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Auburn University Student Learning Outcomes

What this is:  Attached below is a compilation of intended learning outcomes for all students who graduate from Auburn University with a bachelor’s degree. Students enroll in college with many different goals, and the university offers numerous programs of instruction to help them reach those goals. This list of intended learning outcomes is more general than those for a typical program of instruction, expressing educational goals we want all Auburn students to reach, no matter what their chosen degree program.

How this differs from a curriculum model: A curriculum model defines the courses students must take and implies thereby what knowledge and skills they should acquire. A statement of intended outcomes begins by defining the knowledge and skills students should acquire and only then considers the means, including curricular means, by which they will acquire them. Individual courses developed and controlled by faculty and departments remain the major building blocks of the university curriculum, but the outcomes model attempts a holistic assessment of a set of skills and competencies students have gained from their college experience. Most of the goals will be introduced in the core curriculum and developed to higher levels of competency within the major and by co-curricular experiences.

Why this matters:  As Auburn University faculty we care deeply about our own disciplines, research, service, outreach, and courses, but as educators we must also be concerned about the total effort of the university to educate our students to become contributing members and even leaders of our society. Defining these student learning outcomes allows us to consider what abilities we want all Auburn graduates, regardless of major, to attain. Assessing to what extent students attain these goals will provide us a means to evaluate and enhance the general strength of an Auburn education.  The university must be able to define these key educational outcomes and the extent to which graduates have attained them in order to win reaccreditation by SACS in 2013.

Who drafted these goals:  The University Senate's Core Curriculum Oversight Committee is composed of faculty from across campus, including seven representatives from departments that teach Core courses and four faculty representatives from other academic disciplines and the University Libraries. The Associate Provost for Undergraduate Studies chairs the committee, and the Director of Institutional Research and Assessment provides additional support. The committee drafted these student learning outcomes over a period of several years. It examined models from other universities, but sought to develop student learning outcomes appropriate to Auburn’s history and mission. The committee envisions these goals as ambitious, and wants to remind faculty colleagues that every course in the university curriculum—not just classes in the core curriculum—will contribute to student attainment of these outcomes.

What you should do: The Core Curriculum Oversight Committee will ask the University Senate to adopt these student learning outcomes at its May 2008 meeting. Between now and then, the committee seeks input from across campus. Please read and consider the materials below. You may submit comments and questions to the committee directly to hilljul@auburn.edu no later than April 1, 2008.  The committee will present a revised draft, incorporating faculty comments, to the Senate for action at its May 6, 2008 meeting.

Click Here to see Student Learning Outcomes