We continue to read bad news about the ethics of MBAs. Duke’s Fuqua School of Business recently announced they were taking disciplinary action against 10% of this year’s first year MBA class (28 students) for cheating. Of course, like Captain Renault in Casablanca, I am shocked, shocked that there was cheating at a competitive school filled with competitive people—even though the students had signed an honor Code.

Yet there are signs of hope. The New York Times of May 29, 2008 has an article called Hot Ticket in B-School: Bringing Life Values to Corporate Ethics. The Times reports that a lot of MBAs are deeply concerned with bringing their values to work. One Wharton alum who took a class with Professor Stuart Friedman is quoted saying “The course had a profound effect on me. As part of the class, you have to create a leadership vision for yourself, and he asks you to write a brief analysis of yourself 15 years from now. That exercise made me realize that what I was doing at the time — recruiting for hedge funds and venture capital firms — was not having any societal impact other than driving up compensation for people who were already grossly overpaid. I wanted to do something that was still financially rewarding, but had more of a positive impact on society.”

I had my own brush with hope last week. I was interviewed on Fox Business for a program called Fast Track—a career advice segment. (You can view the segment here.) Anna Gilligan and Christina Scotti are the two bright women responsible for this segment. They appear to be in their twenties (it would have been rude to ask)—a generation that many of us a little/lot older criticize for ethical behavior. (“How could they download that music for free?”) They have considerable latitude in choosing content. Yet these intelligent—and presumably ratings savvy—professionals have created a number of segments on ethics issues. “Is it ok to lie?” “Age in the office,” and “What do you do if you see an unethical act?”

After the interview, I asked Anna why. “We find these topics really interesting. We think others do too.”

There is hope for us yet.