The track meet: a practice case, not ours

Part 3 of 4 · Worked example

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.

Seven steps

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.
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.

Connection to PLTW

Related PLTW reference:

• Activity 1.2.1 Anatomy of an Autopsy

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.

referenced by title only; all materials in this file are John Hay original work. Official PLTW section hub link: not supplied.

Turn in one worksheet

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 22, 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.

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.

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.