On a Curricular Level, how do we Function as a System?

General Education Maps and Markers and the Degree Qualifications Profile as Resources

Caroline GearyAssociate Professor of Chemistry

Dale Splinter

Associate Professor of Geography, Geology, & Environmental Science

LEAP Proficiency Initiatives

• The Proficiency Initiatives stem from a decade and more of research into student learning and success conducted by AAC&U and other higher education organizations in partnership with institutions across the country and abroad.

• The projects are focused on helping all students, especially those who have been historically underserved by higher education, learn most effectively and demonstrate and apply their learning outside the classroom.

Liberal Education and General Education

• AAC&U champions a 21st century liberal education and acknowledges the challenges• Liberal education is the approach that 74% of employers would

recommend to all college-bound students (2013 AAC&U/Hart Research Associates survey)• Through GEMs the focus in on general education- why?

Liberal Education and General Education

• What aspect or element of general education is working well at your institution? Example(s)??

• What aspect or element of general education needs attention at your institution? What is the most important unattended area?

• What are the best opportunities for, and challenges to, improvement?

• Is your team working on any of aspect of general education reform here at the conference?

What is GEMs?

• General Education Maps and Markers is a resource that helps colleges and universities redesign general education as a set of guided learning pathways- within and across institutions.

• Promotes the incorporation of applied and integrated learning experiences for all students.

• Suggests multiple routes towards creating general education programs that scaffold these experiences across the curriculum , whatever unique and individualized pathways students take thorough higher education on their way toward completing their degrees.

What is GEMs?

Proficiencies and projects are central to courses and programs and will provide students opportunities to practice integrating and applying knowledge and skills.

Aaron BrowerProvost and Vice Chancellor, University of Wisconsin-ExtensionGEMs Design Working Group Member

GEMs as a ResourceValue to Faculty

• Provides guidance for redesign efforts through design principles

• Facilitates discussions with questions to consider- both for student experience and for institutional and faculty support

• WI is a LEAP state, GEMs works with other LEAP resources and can help integrate other LEAP-based initiatives

GEMs as a ResourceValue to Faculty

• Connects faculty within and across institutions and systems

• LEAP is a national and international movement- allows faculty to connect (what they might already by doing!) to a larger body of work

GEMs as a ResourceValue to System

• The framework is based on proficiencies and guided pathways- it is designed to help Systems • Fewer and fewer students are participating in a traditional, four-year residential

undergraduate experience.

• Developed with new majority of students in mind- those students who are traditionally underrepresented and underserved.

• Facilitates discussions providing uniform language, concepts, and design for both instructors/advisors and for students

• Aids with integration of multiple, existing quality programs

GEMs as a ResourceFive Design Principles

Proficiency• Articulate degree-level learning outcomes or proficiencies that apply to all students.• Institutional proficiency requirements should be keyed to system-level learning outcomes.

Integrative learning and problem-based inquiry• Students should develop and demonstrate proficiencies engaging with problems that integrate

curricular, co-curricular, and community-based learning. • Students should integrate and apply their learning to complex, unscripted problems.

Transparency and Assessment• Assess authentic student work, including problem and project-based inquiry (Signature Work) for

demonstration of proficiencies• Assessment results inform program improvements as well as helping individual

students improve

GEMs as a ResourceFive Design Principles

Agency and self-direction

• Program design should involve students in planning a program that prepares them for knowledgeable citizenship and for continuous learning

Equity

• Design and implementation should be equity-minded. We need to address outcome inequalities for historically underrepresented and underserved student populations.

• Provide opportunities for all students to build on the strengths and talents they bring to undergraduate education

Case Studies: Application of GEMs Design Principles

Proficiency

Integrative learning and problem-based inquiry

Transparency and assessment

Agency and self-direction

Equity

GEMsIN PRACTICE

GEMsIN PRACTICE

ACIS 1.3 Associate Degree Standards

Based on UWS Shared Learning Goals and call for inclusion of HIPs into the

degree programs

Proficiency

Integrative learning and problem-based inquiry

Transparency and assessment

Agency and self-direction

Equity

The DQP as a Resource…

• Degree Qualifications Profile (DQP)• A learning-centered framework for

what college graduates should know and be able to do to earn the associate, bachelor’s or master’s degree

The DQP as a Resource…

• Why was the DQP Created?• To define quality…• Need talented graduates at multiple levels of education

More than a degree• Postsecondary institutions are being called on (policy

makers and the public) to be accountable• A strong link need to exist among postsecondary learning

institutions• Students need a clear path to success

Empower student learning

The DQP as a Resource…

• Quality vs. Qualifications• Quality • How good or bad something is• A high level of value or excellence

• Qualification• A quality or accomplishment that makes someone suitable

for a particular job or activity

Subjective?

