LEAP: LIBERAL EDUCATION AND AMERICA’S PROMISE
-SHARED LEARNING GOALS
WHAT’S IN IT FOR STUDENT AFFAIRS?
STUDENT AFFAIRS DIVISIONAL, UNIT, AND PROGRAM LEARNING OUTCOME ALIGNMENT
WHAT STARTED ALL THIS???
UNDERPERFORMING
 Former Harvard University President Derek Bok has summarized a wealth of
separate studies on student learning in his 2006 book, Our Underachieving Colleges.
 As he reports, college students are underperforming in virtually every area of
academic endeavor, from essential intellectual skills such as critical thinking, writing,
and quantitative reasoning to public purposes such as civic engagement and ethical
learning.
 Other research concludes that less than 10 percent of today’s college graduates have
the knowledge and experience to make them globally prepared. Confirming this
portrait of underachievement, less than 25 percent of human resource professionals
report that the recent college graduates they employ are well prepared for the
workforce.
DIVERSITY, COMPLEXITY, AND CHANGE
 In a democracy that is diverse, globally engaged, and dependent on citizen
responsibility, all students need an informed concern for the larger good because
nothing less will renew our fractured and diminished commons.
 In a world of daunting complexity, all students need practice in integrating and
applying their learning to challenging questions and real-world problems.
 In a period of relentless change, all students need the kind of education that
leads them to ask not just “how do we get this done?” but also “what is most
worth doing?”
THE ERA AND ECONOMY
 In an era when knowledge is the key to the future, all students need the scope
and depth of learning that will enable them to understand and navigate the dramatic
forces—physical, cultural, economic, technological—that directly affect the quality,
character, and perils of the world in which they live.
 In an economy where every industry—from the trades to advanced
technology enterprises—is challenged to innovate or be displaced, all students
need the kind of intellectual skills and capacities that enable them to get things done in
the world, at a high level of effectiveness.
ECONOMIC IMPACT
 Genuinely alarmed by their own international scanning, business leaders
have added another compelling layer of critique. In one urgent report
after another, they warn about Americans’ dangerous loss of
comparative advantage in the so-called STEM disciplines: science,
technology, engineering, and mathematics. And this, they point out, will
inevitably mean a loss of economic advantage as well.
COMMON OBLIGATION
 In a society as diverse as the United States, there can be no “one size-
fits-all” design for learning that serves all students and all areas of study.
The diversity that characterizes American higher education remains a
source of vitality and strength.
 Yet all educational institutions and all fields of study also share in a
common obligation to prepare their graduates as fully as possible for
the real-world demands of work, citizenship, and life in a complex and
fast-changing society. In this context, there is great value in a broadly
defined educational framework that provides both a shared sense of the
aims of education and strong emphasis on effective practices that help
students achieve these aims.
SILENCE
 Stunningly, however, American society has yet to confront the
most basic and far-reaching question of all.
 Across all the discussion of access, affordability, and even
accountability, there has been a near-total public and policy
silence about what contemporary college graduates need to
know and be able to do.
INTENTIONALITY
 Educational communities will also have to become far more
intentional themselves—both about the kinds of learning
students need, and about effective educational practices that
help students learn to integrate and apply their learning.
WHICH METRICS MATTER?
 Student success in college cannot be documented—as it usually
is—only in terms of enrollment, persistence, and degree
attainment.
 These widely used metrics, while important, miss entirely the
question of whether students who have placed their hopes for
the future in higher education are actually achieving the kind of
learning they need for a complex and volatile world.
21ST CENTURY EDUCATION
 Educators and employers have begun to reach similar conclusions—an
emerging consensus—about the kinds of learning Americans need from
college.
 The recommendations in this report are informed by the views of
employers, by new standards in a number of the professions, and by a
multiyear dialogue with hundreds of colleges, community colleges, and
universities about the aims and best practices for a twenty-first-century
education.
 The council urges a new recognition that, in this global century, every
student—not just the fortunate few—will need wide-ranging and crossdisciplinary knowledge, higher-level skills, an active sense of personal and
social responsibility, and a demonstrated ability to apply knowledge to
complex problems. The learning students need is best described as a
liberal—and liberating—education.
