UNIVERSITY OF NORTHERN IOWA
2014 LIBERAL ARTS CORE
STUDENT LEARNING GOALS AND OUTCOMES
CATEGORY 1: CORE COMPETENCIES
First-Year Cornerstone (6 hours required to satisfy Categories 1A AND 1B)
Goal 1: Communication covers the skills individuals (selves) need to send and receive messages, but also the language, grammar, concepts and associations to words and images that allow us to interact with each other socially. Students will achieve this goal by:
Outcome 1: Composing and presenting effective written and oral messages in a variety of contexts.
Outcome 2: Documenting your awareness and skillful use of effective writing and speaking processes.
Goal 2: Success in college, at its most basic level, is the student's responsibility, but students can also develop strategies that can assist them in being successful throughout one's college career. Students will achieve this goal by focusing on:
Outcome 1: Demonstrating strategies for succeeding in college and beyond.
Outcome 2: Working constructively in groups to solve problems and accomplish tasks.
Goal 3: Civility is embodied in one's ability to interact well with others. Civility requires knowing that one’s own behaviors always take place in relation to the norms, expectations and interpretations of others. Students are going to work on this by focusing on:
Outcome1: Recognizing that there are multiple perspectives and world views, and identifying how these differences affect interactions with others.
Outcome 2: Examining the impact of your beliefs and values on your interactions with others.
1A. Reading and Writing (3 hours required)
Goal 1: Students will display the ability to produce written texts that are focused, clear, complete, and effective.
Outcome 1: Ideas expressed and explained in written texts are organized and communicated clearly, with detailed explanation and support for points made.
Outcome 2: Research and source materials are used critically and with understanding of their content and context.
Outcome 3: Ability to use professional documentation style correctly and consistently.
Outcome 4: Written texts demonstrate understanding of audience needs, critical context, and writing purpose.
Goal 2: Students will display the knowledge of and ability to practice the processes of effective writing.
Outcome 1:Awareness and skillful use of writing processes, including invention, drafting, revising, and editing.
1B. Speaking and Listening
Goal 1: Presentational/Speaking Skills: Students will display competence in creating and presenting oral messages in a variety of contexts.
Outcome 1: Create and present well-organized, well-delivered speeches.
Outcome 2: Use effective audience analysis to communicate in interpersonal, group, and public situations.
Outcome 3: Use research support to make a persuasive argument.
Outcome 4: Use appropriate visual aids and/or technology to enhance communication.
Outcome 5: Demonstrate an awareness of the ethical responsibilities of communicators in public, interpersonal, and group situations.
Outcome 6: Work constructively in groups to solve problems and accomplish tasks by applying specific group communication concepts and processes.
Goal 2: Thinking/Listening Skills: Students will develop thinking and listening skills necessary for effective communication in a variety of relational contexts.
Outcome 1: Identify how the process of perception works in everyday life.
Outcome 2: Critically analyze and interpret verbal and nonverbal messages.
Outcome 3: Identify specific strategies for how interpersonal relationships begin, are maintained and end.
Outcome 4: Apply interpersonal conflict concepts to personal interactions.
Outcome 5: Demonstrate an understanding of language bias/prejudice and its impact on the communication process.
Outcome 6: Demonstrate an understanding of culture and its impact on the communication process.
Outcome 7: Demonstrate effective listening in a variety of contexts.
1C. Quantitative Techniques and Understanding
Goal 1: Make sense of quantitative information.
Outcome 1: Interpret information from verbal, graphical, numerical, and algebraic perspectives used to describe or model quantitative situations.
Goal 2: Use appropriate mathematical tools/techniques to work with quantitative information.
Goal 2: Use appropriate mathematical tools/techniques to work with quantitative information.
Goal 2: Use appropriate mathematical tools/techniques to work with quantitative information.
Outcome 1: Represent and manipulate quantitative information, using standard mathematical conventions, to clarify meaning.
Outcome 2: Draw correct conclusions from quantitative information and construct valid arguments to justify them.
Goal 3: Value mathematics as a natural way to approach and address questions that arise in daily life, the workplace, and society.
Outcome 1: Recognize the broader definition of mathematics.
Outcome 2: Increase mathematical confidence as it is applied to daily life and lifelong learning.
1D. Personal Wellness
Outcome 1: Students will gain knowledge to be able to distinguish between healthy behaviors and risky behaviors.
Outcome 2: Students will demonstrate an understanding of the decision-making process related to the selection of healthy and risky behaviors.
Outcome 3: Students will demonstrate an understanding of the role of exercise theory, nutrition, stress management, and healthful sexual and substance use decision-making in maximizing one’s quality of life.
Outcome 4: Students will assess various personal health risk behaviors, including physical fitness level, dietary habits, stress management, alcohol and drug use behaviors and sexual behaviors.
Outcome 5: Students will demonstrate an understanding of the role of lifetime conditioning and lifetime skill activities in maximizing one’s quality of life.
Outcome 6: Students will experience the process of becoming more physically fit through participation in moderate to vigorous physical activities contributing to health-related issues.
Outcome 7: Students will learn or increase their skill in a lifetime skill activity which will have the potential to enhance their long-term health if adhered to on a regular basis.
Outcome 8: Students will develop and learn to adapt to their lifestyle a personalized physical activity program that, if followed over the long-haul, will have the potential to enhance their quantity and quality of life.
