March 06, 2025
Providence College team wins national business ethics competition
By Christopher Machado
Two Providence College students — both double majors in management and political science — earned first place at the national Templeton Business Ethics Case Competition, held at Stetson University in Florida from February 20-22, 2025.
William Ringuette ’26 and Zachary Stoyer ’27, who comprised PC’s first team to ever participate in the competition, topped teams from such institutions as Florida State University, Iowa State University, Penn State, and the University of Arizona.
The competition is sponsored by the Stetson Business Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility Initiative with a goal of promoting ethical business conduct and developing ethical leadership. Each year, participants are invited to Stetson’s campus in DeLand to present on an ethics case before a panel of judges.
This year, participants tackled “DEI at Daytona: Stay on Track, Accelerate Forward, or Race Away?” The Daytona International Speedway, located less than 20 miles from Stetson’s campus, is home to NASCAR’s Daytona 500. As an organization, NASCAR unveiled its Drive for Diversity more than 20 years ago to attract underrepresented groups to racing as drivers, sponsors, and crew members, and to attract a more diverse audience.
Through an ethical lens, students were asked to create a presentation addressing NASCAR’s challenges with the program. The 16 teams were sectioned into four brackets. The winners of each bracket after rounds one and two advanced to a third round where they gave eight-minute presentations.
In their presentation, “Changing Lanes,” Ringuette and Stoyer acknowledged that programs focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion are under scrutiny, but focused on the effectiveness of NASCAR’s efforts. They concluded that NASCAR could make genuine progress by featuring drivers from diverse backgrounds and by improving recruitment to mirror the NFL’s Rooney Rule — a policy that promotes diverse leadership among NFL franchises through hiring practices.
“We found that these alternative methods would make diversity efforts more fruitful while avoiding most of the political fire NASCAR has taken in recent years,” said Stoyer.
Patrick Kelly, Ph.D., the Michael A. Ruane Endowed Professor in Accountancy at PC, and Thomas Ptashnik, Ph.D., assistant professor of management, advised Ringuette and Stoyer in preparation for the competition. Kelly called the team’s victory a significant accomplishment because it was PC’s first time participating.
“It is very difficult to win these competitions,” Kelly said. “Zach and Will are only the second PC team to win a national ethics case competition in the last 10 years, and the first team that won a national competition was comprised for four senior accountancy majors. To have Zach and Will achieve this accomplishment as underclass students, and for the first time they competed in this particular competition, is very impressive.”
Kelly said the team’s victory also speaks to the breadth of ethics education at PC, which includes the Ethics in Business Education Program and the annual Providence College Ethics Case Competition. Ringuette and Stoyer were chosen to participate in the Stetson competition after finishing in second place at the Business Ethics Case Competition held at PC in October 2024.
Ringuette, who is from Sudbury, Massachusetts, realized that coursework in and outside his majors, including the Development of Western Civilization Program, prepared him for the challenge at Stetson.
“The philosophical teaching from my Civ professors, as well as what I learned in my General Ethics class, gave me a great foundation to develop and prepare my business ethics arguments,” Ringuette said.
He also credited help from PC faculty members. In addition to Kelly and Ptashnik, Abigail Corrington, Ph.D., assistant professor of management, and Sydnee Manley, Ph.D., assistant professor of accountancy, provided feedback to the team.
“Without them, I am certain the results would have been much different, so I am incredibly thankful to have been taught by such outstanding teachers,” Ringuette said.
As for taking first place in their first attempt at a national ethics competition, Ringuette and Stoyer described the outcome as “amazing” and said they were “overjoyed to have won.”
“We figured that we would have more of a learning experience in seeing the best of the best at this competition,” said Stoyer, who is from Garden City, New York. “Winning was a validation of the hard work that all of us put into preparation.”
Following the competition, participants had the opportunity to tour the NASCAR headquarters and speedway at Daytona.