LIBERAL EDUCATION AND AMERICA’S PROMISE
—OR LEAP
PROMISES TO KEEP
 [It’s…] about the promises we need to make—and keep—to all
students who aspire to a college education, especially to those
for whom college is a route, perhaps the only possible route, to
a better future.
AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF COLLEGES AND
UNIVERSITIES RESPONDS
 AAC&U launched the LEAP initiative because the academy stands at a
crossroads.
 Millions of students today seek a college education, and record numbers
are actually enrolling without a serious national effort to recalibrate
college learning to the needs of the new global century,
 Too few of these students will reap the full benefits of college.
The essence of these learning goals
is a commitment to liberal education.
LIBERAL EDUCATION VALUE
 Belief in the power of liberal education and its importance in meeting
the challenges of the new global century. But they have also been
insistent that liberal education cannot be restricted, as it has been in the
past, mainly to colleges of arts and sciences, or to the general education
courses that most students take in addition to courses in their majors.
 The essential learning outcomes described….apply to the professional
and occupational majors as well as the more traditional settings for
liberal and liberal arts education.
LIBERAL EDUCATION DEFINED
 The University of Wisconsin System embraces the definition of liberal education developed by the American
Association of Colleges and Universities, a definition informed by AAC&U’s dialogue with hundreds of colleges,
universities, and business and civic leaders.
 Liberal education is a philosophy of education that empowers individuals
with broad knowledge and transferable skills, and a strong sense of values,
ethics, and civic engagement.These broad goals have been enduring even as
the courses and requirements that comprise a liberal education have
changed over the years.
 Characterized by challenging encounters with important and relevant issues today and throughout history, a liberal
education prepares graduates both for socially valued work and for civic leadership in their society. It usually includes
a general education curriculum that provides broad exposure to multiple disciplines and ways of knowing, along with
more in-depth study in at least one field or area of concentration.
[http://www.aacu.org/advocacy/What_is_liberal_education.cfm]
UW System Shared Learning Goals (2008)
•
Knowledge of Human Cultures and the Natural World including
breadth of knowledge and the ability to think beyond one’s discipline, major, or area
of concentration. This knowledge can be gained through the study of the arts,
humanities, languages, sciences, and social sciences.
•
Critical and Creative Thinking Skills including inquiry, problem solving,
and higher order qualitative and quantitative reasoning.
•
Effective Communication Skills including listening, speaking, reading,
writing, and information literacy.
•
Intercultural Knowledge and Competence including the ability to
interact and work with people from diverse backgrounds and cultures; to lead or
contribute support to those who lead; and to empathize with and understand those
who are different than they are.
•
Individual, Social and Environmental Responsibility including civic
knowledge and engagement (both local and global), ethical reasoning, and action.
THESE FIVE SHARED GOALS WERE DERIVED FROM EXTENSIVE
DISCUSSIONS AMONG FACULTY AND STAFF REPRESENTING
EVERY INSTITUTION WITHIN THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN
SYSTEM. THEY REPRESENT THE SYNTHESIS AND ESSENCE OF THE
GOALS OF THESE VARIOUS INSTITUTIONS.
 It is within this larger context of liberal education that we envision the UW System
Shared Learning Goals.
 The UW System Shared Learning Goals provide a framework to communicate the
meaning and value of a college education to students, parents, and the broader
community.
 The UW System Shared Learning Goals provide support to faculty, instructional and
academic staff to be more intentional in their teaching and learning activities. They
may be used to guide those at individual institutions to write specific, assessable,
objectives for student achievement, and to develop curriculum.
 The UW System Shared Learning Goals provide support to faculty, instructional and
academic staff to become more intentional in their teaching, learning, and extracurricular activities.
UW SYSTEM SLOS
 Many University of Wisconsin System campuses are currently working to
advance these primary learning goals and values. However, we can be more
intentional, coordinated, systematic, and effective in educating the citizens that
our communities, state, and nation need.
 United in our focus on these shared learning goals, the University of Wisconsin
System is committed to preparing students with the learning they need to
become life-long learners, to enjoy a high quality of life, and to succeed in and
contribute to our rapidly changing, increasingly global society.
College Learning for the New Global Century, AAC&U, January 2007
http://www.aacu.org/advocacy/leap/documents/GlobalCentury_final.pdf
UW System
SLGs
RATIONALE: WHY SHARED LEARNING
OUTCOMES?
