"If you torture data sufficiently, it will confess to almost anything."
-- Fred Menger, Chemistry professor

 

"Far better an approximate answer to the right question, which is often vague, than an exact answer to the wrong question, which can always be made precise."

--John Tukey

College Wide Competencies and supporting outcomes

The College is committed to providing opportunity for students to gain knowledge and to use it effectively. To accomplish this goal, degree and certificate candidates will follow a course of study that addresses the competencies listed below. The course of study lays the groundwork for further learning. Students are expected to be responsible partners in the learning process. By the time of program completion, students will have demonstrated, at a level appropriate to their degree or certificate, the ability to:

1. Communicate effectively with others
Students will:
  1. produce coherent texts meeting standards appropriate to academic programs
  2. demonstrate the ability to understand and use the language of their academic programs
  3. effectively use the oral discourse of the academic program
  4. research a topic and develop an oral or written argument
  5. evaluate an oral presentation according to established criteria
2. Organize information, evaluate alternatives, distinguish fact from opinion and reach logical conclusions
Students will:
  1. effectively frame questions and develop hypotheses
  2. obtain, evaluate, and organize information
  3. research and present logical conclusions
3. Interact effectively within a diverse society
Students will:
  1. demonstrate an awareness of and respect for the differences among individuals and for other cultures in the global society
  2. demonstrate an understanding of how different cultures interact in the global society
  3. appropriately participate with diverse groups and with individuals with different points of view
4. Think logically and solve quantitative problems by using various computational and other mathematical techniques.
Students will:
  1. express mathematical information symbolically, visually, numerically, and verbally
  2. use mathematical processes to solve quantitative problems and draw reasonable conclusions
  3. interpret and draw inferences from mathematical models such as formulas, graphics, tables, and schematics
5. Identify and locate information from a variety of sources and understand the related legal and ethical uses
Students will:
  1. use traditional and contemporary information technology
  2. identify, access, and appropriately use authoritative sources of information