Dimensions of Well-Being (DWB) and Dimensions of Well-Being Lab (DWBL)
Goal 1: Students will recognize that wellness affects all aspects and quality of life.
Outcome 1: Describe and differentiate the 6 dimensions of wellness and apply to content area (DWB)
Outcome 2: Know how to self-assess (DWBL)
Goal 2: Students will be able to apply decision-making processes to improve well-being.
Outcome 1: Identify credible and reliable sources of wellness information for decision- making purposes. (DWB)
Outcome 2: Explain behavior change via a theoretical perspective. (DWB)
Outcome 3: Apply knowledge from self-assessment to create goals. (DWBL)
Outcome 4: Ability to perform basic techniques of a specific activity. (DWBL)
Goal 3: Students will be able to articulate why wellness is important.
Outcome 1: Identity situations that illustrate how wellness can impact the everyday life of individuals, society and/or environment. (DWB)
Outcome 2: Identify situations that illustrate how wellness can impact me. (DWBL)
CATEGORY 2: CIVILIZATIONS AND CULTURES
2A. Humanities
Goal: The purpose of Humanities 1, 2, and 3 is to acquaint students with the Western tradition as expressed in its literature, philosophy, religion, politics, arts, sciences, and technology. The study both of history and of core texts in their contexts is central to this process. Humanities 1, 2, and 3 share the broader goals of the Liberal Arts Core, including the development of core skills such as reading, writing, and critical inquiry.
Outcome 1: Students who complete Humanities 1, 2, and/or 3 should be able to explain the contents of the works of literature, religion, philosophy, etc. which they were assigned; be able to place those works in the historical and/or cultural context within which they were written; and discuss what importance they have for the intellectual and/or religious tradition of the West.
Outcome 2: Be able to place major works of art, sculpture, and architecture within the periods and cultures to which they belong, and discuss how those works relate to intellectual, religious, or historical developments in those periods and cultures.
Outcome 3: Identify significant historical events and developments in the periods which they studied, discuss this origins, how they relate to intellectual, religious, and other cultural developments, and their importance for Western civilization.
2B. Non-Western Cultures
Goal 1: Students will achieve a broad understanding of a particular Non-Western Culture.
Outcome 1: Students will be able to independently and critically interpret a document, item from the news, artifact, question, or scenario in the light of an informed general understanding of the particular Non-Western Culture they have studied.
Goal 2: Building upon this understanding of a particular Non-Western Culture, students may also achieve a better appreciation of the simultaneous uniqueness and universality of all humanity.
Outcome 1: Students may also be able to draw some cross-culturally comparative and/or universal conclusions from the same document, item from the news, artifact, question or scenario.
CATEGORY 3: FINE ARTS, LITERATURE, PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION
Goal: Students shall be able to articulate and enhanced understanding of the fine arts and the study of literature and/or philosophy and religion.
3A. Fine Art
Outcome 1: Explain the nuance and meanings in a variety of works of artistic/creative works.
Outcome 2: Explain and support the values of studying and understanding artistic creative activity.
3B. Literature and Philosophy
Outcome 1: Explain the nuance and meanings in a variety of works of philosophy and/or literature and religion.
Outcome 2: Explain and support the values of studying and understanding literary and philosophic works.
3C. Religion
Outcome 1: Explain the nuances and meanings in a variety of religious texts.
Outcome 2: Explain and support the values of studying diverse approaches to religion.
CATEGORY 4: NATURAL SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
Goal 1: Know the processes and dynamic nature of science
Outcome 1: Describe how scientific concepts and principles apply to the natural world.
Outcome 2: Recognize that scientific knowledge is durable but subject to change.
Goal 2: Apply scientific reasoning skills to investigate natural phenomena.
Outcome 1: Develop skills to generate and critique testable hypotheses related to science.
Outcome 2: Engage in the experimental process by conducting observations, making predictions, collecting data and/or organizing results.
Goal 3: Be able to articulate why science is important.
Outcome 1: Identify situations that illustrate how science can impact the everyday life of individuals, society, and/or the environment.
CATEGORY 5: SOCIAL SCIENCE
Goals: The Liberal Arts Core should encourage students to develop skills in inquiry, critical analysis, and logical thinking. The social science component of the Liberal Arts Core should contribute to students’ knowledge and understanding of the economic, environmental, geographical, historical, political, psychological, and socio-cultural influences on human behavior, relationships, and institutions; and how human behavior can be analyzed from social scientific and historical perspectives.
Outcomes are demonstrable general consequences of the process of attempting to reach the goals of the category. As such, after completing Category V of the Liberal Arts Core, students should be able to:
Outcome 1: Discuss the kinds of questions social scientists and historians ask.
Outcome 2: Identify some major concepts and/or issues within the social sciences and history.
Outcome 3: Comprehend and identify ways in which human behavior, relationships, and institutions are influenced by economic, environmental, geographical, historical, political, psychological, and socio-cultural structures and processes.
Outcome 4: Describe and critique scientific methods social scientists use to explore social and behavioral phenomena.
CATEGORY 6: CAPSTONE
Goal 1: Challenge students’ intellect and promote the development of their higher-order thinking skills
Goal 2: Synthesize a student’s previous learning experiences in the LAC.
Goal 3: Provide students with a link of theory to practice through applied problem solving.
Goal 4: Promote the development of skills and dispositions associated with self-directed, life-long learning.