General Nursing
student Pam
Halpin accepts the
Nursing Showcase
creative project
prize from Vice
President
Instruction John
McKendry as
Instructors Shirley
McKinley and Lois
Felkar look on.
Pam developed a
board game,
“Sugar Shock,” as
a teaching tool for
juvenile diabetics.

 

 

Alverno speaks!

he traditional liberal arts education

is sometimes criticized these days

for not providing students with
applied skills or adequately preparing
them for a competitive job market. But a
group of education innovators at Alverno
College in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, has
provided a working model of how
practical a liberal arts education really is.
Called outcomes-based learning, it’s an
effort to redefine education in terms of
abilities needed to be effective in the
worlds of work, family and community
participation.

“We put a unique emphasis on
teaching the abilities needed to put
knowledge to use, and these may take
different forms,” says Alverno Academic
Dean Kathleen O’Brien. “Every one of
our classes has two aims: to help students
acquire liberal arts knowledge; and to

help them solve problems with it, make
decisions with it, and communicate
effectively with it.”

Alverno, a highly-respected women’s
college, revamped its curriculum in the
1970s to do away with grades and instead
conduct assessments of its students in
eight key ability areas: communication,
analysis, problem solving, valuing in
decision-making, social interaction, global
perspectives, effective citizenship, and
aesthetic responsiveness. Faculty, students
and members of the local community all
contribute to the assessment process,
which provides performance evaluations
and specific steps for improvement.
Students cannot graduate until they

demonstrate profiency in all eight abilities.

From business to philosophy, nursing,
math and engineering, all Alverno courses
are developed to help students put

knowledge into action for the rest of their
lives. Those skills are not only vital to full
individual development and community
participation, but can be applied in any
work context. Moreover, the flexibility
students develop allows them to keep on
learning and changing for the jobs of the
future.

The success of Alverno’s innovations
led Douglas College and BCIT to co-
sponsor a three-day Institute on April 29,
30 and May | that brought Alverno
College representatives together with BC
educators and community leaders. An
“Alverno Follow-up” session was held
May 2 to discuss insights, cautions and
recommendations arising from the
weekend. For more information on
Alverno or future Douglas College
Institutes, contact Gillies Malnarich at
local 5411 or email
malnarig @douglas.bc.ca. |