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LIBERTY, MO. — Cloning. Stem cell research. Assisted suicide.

When the next academic year begins at William Jewell College, those and other touchy topics are likely to be included in the school's new bioethics program.

The major will include study in biology, chemistry, and religion and philosophy, and it's being introduced as the Kansas City area positions itself to become a hub for biomedical research.

The Center for Practical Bioethics is in Kansas City, as is the Stowers Institute for Medical Research.

"I don't think there is any question it will be synergistic," said Bill Duncan, president of the Kansas City Area Life Sciences Institute.

Emily Abdoler, a junior who has majored in molecular biology at the historically Baptist school, is one of the first six students planning to pursue a bioethics degree there.

"Society has the capability to do all this stuff as far as human life is concerned," Abdoler said. "Of course, I am a big advocate of using our capabilities. ... But we need to keep up with it ethically as well."

Abdoler said one reason she chose William Jewell was the school's push to create a bioethics major or minor.

"It made Jewell seem very proactive to me," she said.

Kansas University does not have a bioethics program, although some bioethics courses are taught at the Lawrence campus and at University of Kansas Medical Center in Kansas City, Kan. One of those teachers, philosophy professor Don Marquis, has studied and researched bioethics for 30 years.

William Jewell is the only school Marquis knows that now has its own bioethics program.

Marquis can see a bioethics program working at William Jewell more easily than he can at KU. A "liberal artsy degree" in bioethics at William Jewell will include a mix of classes from different departments, he said.

"It's a little harder to do here (at KU) because there is more of a sense of disciplinary boundaries," Marquis said.

Interest among KU students and faculty for a bioethics program and bioethics classes would have to be greater than it is now, Marquis said. During the spring semester Marquis taught a large class about medical ethics. But a class he has taught about death and dying in modern medicine did not bring much of an enrollment, he said.

Marquis also said he thought taking a bioethics class at KU along with classes in conjunction with other programs was adequate.

At William Jewell, associate biology professor Dan Heruth, who is coordinating the bioethics major with a religion and philosophy professor, said the school expected to work with the Med Center and Stowers Institute to provide experience for students.

The bioethics major also was in keeping with William Jewell's religious traditions, Heruth said.

"Our goal at the university," he said, "is to train responsible students who understand they have an ethical role to play in society."

While the school hopes its graduates will find a ready market for their degrees, at least one observer remained skeptical.

"I don't see it leading to great employability," said Bill Bondeson, a medical ethics professor at the University of Missouri in Columbia.

Still, Bondeson applauded Jewell's efforts.

"I say more power to them," he said. "I'll be curious to see what kind of demand they get."