unanswered task ID and use F1's restart cue. Guided notes and the separate worked model are support, not extra submissions.

There was no lab work today. The class sat as a review board on a separate, fictional scenario packet (DOC-5), argued both sides in pairs, swapped sides, and wrote position slips. Our own case's authorization memo was attached: the examination is ordered and the next of kin (the closest living relative, who speaks for the family) consented, so the debate stays hypothetical.

If your teacher is absent: Complete the paper-record worksheet from the briefing, the worked model and the scenario record. Argue in pairs only if the adult in the room can keep the steelman rule; otherwise write both sides in B1. Submit the same one product. Nothing physical is opened, handled or examined.

R1 / R2. The required briefing

R1. Your one worksheet

Complete the ethics review-board worksheet, Parts A–E plus the position slip block at the end. Today you sit on a review board. There is no specimen, no instrument and no collection. You reason about a supplied fictional scenario record and you read our own case's one-line authorization memo. Nothing you write claims that you attended, ordered or performed an examination, and nothing today releases a finding, a cause or a manner of death.

Keep every answer tied to the record. A record may give less than you would like: no name for the family's tradition, no age for the housemate, no result from any examination. Preserve that limit instead of filling the gap. The scenario is the same for everyone, present or absent.

R2. By what right: jurisdiction

Before the medical thread opens its instruments, it has to answer a human question: by what right? A medical examiner is a physician with legal authority to investigate certain deaths: sudden, unexplained, violent, or in official custody. In those deaths the examination is not optional and family consent is not required by law, because society has decided the truth of a death is a public good. That decision has costs, and today you weigh them honestly.

Jurisdiction is the set of deaths the law gives a medical examiner the authority to investigate: sudden, unexplained, violent, or in custody. Analogy to hold onto: the referee's field of play. In this reading the list is a classroom rule for the scenario, not a statement of any one state's statute. Authority is not obligation: in the scenario record, the office that has authority still chooses what form the examination takes, from a full examination to release without one. A ruling has to say which option it picked and why.

R3 / R4. The required briefing

R3. Dignity and accommodation

Dignity requirements are not decoration: examinations are documented, limited to what the question requires, and the person is treated as a patient to the end. Many traditions have burial timelines and bodily-integrity beliefs that an autopsy strains. Examiners accommodate what can be accommodated (speed, minimal technique, returning all tissues) and must sometimes proceed over objection. The honest frame is a conflict of real goods: family autonomy and religious liberty against public truth and, sometimes, justice for the dead themselves.

An accommodation is a change to how an examination is done so a family's needs are respected while the question still gets answered. Analogy to hold onto: an ADA ramp. The scenario record names four: speed (release within the burial timeline); minimal or targeted technique; return of all tissues; and an external-and-imaging-only examination, where imaging means scans such as X-ray or CT, which look inside without opening. The reading's answer to which of these still answers the question in doubt is a targeted technique aimed at the injury in question. That is the reading's answer for this scenario. It is not a promise that a targeted examination answers every question in every case.

R4. Why perform one at all

Why perform one at all? Because some questions only the body can answer: which injury came first, what disease was hiding, whether a death that looks like one manner is actually another. Getting cause and manner right protects the living: it catches dangerous products, missed diseases, and disguised violence.

An autopsy is the systematic medical examination of a body to determine cause and manner of death. Analogy to hold onto: the final physical exam. The ten-year idea: an autopsy is the last physical exam, performed for the living as much as the dead; it answers the questions the body can still answer. Today no examination happens and none is described. You reason about whether one should, on a supplied fictional record.

R5 / R6. The required briefing

R5. How to take a position: interests, a fair argument, a deciding principle

Today is a position-taking day: you will argue a side, steelman the other, and notice that the discipline is the same as the lab's: reasons you can point to, limits you must state. To steelman is to state the other side's argument the way its best defender would say it.

An interest is what a person or group needs or is trying to protect in the scenario: the family's faith and timeline, the public's need for the truth, the examiner's duty. A deciding principle is the one rule you apply when interests conflict, stated so that someone who disagrees can still see how you got there. Fill the interests table before you rule. A position without the other side's best argument is incomplete.

A complete decision memo names the ruling, the deciding principle, the accommodation ordered, the strongest opposing argument and why it did not win, and one sentence on what would change your mind. Keep it respectful of every person in the scenario. The claim ceiling holds for every reader. This is a reasoning exercise on a fictional scenario. Real cases involve real law, real faith, and real families; our ruling binds nobody.