1:13-2:19

https://video.search.yahoo.com/video/play;_ylt=A2KLqIOggmdWrEUALwgsnIlQ;_ylu=X3oDMTBzcGpmZHRqBHNlYwNzcgRzbGsDdmlkBHZ0aWQDBGdwb3MDNjQ?p=sail+loose+images&vid=e78e962b796a46f9aa29fa8a35255e01&turl=http%3A%2F%2Ftse2.mm.bing.net%2Fth%3Fid%3DWN.Z10kUkmR5cXxmMUsYVrTmQ%26pid%3D15.1%26h%3D168%26w%3D300%26c
%3D7%26rs%3D1&rurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D87InmxIGtV8&tit=Gopro+Europe+sailing%2FMastcam&c=3&h=168&w=300&l=286&sigr=11buo4s0a&sigt=10sf43127&sigi=12l2
rqorc&age=1330354178&fr2=p%3As%2Cv%3Av&b=61&fr=yhs-mozilla-001&hsimp=yhs-001&hspart=mozilla&tt=b
Intentionality
Congruency
Transparency
STUDENT AFFAIRS
 Some of the most powerful learning in college occurs in activities undertaken
as part of the co-curriculum, both on campus and through campus outreach
to community partners.
 The essential learning outcomes can be fostered through intentional
integration of students’ in-class and out-of-class activities.
 There should be far more systematic attention paid to fostering these
opportunities for guided experiential learning and to documenting, through
expanded forms of assessment, the gains students make on the essential
learning outcomes through these co-curricular experiences.
 Example: http://www.northwestern.edu/studentaffairs/assessment/learningoutcomes/student-learning-outcomes/index.html
OUR WORK
Objective: Lead the Division of Student Affairs staff through a process that clarifies [Identifies and
aligns the DSA student learning outcomes with the SLOs] divisional learning goals and their
relationship to the institutional/UW system Shared Learning Goals. This process will help our division
achieve the following:
 Articulate the unique contribution(s) of the Division of Student Affairs to promoting




student learning and development.
Provide an ongoing process for individual units to gauge how each unit program
contributes and supports unit and SLOs student learning and development.
Increase unit and Division intentionality in selecting and developing programs.
Uncover Divisional SLOs strengths, areas of potential growth, and opportunities for unit
and cross unit collaboration in programming and assessment.
Assess the achievement of [Unit SLOs] through programs and services utilizing direct and
indirect assessment methods
VALUE AND BENEFITS
EXCHANGES WITHIN AND ACROSS UNITS
TARGET PROGRAMMING
MARKET
RATIONALE
Student/parent/state
investment
Academic Affairs:
Programs
Employers
Student Affairs
Units
?
UW
System
SLGs
Accreditors
Common language
Comparison
With Unit/Across Units
Institution
Higher Education
U.S.
YOU CAN TALK WITH A UNIT AROUND SLGS
 What do you want to know?
YOU CAN TALK ACROSS UNITS WITHIN IN STUDENT AFFAIRS
 What would “cross-talks” provide for your unit?
 If you knew that another unit had stronger programming in an SLG,
would you develop a partnership?
INTENTIONALLY TARGET WEAKER SLGS WITHIN DIVISION OF
STUDENT AFFAIRS
INTENTIONALLY SELECT UNIT PROGRAMS
 Increase weaker SLGs with slight or major changes to programs.
YOU CAN TELL YOUR STORY
 The Co-curricular Story aligned with the Shared Learning Outcomes.
 Translated into the many, many Units and programs/events/services that you
work to produce each year.
 http://issuu.com/samarketing/docs/learning_outcomes_booklet_2015_issu
HOW?
MAPPING PROCESS –SHARED LEARNING OUTCOMES SLGS
UW System Shared Learning Goals (SLGs)
Each Student Affairs Unit Aligns with SLGs
DRAFTs UNIT LGs
Programs w/in Units write Program/Event LGs-Match to Unit LGs
Units Revise Unit LGs
DIVISION MAP DSA SLG Map Strongly Embedded
A
M
W
1. Knowledge of Human
6
4
2
2.
4
3
5
3
2
-
5
6
-
7
10
1
3
4.
