Proposal For General Education Outcomes and Outcomes Assessment Process
Proposal Goals:
1. Satisfy ACCJC requirement that course, program/general education (GE), and institutional
outcomes are aligned. We should be able to show that course outcomes are mapped to GE
outcomes, and that GE outcomes are aligned with institutional outcomes, and the basis for
evaluating the institutional outcomes. (also, Goal 4)
2. Map course outcomes to GE outcomes so no additional assessment is required to analyze
achievement of GE outcomes.
3. Focus assessment dialogue on specific GE areas to provide the basis for meaningful arearelated dialogue.
4. Provide GE outcome assessment that can be used to evaluate achievement of institutional
learning outcomes.
General Education Outcomes and Assessment Proposal:
• The course content of each GE course is required to be aligned with the GE area
description as defined in the College Catalog and Board Policy (BP 4025).
•
At least one course outcome for each GE course is required to map to each of the GE areaspecific outcomes (or sub-area in the case of Area D).
•
Assessments results for the mapped course outcomes will be used to evaluate achievement
of the GE outcome in each area.
•
The assessment results from the mapped GE courses will also be used to evaluate the
effective communication and analytical thinking components of Institutional Learning
Outcome 1 (ILO #1: Academic and Career Technical Objectives). Assessment results
from GE Area E will also be used as part of the evaluation of Institutional Learning
Outcome 3 (ILO #3: Community and Global Responsibility).
Proposed General Education Outcomes
These are GE-Area specific, but each set is also a measure of effective communication (first
outcome) and critical thinking (second outcome).
Area A – Natural Sciences
• communicate scientific ideas;
• apply scientific concepts to analyze natural relationships.
Area B – Social Sciences
• communicate intellectual ideas related to the social sciences;
• apply social science concepts to analyze social, historical, political, anthropological or
psychological relationships.
Area C – Humanities
• communicate aesthetic and/or cultural ideas;
• analyze ideas or practices specific to the influence of culture on human expression.
Area D – Language, Communication and Rationality
Area D1- Writing.
• generate, compose, revise and communicate ideas clearly in writing;
• analyze ideas presented in writing, media, speech or artistic representations.
Area D2 – Oral Communication
• generate, compose, revise and communicate ideas clearly;
• analyze ideas presented in writing, media, speech or artistic representations.
Area D3 – Analytical Thinking
• communicate mathematical ideas;
• apply mathematical concepts to analyze relationships.
Area E – Multicultural Understanding
• communicate an awareness of cultures in a diverse global community;
• analyze issues from multiple perspectives, specifically as they relate to gender, self
identity, ethnicity, race, socioeconomic status, sexuality, worldview, collective
behavior, and/or values.
Proposal Implementation Process:
Discipline (GE-Area) experts in coordination with divisional administrators will work to map
GE course outcomes to the required new GE outcomes. This mapping will be incorporated
into the assessment planning and reporting tools to allow existing course outcome analysis to
be used as the basis for dialogue and analysis of GE outcome achievement.
In the future (to be determined by the Curriculum Committee workload), course outlines will
be required to include mapping that shows how course outcomes are mapped to the GE
outcomes as described in this proposal.
The area-specific outcomes will be assessed on a 4-year cycle. One of the two area outcomes
will be assessed every two years, with a complete cycle of assessment completed every 4
years.
This analysis and associated dialogue of the area-specific GE outcomes will consist of using
course outcome assessments to evaluate the area-specific GE outcome.
The GE assessment reporting template will require that the analysis include a statement
regarding the degree to which the assessment reflects achievement of effective
communication or critical thinking (depending on which of the two area-specific outcomes
are assessed).
Analysis of Institutional Learning Outcomes will include analyses of the GE assessment
reports, and will normally be conducted following a complete cycle of GE assessment.