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Statements of International Learning Outcomes
California State University–Stanislaus
http://www.csu.edu/
Draft Learning Outcomes
Global education across the disciplines seeks to equip students with
knowledge of the diverse peoples, governments, histories, and natural
systems that comprise the world—and the forces that continue to
shape them. It produces graduates who respect the many groups that make
up a global society and who have skills and perspectives to meet the
challenges of an interdependent world. As students learn to see the
“global in the local,” global education allows students to
understand how their own behavior affects and is affected by larger
world patterns.
Multiple Perspectives
Learning outcome: Each student will demonstrate the
ability to perceive any given event from more than one cultural
viewpoint.
Sample learning activity: Students work in small,
diverse groups to assess a current or historical issue from the
different points of view represented in the group, and seek to
understand the reasons behind the differing perspectives.
Interdependence
Learning outcome: Each student will show how a given
enterprise or living being affects and is affected by [depends upon and
also influences] the larger natural, economic, or social systems of
which it is a part.
Example: Welfare rolls in the Central Valley increased
after the Asian financial crisis. This was a result of the reduced
purchasing power of Asian currencies, which led people in Thailand,
Japan, and elsewhere to reduce their purchase of imported foodstuffs,
including nuts and other agricultural products from the Central
Valley.
Equity/Living Responsibly with Others
Learning outcome: Each student will show how the
behavior of individuals, groups, and nations affects others, in terms of
human rights and economic well-being.
Example: Students will give examples of national
policies that may have had unintended negative effects on other nations.
Or: Students will identify their own behaviors that may
unintentionally compromise the human rights or the dignity of
others.
Sustainability
Learning outcome: Each student will demonstrate ways of
handling environmental resources that will help or hurt future
generations’ ability to meet their own needs.
Examples: Students will explain the long-term economic
and environmental impact of continuing to develop Central Valley
farmland for urban uses. Or: Students will explain the short-term
and long-term issues involved in harvesting the massive forests of
Russia or the Amazon region for lumber to export.
Language
Learning outcome: Students will demonstrate that they
can satisfy basic social needs in a language other than English.
Means of demonstration: Students can demonstrate this
learning through successful formal language study, high-intensity
language training (HILT), testing, or other means to be determined.
Cleveland State University
http://www.csuohio.edu/
Draft Learning Outcomes
Upon graduation, students will be able to:
- Demonstrate critical thinking abilities and skills in geography,
other cultures, international relations, and global issues.
- Demonstrate open-minded attitudes and an absence of ethnocentrism
(including an awareness of racial, ethnic, and international
issues).
- Understand the importance of cultural diversity in a global
community.
- Demonstrate willingness to learn and practice critical thinking
skills that will develop the competencies required to live in a global
community.
College of Notre Dame of Maryland
http://www.ndm.edu
Draft Learning Outcomes
Students will:
- Experience a culture other than their own.
- Acquire communicative competence in a second language.
- Be able to identify and discuss international and cultural issues
from multiple perspectives.
- Understand and respect the values, practices, and products of other
cultures.
- Be able to appreciate and evaluate other cultures.
- Actively and ethically engage with people of cultures other than
their own.
- Creatively apply multicultural skills to a dynamic, changing work
environment.
Kennesaw State University
http://www.kennesaw.edu
Learning Outcomes
-
International Education
-
Global Perspectives [Knowledge]
-
Intercultural Communication/Cross-cultural Adjustment
[Skills]
-
Social Justice and Sustainable Development [Values]
International Education
International education involves a transformation of social
consciousness beyond national consciousness. It prepares students to
become responsible global citizens. It helps clarify values that seem to
be in contradiction by developing an understanding for and appreciation
of different cultural perspectives. It seeks to find a common ground. It
is learning to create cultural bridges. It requires that students
understand culture as the context in which people solve their problems,
not as the cause of their problems. Conflict arises when different
groups fail to understand their problems as interrelated. International
education emphasizes the development of multicultural communities
centered on creating respect for differences as well as addressing
common problems affecting humanity. Through an interdisciplinary and
experiential approach to international education, KSU creates
opportunities for students to immerse themselves in systems of meaning
different from their own. The more we know about other countries and
cultures, the better we will understand our own.
The following list of global (general) learning outcomes is meant as
a starting point for conversations about developing specific learning
outcomes, primarily for courses in the general education curriculum but
also within degree programs. The categories provide a general framework
and may overlap considerably.
Global Perspectives [Knowledge]
- Through the general education curriculum, students will demonstrate
knowledge of world history, literature, regional geography, and
economics.
- Students will demonstrate the ability to systematically acquire
information from a variety of sources regarding diverse regions,
countries, and cultures.
- Students will acquire knowledge and methods needed for critical
assessment of global events, processes, trends, and issues.
- Students will demonstrate an understanding of the interconnectedness
of political, economic, and environmental systems.
- Students will develop an understanding of the role of culture in
identity formation, social relationships, and the construction of
knowledge systems.