5
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
Weakly Embedded
S
Cultures and the
Natural World
Breadth of knowledge
through the study of the
arts, humanities,
languages, sciences, and
social sciences, and the
ability to think beyond
one’s major.
Critical and Creative
Thinking Skills
Inquiry, problem solving,
and higher-order
qualitative and
quantitative reasoning.
Effective
Communication Skills
Listening, speaking,
reading, writing, and
information literacy.
Intercultural
Knowledge and
Competence
Ability to interact and
work with people from
diverse backgrounds and
cultures, an
understanding of
difference, and
leadership capacity.
Individual, Social, and
Environmental
Responsibility
Civic knowledge and
engagement (both local
and global), ethical
reasoning, and action.
B
Moderately Embedded
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
U
V
Unit Level SLG Map Unit A:__________________________________________________
Unit Programs a-v
S
M
W
1. Knowledge of Human
5
2
2
2.
2
3
-
3
1
6
3
6
1
4
7
2
3
4.
5
6.
7.
Cultures and the Natural
World
Breadth of knowledge
through the study of the arts,
humanities, languages,
sciences, and social
sciences, and the ability to
think beyond one’s major.
Critical and Creative
Thinking Skills
Inquiry, problem solving, and
higher-order qualitative and
quantitative reasoning.
Effective Communication
Skills
Listening, speaking, reading,
writing, and information
literacy.
Intercultural Knowledge
and Competence
Ability to interact and work
with people from diverse
backgrounds and cultures, an
understanding of difference,
and leadership capacity.
Individual, Social, and
Environmental
Responsibility
Civic knowledge and
engagement (both local and
global), ethical reasoning,
and action.
a.
b.
c.
d
e
f
g
h
i
j
k
l
m
n
o
p
q
r
s
t
u
v
Unit Level SLO Map Unit A:__________________________________________________
Unit Programs a-v
S
M
W
1. Knowledge of Human
5
2
2
2.
2
3
-
3
1
6
3
6
1
4
7
2
3
4.
5
6.
7.
Cultures and the Natural
World
Breadth of knowledge
through the study of the arts,
humanities, languages,
sciences, and social
sciences, and the ability to
think beyond one’s major.
Critical and Creative
Thinking Skills
Inquiry, problem solving, and
higher-order qualitative and
quantitative reasoning.
Effective Communication
Skills
Listening, speaking, reading,
writing, and information
literacy.
Intercultural Knowledge
and Competence
Ability to interact and work
with people from diverse
backgrounds and cultures, an
understanding of difference,
and leadership capacity.
Individual, Social, and
Environmental
Responsibility
Civic knowledge and
engagement (both local and
global), ethical reasoning,
and action.
a.
b.
c.
d
e
f
g
h
i
j
k
l
m
n
o
p
q
r
s
t
u
v
Example: Women’s Center
Sista Talk
C D
Knowledge human
culture
4
Critical and
Creative Thinking
4
Intercultural
Competence
4
Effective
communication
0
Individual
Responsibility
Total
A
Vagina
Monologues
EXERCISE
 How would you use this information at the Division level?
 At the Unit level?
 At the program level?
 Which SLOs overall are embedded the most strongly
across all DSA units? Which are the weakest?
 Which units might collaborate on which SLOs?
ASSESSMENT PLANNING
Assessment Plan by Unit
Unit A Year 1 assessment =10
Unit Programs a-v
Year 2 assessment = 17
S
M
W
1. Knowledge of Human
5
2
2
2.
2
3
-
3
1
6
3
6
1
4
7
2
3
4.
5
6.
7.
Cultures and the Natural
World
Breadth of knowledge
through the study of the arts,
humanities, languages,
sciences, and social
sciences, and the ability to
think beyond one’s major.
Critical and Creative
Thinking Skills
Inquiry, problem solving, and
higher-order qualitative and
quantitative reasoning.
Effective Communication
Skills
Listening, speaking, reading,
writing, and information
literacy.
Intercultural Knowledge
and Competence
Ability to interact and work
with people from diverse
backgrounds and cultures, an
understanding of difference,
and leadership capacity.
Individual, Social, and
Environmental
Responsibility
Civic knowledge and
engagement (both local and
global), ethical reasoning,
and action.
a.
b.
c.
d
e
f
g
Year 3 assessment = 5
h
i
j
k
l
m
n
o
p
q
r
s
t
u
v