Is it worthwhile for college professors to join SIGCSE? When I had grant money or worked in industry, I was a member of the Association for Computing Machine (ACM) and the Special Interest Group on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE), which holds several annual conferences and publishes ACM Inroads. Now that I'm no longer publishing in CS education, am focused on teaching, and would have to pay for membership out of my own pocket, I'm wondering if membership is worthwhile. What do SIGCSE members or non-members in situations similar to mine think?
I would say yes, definitely. It is a great bunch of well informed and friendly people. The conferences are very valuable, including the panel discussions, demos, and tutorials. 

The SIGCSE conference is also a place at which some of your students might publish and, if they are interested in teaching as a career, meet people who can help them. The people who go to the conference have broad interest in CS as a whole, not just teaching. 

Some of the questions that you ask here would find ready answers in the SIGCSE community. Many things done and discussed in the community would enhance your own teaching. 

SIGCSE also has an international conference (ITICSE) at which people from lots of places, but mostly Europe, come together annually. 

If you don't care to get conference proceedings, etc, on paper, an electronic only option is available and very inexpensive. 

I'm a long time member, never an officer, frequent reviewer. I've maintained membership even after retirement, though I've withdrawn from other, more technical, SIGS. Worth it, always. 



Let me add that ethics and related topics are often in the Inroads magazine and a number of members are strongly focused on ethics (say, Don Gotterbarn)