R6. Our case today: the authorization memo

The scenario you argue is a separate fictional packet. Our own case supplies one line today, and nothing you rule changes it. Follow only your own case's note.

Case A note

Our case's examination is ordered today, over no family objection: the next of kin consented. Next of kin means the closest living relative, who speaks for the family. Team F logs the autopsy authorization date as a timeline event. No new physical evidence, no findings, no cause and no manner of death are released today.

PLTW connection and optional help

This John Hay original worksheet practices ethical reasoning, fair argument and careful record keeping connected to PLTW Activity 1.2.1 Anatomy of an Autopsy, referenced by title only. It does not certify official activity completion. myPLTW student access is reported down for technical reasons; the portal day page and these printed materials carry the day.

F1 shows the reasoning workflow. The separate track-meet worked model shows one complete ruling with its steelman. Guided notes can support your work but are not another submission. Carry your worksheet to the next assigned case lesson, where the body starts answering: the external exam and time of death arrive as supplied records, not as anything you perform.

Plain-English terms

Autopsy

The systematic medical examination of a body to determine cause and manner of death. Analogy to hold onto: the final physical exam.

Jurisdiction

The set of deaths the law gives a medical examiner the authority to investigate: sudden, unexplained, violent, or in custody. Analogy to hold onto: the referee's field of play.

Accommodation

A change to how an examination is done so a family's needs are respected while the question still gets answered. Analogy to hold onto: an ADA ramp.

Interest

What a person or group needs or is trying to protect in the scenario: the family's faith and timeline, the public's need for the truth, the examiner's duty.

Deciding principle

The one rule you apply when interests conflict, stated so that someone who disagrees can still see how you got there.

Next of kin

The closest living relative, who speaks for the family.

Integrity (of the body)

The body kept whole.

Advocate

A person who speaks for them.

Limited (examination)

Targeted.

Imaging

Scans such as X-ray or CT, which look inside without opening.

Expedite

Speed up.

Undetermined

No manner assigned.

Steelman

To steelman is to state the other side's argument the way its best defender would say it.

No laboratory preparation applies to this day: there is no specimen, no instrument and no collection. The next assigned case lesson opens the external exam and time of death as supplied records; any separate physical activity keeps its own preparation requirement.

The track meet: a practice case, not ours

This practice scenario is printed on the separate track-meet worked model, not in your own case's worksheet. It is not Case A or Case B, and it is not the scenario you rule on in Part B. Use its structure, not its answers, in your worksheet.

The practice scenario

A 19-year-old collapses and dies during a track meet; the family wants the body released within two days for a funeral, and the examiner suspects an undiagnosed heart condition that the athlete's two younger siblings could share.

What to notice: the folder is closed and the chair is empty. The ruling has to be written so the person who is not in the room could read it and see how you got there.

Steps 1 to 4

1. Name the sides before ruling: the family, the examiner, the public (here, the siblings and other young athletes). Three rows, no arguments yet.
2. Write each side's interest in one sentence. Family: bury their child on time and whole. Examiner: learn what stopped a young heart, which only the body can answer. Public: if the cause runs in the family, two living siblings need to know.
3. State each side's strongest argument the way its best defender would. Family: "Our grief and our faith are real, and the death was witnessed by hundreds; nobody suspects a crime." Examiner: "A witnessed collapse tells me it was sudden, not why; a hidden heart condition is exactly the kind of thing that kills the next sibling." Public: "Getting cause right protects the living."
4. List the accommodations that fit: expedite so the two-day timeline holds; a targeted examination of the heart only; return of all tissues; imaging first, opening only if imaging cannot answer.

The track meet. Steps 5 to 7, the finished product and its limits

Steps 5 to 7

5. Pick the deciding principle and say it so a person who disagrees can see how you got there: "When a finding could protect identifiable living people, the examination proceeds, in the smallest and fastest form that answers the question."
6. Write the ruling in one sentence: a targeted heart examination, expedited to meet the funeral, all tissues returned. Then write the strongest argument against your own ruling, fairly: "A targeted exam is still an opening of the body the family holds sacred, and genetic testing on a blood sample from the siblings themselves could answer the family question without touching the deceased." Say what would change your mind: evidence that testing the siblings could answer the family's question as well as a targeted examination would.
7. Check the ceiling: this is a fictional scenario; the ruling binds nobody, and the tone respects every person in it.

