ECC General Education Assessment

Through classroom and cross-campus experiences, ECC students develop skills and knowledge necessary for academic, career, and civic success. The general education curriculum provides students the foundation to create meaningful lives as contributors to their local communities and throughout the connected world.

ECC General Education Outcomes

Communication

Students will demonstrate effective communication skills by being able to:

C1. Identify audience, context, and purpose of messages

C2. Read or listen to a variety of written texts, media formats and images to comprehend and apply information

C3. Create clear, well-organized written, oral or visual messages

C4. Produce mechanically correct texts

Communication Rubric

Scientific Literacy

Students will demonstrate scientific understanding by being able to:

SL1. make observations and develop a testable hypothesis.

SL2. Collect and examine scientific data.

SL3. Evaluate, analyze, and draw valid conclusions.

SL4. Students will also demonstrate the ability to make reasoned judgments about the impact of science on the individual, community, society, and environment.

Quantitative Literacy

Students will demonstrate an understanding of the language of mathematics and its real-world applications by being able to:

QL1. Read and communicate with mathematical symbols and graphical representations.

QL2. Accurately perform measurements and calculations.

QL3. Analyze and interpret data.

QL4. Estimate the reasonableness of conclusions.

Quantitative Literacy Rubric

Critical Thinking

Students will demonstrate critical thinking skills by being able to:

CT1. Form logical arguments by interpreting, analyzing, and synthesizing multiple perspectives, experiences, assumptions and evidence.

CT2. Develop reasoned solutions to problems by evaluating issues, ideas, facts, and inferences.

CT3. Make ethical, creative, and informed conclusions by using evidence and applying reasoning.

Critical Thinking Rubric

Information Literacy

Students will demonstrate information literacy by being able to:

IL1. Engage in an ongoing process of forming questions and identifying gaps in their knowledge related to a particular subject matter.

IL2. Utilize research tools to locate relevant sources that address their inquiry.

IL3. Determine the credibility of a source utilizing indicators of authority and purpose (such as publication type, author's credentials, intentions and potential bias).

IL4. Credit or cite sources correctly and ethically.

Global and Multi-cultural Literacy

Students will begin to develop a sense of global awareness, cultural competence, and civic responsibility by being able to:

GML1. Identify the historical, cultural, and socioeconomic perspectives of living in a global society.

GML2. Describe, interpret, and analyze culture in self and others.

GML3. Take an active role in the community.

Global and Multi-cultural Literacy Rubric

SLAAC

The Student Learning Assessment and Advisory Committee (SLAAC) oversees matters relevant to institutional-level general education assessment at Elgin Community College. The Committee ensures that institutional level assessment reflects the current general education goals of the college.

Additionally, SLAAC was recently restructured to take on responsibilities of the college’s Assessment Strategy Team, including supporting the Advancing Equity Through the Assessment of Student Learning assessment cohorts, which is intended to support faculty in using outcomes assessment to study and close equity gaps in courses and other questions of interest for faculty. SLAAC will now oversee the selection of courses and the Cohort Lead selection process and wll develop and share expertise regarding best practices to incorporate an equity lens into assessment activities.

This change for SLAAC is intended to help SLAAC further make connections among academic divisions and between faculty and administrators in assessment work. Additionally, SLAAC has committed to regularly reviewing assessment work documented in the Learning Improvement Reports (LIRs). The idea is to continue a new culture, which ECC has been encouraged to do by the Higher Learning Commission, in which people are seeing that the work they’re doing in assessing and submitting their work is actually paying off, that others are caring, looking at it, and doing something about it.

The committee meets the 2nd and 4th Tuesdays of the month.

SLAAC Faculty Co-Chair: Angelika Stachnik (Medical Imaging)

SLAAC Administrative Co-Chair: Tyler Roeger (CETAL)