- Students will demonstrate the ability to perceive any given event
from more than one cultural viewpoint.
- Students will analyze the effects of globalization on local
culture(s).
Intercultural Communication/Cross-cultural Adjustment [Skills]
- Students will recognize individual and cultural differences and
demonstrate an ability to communicate and interact effectively across
cultures.
- Students will perform in a culturally appropriate and professional
manner in international, cross-cultural, and/or multicultural
contexts.
- B.A. degree–seeking students will demonstrate at least an
intermediate ability to speak, read, and write one or more foreign
languages.
- Students will demonstrate awareness of their own values as well as
of their biases and how these influence interaction/relationships with
others.
- Students will be able to read the signals of an unfamiliar
situation, interpret its elements, and adjust to them.
- Students will demonstrate flexibility, openness, empathy, and
tolerance for ambiguity.
- Students will demonstrate respect for diversity.
- Students will demonstrate an ability to successfully use computer
technology, including e-mail and the Internet, for both local and global
communication needs.
Social Justice and Sustainable Development [Values]
- Students will recognize the importance of diversity in
globalization.
- Students will show how the behavior of individuals, groups, and
nations affects others, in terms of human rights and economic
well-being.
- Student will demonstrate ways of handling environmental resources
that will protect future generations’ ability to meet their own
needs.
- Students will connect root causes of basic global problems (e.g.,
population growth, poverty, disease, hunger, war, and ethnic strife) to
issues of land use and access to natural resources (e.g., clean air and
water, biodiversity, nutritious food sources, minerals, and
energy).
- Students will demonstrate an understanding of the need to protect
human rights in areas such as access to education, health care, and
employment.
- Students will recognize the interconnected nature and importance of
issues such as arms control, maintaining peace, enhancing security,
alleviating poverty, and managing resources cooperatively, responsibly,
and equitably.
Montgomery College
http://www.montgomerycollege.edu/
Draft Learning Outcomes
Upon completion of general education requirements, students will:
- Appreciate the value of learning languages.
- Demonstrate an awareness of world geography, economics, politics,
religion, philosophy, history, literature, the arts, and other aspects
of culture.
- Understand how policy decisions made by one government affect other
nations.
- Understand the interconnectedness of modern world politics and
economics.
- Exhibit an awareness of the interrelatedness of global society.
- Develop critical thinking skills and be able to apply them when
encountering unfamiliar environments, experiences, and change.
- Demonstrate a respect for diversity and an appreciation of the
multiplicity of perspectives.
- Gain an appreciation of their cultural heritage.
- Develop an understanding of the ways that culture shapes an
individual's world view.
- Use technology to be able to participate in global exchange of ideas
and information.
- Achieve awareness of international business, interpersonal, and
intercultural etiquette.
- Understand the ethical implications of personal, business, and
political decisions.
- Achieve an awareness of the commonality of core human experience.
Portland State University
http://www.pdx.edu
International Student Learning Goals
Graduates of Portland State University should leave the university
with certain knowledge, attitudes, and skills that will enable them to
function as citizens of the world. Specifically, they should have
acquired or developed these attributes:
Knowledge
- Understand where the main culture zones of the world are, and why
they are important.
- Understand prevailing world conditions, developments, and trends
associated with such world issues as population growth, economic
conditions, international conflict, human rights, and the like.
- Understand how human actions modify the physical environment, and
how physical systems affect human systems.
- Demonstrate in-depth knowledge of a single culture (other than their
own).
Attitudes
- Recognize and appreciate differences among cultures; have developed
tolerance for the diverse viewpoints that emerge from these
differences.
- Have moved beyond ethnocentrism to a position approaching empathy;
have developed the ability to see others as they see themselves, given
their conditions and values.
- Have developed self-awareness and self-esteem regarding their own
culture, with all its inherent diversity.
Skills
- Communicate effectively across cultures.
- Can use maps and other geographic representations to acquire,
process, and report information.
- (Recommended) Can use another language to accomplish basic
communication tasks, including understanding a newspaper, technical
reports, and everyday instructions.
Status of Learning Goals: These goals are in draft stage. We have
not yet taken them to our Faculty Senate for approval because we are
working with a Faculty Senate committee (the Educational Policies
Committee) to explore the possibility of incorporating these
international learning goals into a broader set of goals—the
“baccalaureate markers”—for all graduates.
Assessing International Learning Goals
Because our international learning goals are a work in progress, so
are our specific strategies for assessing them. We feel confident that
our participation in the Global Learning for All project will provide us
with ideas that we can use to achieve these goals.
At present, we are focused on the big picture, namely, how assessing
international learning goals meshes with the larger “climate of
assessment” that prevails on our campus. A group of graduate
students working on our Assessment Initiative noticed that Portland
State has nearly a dozen assessment-related initiatives underway
simultaneously, some more developed than others. How are these things
related? they asked. Can we connect the dots?