Finished product

Ruling: a targeted, expedited heart examination with all tissues returned, under the principle that a finding that can protect identifiable living people justifies the smallest examination that answers the question. Strongest opposing argument, stated fairly: sibling blood testing might answer the family question without opening the body at all.

What the model does and does not claim

The heart condition, whether it runs in a family, and whether a blood test on the siblings could answer the question are premises of a practice scenario. No condition, test or reliability figure is named, and none should be added. The model shows the shape of a complete ruling: sides named, interests written, arguments stated fairly, accommodations listed, one principle, one ruling, one honest steelman, one sentence on what would change your mind.

Now do the same steps on the scenario record in Part B. Present and absent students use the same record.

F1. Name, argue, rule

Full text equivalent

Read the scenario record and find its four parts: the death, the examiner's view, the family's objection, and the law and the options. Name the three sides before you argue anything: the family, the examiner, and the public or the law. Write each side's interest in one sentence. State each side's strongest argument the way its best defender would say it. List the accommodations the record names that fit the situation: speed, minimal or targeted technique, return of all tissues, an external-and-imaging-only examination. Pick one deciding principle and state it so a person who disagrees can still see how you got there, then rule by choosing among the record's options. Write the strongest argument against your own ruling, fairly, and one sentence on what would change your mind. Check the ceiling: the scenario is fictional, the ruling binds nobody, and the tone respects every person in it. Copy your ruling with principle, the opposing argument and the accommodation ordered into the slip block, and hand in the one worksheet.

Optional restart cue

Find the next unanswered task ID. Use R2 for jurisdiction, R3 for accommodations, R4 for why an autopsy exists, R5 for the ruling and the steelman, and the scenario record for every fact. Do not switch to the other case or create a second product.

The supplied fictional scenario record

Supplied fictional scenario record plus the own-case authorization memo, available to all students including absent students. Use the scenario packet in today's pack. Fill the interests table before you rule. A position without the other side's best argument is incomplete.

Your case: STATIC, case number JH-26-0831-A. Setting: Statik Sound, a neighborhood recording studio. The scenario itself is the same fictional packet (DOC-5) for every student, present or absent.

The record names 5 options, 4 argued roles and 4 accommodations. Nothing beyond these rows is supplied; if the record is silent, write that it is not supplied.

Our own case today

The medical thread pauses for the question that governs it: who authorizes an autopsy here, and what does dignity require? Our case's examination is ordered today, over no family objection: the next of kin consented. No findings are released.

• Team A, Scene and Documentation: Chair one exchange pair-group; keep the steelman rule honest.
• Team B, Trace: Chair one exchange pair-group.
• Team C, Serology and DNA: Chair one exchange pair-group.
• Team D, Toxicology and Chemistry: Chair one exchange pair-group.
• Team E, Medical Examiner: Brief the class, in one minute, on what the next case lesson opens: the external exam and time of death, as supplied records.
• Team F, Records and Timeline: Log today as a timeline event: the autopsy authorization date in our case.

Notebook pages: Day 11 Cornell page; Vocabulary bank: autopsy entry. Keep the Day 11 Cornell page and the Vocabulary bank: autopsy entry in your notebook.

Your Parts A to E worksheet

Case A, STATIC, Period 1-2. Investigator code, not name:

Header label: Supplied fictional scenario record.

Date: September 23

Answer from the reading above. Cite the sentence you used by copying its first three words in quotation marks.

PBS-U1-D11-A1

According to the reading, which deaths fall under a medical examiner's legal authority? Copy the first three words of the sentence you used, in quotation marks.

The reading lists four kinds of death. The answer is the list, not the word jurisdiction by itself.

Deaths listed

Supporting sentence starts

PBS-U1-D11-A2

The reading says an autopsy is performed for the living as much as the dead. Name two ways the reading says getting cause and manner right protects living people.

Find the sentence that begins with the words getting cause and manner right.

First way

Second way

B1. The interests table

PBS-U1-D11-B1

Fill the interests table for the scenario record: three sides (the family, the examiner, the public or the law), each with an interest in one sentence, their strongest argument stated fairly, and an accommodation that would help them. Fill the table before you rule.

A fair argument is one its own side would recognize. Use the accommodations the scenario record names; do not invent a new medical option.