Job ads do not ask for quality, rather they ask for qualifications

The DQP as a Resource…

• Value for Faculty • Active clarification of how and what they teach in

relation to what they want their students to learn• Break down siloes • Facilitates discussion about the purpose of

postsecondary education at multiple levels• Enables faculty to examine assignments to ensure

they properly assess desired proficiencies• Utilizing the DQP can showcase faculty interest in

learning and teaching

The DQP as a Resource…

• Five Learning Categories• 1. Specialized Knowledge• 2. Broad and Integrative Knowledge• 3. Intellectual Skills• A. Analytic Inquiry• B. Use of Information Resources• C. Engaging Diverse Perspectives• D. Ethical Reasoning• E. Quantitative Fluency• F. Communication Fluency

• 4. Applied and Collaborative Learning• 5. Civic and Global Learning

Transcend the boundariesof particular fields of study

The DQP as a Resource… Associates Bachelor’s

Specialized Knowledge

• Describe the scope of the field of study, its core theories and practices, using field-related terminology, and offers a similar description of at least one related field.

• Applies tools, technologies and methods common to the field of study to selected questions or problems.

• Generates substantially error-free products, reconstructions, data, juried exhibits or performances appropriate to the field of study

• Defines and explains the structure, styles and practices of the field of study using its tools, technologies, methods and specialized terms.

• Investigates a familiar but complex problem in the field of study by assembling, arranging and reformulating ideas, concepts, designs and techniques.

• Frames, clarifies and evaluates a complex challenge that bridges the field of study and one other field, using theories, tools, methods and scholarship from those fields to produce independently or collaboratively and investigative, creative or practical work illuminating a challenge.

• Constructs a summative project, paper, performance or application that draws on current research, scholarship and techniques in the field or study.

The DQP as a Resource… Bachelor’s Master’s

Specialized Knowledge

• Defines and explains the structure, styles and practices of the field of study using its tools, technologies, methods and specialized terms.

• Investigates a familiar but complex problem in the field of study by assembling, arranging and reformulating ideas, concepts, designs and techniques.

• Frames, clarifies and evaluates a complex challenge that bridges the field of study and one other field, using theories, tools, methods and scholarship from those fields to produce independently or collaboratively and investigative, creative or practical work illuminating a challenge.

• Constructs a summative project, paper, performance or application that draws on current research, scholarship and techniques in the field or study.

• Elucidates the major theories, research methods and approaches to inquiry and schools of practice in the field of study, articulates their sources and illustrates both their applications and their relationships to allied fields of study.

• Assesses the contributions of major figures and organizations in the field of study, describes its major methodologies and practices and illustrates them through projects, papers, exhibits or performances.

• Articulates significant challenges involved in practicing the field of study, elucidates its leading edges and explores the current limits of theory, knowledge and practice through a project that lies outside of conventional boundaries.

The DQP as a Resource…

• Uses of the DQP by institutions• Review general education curricula • Assess DQP proficiencies in the

context of student transfer• Platform for discussions with

employers and other stakeholders about needs and expectations

• Review of major and minor curricula

• Comparing student learning outcomes with DQP benchmarks for applied learning

The DQP as a Resource…

• DQP vs. Student Learning Outcomes• The DQP provides a detailed

framework for helping students, faculty, and institutions achieve and demonstrate expected proficiencies• Advances the Essential Learning

Outcomes (ELOs) of the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) by describing what students should be able to do to develop and demonstrate the essential learning outcomes of the LEAP initiative

The DQP as a Resource…

Example

The DQP as a Resource…

• SLOs Environmental Science: UW-W• Broad Learning Objectives and Outcomes (All Tracks)• Students will have knowledge of significant current and

historical environmental issues at the regional, national, and global scales, and be able to describe the origins, drivers, and implications of each from both scientific and social perspectives.

• Students will be proficient at a broad range of skills and techniques needed to collect, analyze, and disseminate information related to contemporary environmental problems. Students will be able to demonstrate an advanced understanding of research techniques in their chosen field.

The DQP as a Resource…

• SLOs Environmental Science: UW-W• Submajor Learning Objectives-Geosciences• Students will gain an understanding of the scientific

method and the complexity and interconnectedness of earth systems, including the atmosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, and lithosphere and how they influence the source, geographical distribution, and abundance of natural resources.

• Students will be able to recognize threats to natural resources from human activity, how humans are making themselves more vulnerable to threats from environmental hazards, and potential solutions to alleviate both types of threats.

The DQP as a Resource…

• Retool SLOs for ENVR Major• Create document highlighting how proficiencies will

be attained over the course of their educational experience• Perspective students (and parents)• Enrolled students • Courses• Advising appointments