- The initiative begins with assessment of student learning.
Set in motion by the demands of accreditation, assessment has
been a major effort at Portland State and has led to a cultural shift.
Does our curriculum do what we think it should, in terms of its impact
on students?
- Assessment feeds into program review, based on the assumption
that a fair test of the quality of programs is whether they
“work.” Regular program review becomes part of
accreditation. We also want to know if graduates actually demonstrate
the characteristics we might reasonably expect of a college graduate,
hence the baccalaureate markers.
- We have already put more than 10 years into a statewide effort to
transform the other end of our students’ college careers, a system
known as PASS, or proficiency-based admissions system, a system
which will admit students on the basis of what they know and can do,
rather than GPA and seat time.
- Admissions are, in turn, related to enrollment management, an
effort to be intentional about our student population as our campus
expands wildly. All of these evaluative activities point in directions
set by our work in planning, vision, and values. And most of this
is happening in public, on our electronic institutional
portfolio, which can be accessed by anyone in the university, the
community, or the country.
According to the recent brochure titled Connecting the Dots,
“The President’s Internationalization Initiative is
integrally related to each of the other initiatives,” with mutual
recognition of those interests that are shared with the diversity
initiative. International priorities inform admissions and enrollment
management alike.
Global citizenship is part of Portland State’s institutional
vision and part of what we want graduates to take away with them. It
goes without saying that, if part of internationalization is what we
want our students to know and be able to do, we need to find a way to
assess that knowledge. And to assess it, we first need to refine our
student learning goals. This we plan to do during 2003–04 through
the work of the Internationalization Action Council and the
internationalization cohort of the Scholarship of Teaching Resource
Team.
San Diego Community College District
http://www.sdccd.edu/
Learning Outcomes
-
Global Perspective
-
Intercultural Competencies
-
Global Communication Skills
-
Technology Skills
-
Resiliency and Coping Skills
Global Perspective
- Students will demonstrate an understanding of the interconnectedness
of political, economic, and environmental systems.
Sample learning activity: Successfully complete two
courses from a list of courses that integrate the concepts of
interdependence and the integration of social systems. Students must
complete a course with a grade of C or better.
- Students will demonstrate a knowledge of history and world
events.
Sample learning activity: Successfully complete at least
one world history/political science course from a list of world history
and political science courses. Students must complete a course with a
grade of C or better.
Intercultural Competencies
- Students will demonstrate an understanding of the common human
experience and knowledge of intercultural issues and viewpoints.
Sample learning activity: Successfully complete an
intercultural communications course in which students learn to work in
small, diverse teams to complete projects and activities that focus on
intercultural communication issues. Students must complete a course with
a grade of C or better.
- Students will be able to recognize individual and cultural
differences and demonstrate knowledge for these differences.
Sample learning activity: (Same learning activity as noted
in #1 above)
- Students will demonstrate good listening and information processing
skills.
Sample learning activity: (Same learning activity as noted
in #1 above)
Global Communication Skills
- Students will demonstrate an ability to speak, read, and write one
or more foreign languages.
Sample learning activity: Successfully complete a
two-semester sequence of a foreign language course.
- Students will demonstrate an ability to interact successfully with
people of other cultures, backgrounds, and countries.
Sample learning activity: Successfully complete an
intercultural communications course in which students are assigned to
diverse work teams to complete projects and activities that focus on
intercultural communication issues. Students must complete a course with
a grade of C or better.
- Students will demonstrate an ability to use appropriate
international etiquette in business and other situations.
Sample learning activity: Successfully complete a course
from a list of courses with learning activities that address business
and personal etiquette of different peoples and cultures. Students must
complete a course with a grade of C or better.
Technology Skills
- Students will demonstrate an ability to successfully utilize
computer technology, including e-mail and the Internet, for
communication.
Sample learning activity: Successfully complete a course
from a list of courses containing computer literacy learning activities.
Students must complete a course with a grade of C or better.
Resiliency and Coping Skills
- Students will demonstrate an ability to manage change in their
personal and professional life.
Sample learning activity: Successfully complete a course
from a list of courses having time management, personal growth and
development, and life management activities. Students must complete a
course with a grade of C or better.
St. Louis Community College at Forest Park
http://www.stlcc.cc.mo.us/fp/
Learning Outcomes
The globally competent learner will be able to:
- Demonstrate appreciation of all people, regardless of differences in
race, gender, age, lifestyle, and class.
- Demonstrate the equality of peoples of different nations.
- Recognize the geopolitical and economic interdependence of our
world.
- Recognize the impact of other cultures on American life and vice
versa.
- Demonstrate a capacity to work in diverse teams.
- Demonstrate an understanding of the non-universality of culture,
religion, and values.
- Demonstrate the responsibility of global citizenship.
- Recognize and celebrate cultural diversity, respecting the rights of
all to express and share their individual cultural heritages.
Last updated: April 27, 2005
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