Use the scenario packet in today's pack. Fill the interests table before you rule. A position without the other side's best argument is incomplete.

B2 / B3. Accommodations, then rule and steelman

PBS-U1-D11-B2

List three accommodations an examiner can offer an objecting family, and say which of them still lets the question in doubt be answered.

The reading's own answer is in the scenario record. Say it in your words and give the reason.

Accommodation 1

Accommodation 2

Accommodation 3

Which still answers the question, and why

PBS-U1-D11-B3

Write your ruling in one sentence and the deciding principle in one sentence. Then write the strongest argument against your ruling, stated the way its best defender would say it.

State the principle so a person who disagrees can still see how you got there. The opposing argument should sound like its best defender, not like a weak version you can knock down.

Ruling

Deciding principle

Strongest opposing argument, stated fairly

C1. The decision memo

PBS-U1-D11-C1

Write the review board's decision memo: the ruling, the deciding principle, the accommodation ordered, the strongest opposing argument and why it did not win, and one sentence on what would change your mind. Five to seven sentences, respectful of every person in the scenario. This is a reasoning exercise on a fictional scenario; the ruling binds nobody.

Count the five parts before you count the sentences. Do not add facts the scenario record does not give, and do not describe an examination as if it happened.

The five parts: the ruling; the deciding principle; the accommodation ordered; the strongest opposing argument and why it did not win; one sentence on what would change your mind. Five to seven sentences, respectful of every person in the scenario.

Your writing:

D / E. Finish the same worksheet

One line each. These come from today's pack; answer from memory first, then check.

PBS-U1-D11-D1

Use autopsy, jurisdiction and accommodation correctly in one or two sentences about today's work. A definition alone does not count; use the words about something real.

Something real means the scenario, the worked model or our own case's memo. No invented finding.

One or two applied sentences

PBS-U1-D11-E1

According to the reading, when can an examination legally proceed without family consent?

Answer from memory first, then check R2.

One line

PBS-U1-D11-E2

Name two accommodations an examiner can offer an objecting family.

Any two from the reading's list.

Two accommodations

PBS-U1-D11-E3

What makes a position slip complete?

This is a rule check, not another ruling. Do not copy your B3 answer here.

One line

Optional single check, not alternate work plans

The examiner has legal authority to proceed. What does that authority require?

1. A full examination must follow.
2. The office chooses among its options; authority is not obligation.
3. The family's objection cancels the authority.

The worked model, the optional check and the short check do not require another upload. Complete Parts A to E and the position slip block in the one worksheet.

Short check

A death is sudden and unexplained, and the family refuses an autopsy. In this reading, does the examiner's authority depend on the family's consent, and what does the reading say that authority covers?

Notebook support, not another submission

Keep the Day 11 Cornell page and the Vocabulary bank: autopsy entry in your notebook.

Optional support

• Optional Guided Notes
• Day 11 Cornell page and the autopsy vocabulary entry, kept in the notebook
• Existing voluntary vocabulary extra credit, kept separate from required D1

Handoff, PLTW and the claim ceiling

Complete one ethics review-board worksheet, Parts A–E plus the position slip block. Hand the paper worksheet to Mr. Mendoza before leaving, or submit one PDF to this section's assignment, Wk5 D11 · Who Speaks for the Dead (PLTW 1.2.1), by September 23, at the due time on the assignment. Use your period and investigator code, no names. Do not submit twice; the Day 11 Cornell page and the autopsy vocabulary entry stay in your notebook.

Keep this worksheet. In the next assigned case lesson the body starts answering: the external exam and time of death arrive as supplied records. Nothing you rule today changes our own case, where the examination is ordered and the next of kin consented.

This John Hay original worksheet practices ethical reasoning, fair argument and careful record keeping connected to PLTW Activity 1.2.1 Anatomy of an Autopsy, referenced by title only. It does not certify official activity completion. myPLTW student access is reported down for technical reasons; the portal day page and these printed materials carry the day.

John Hay original local work connected by title; no official completion claim. The complete required briefing, scenario record and worked model are here.

Your Case A D11 assignment · Daily directions · Official PLTW section hub link: not supplied.

This is a reasoning exercise on a fictional scenario. Real cases involve real law, real faith, and real families; our ruling binds nobody. Nothing today claims that you attended, ordered or performed an examination, and nothing releases a finding, a cause or a manner of death.

No public background reference is printed for this day; the briefing cites the pack sections only.