DESCRIPTION

Miramar College is one of sixteen colleges nation-wide participating in the League 
for Innovation’s Twenty-First Century Learning Outcomes Assessment Project. 
A team of faculty and administrators at Miramar worked collaboratively with 
Foothill College in 2000 to identify core competencies that community college 
students should be expected to master for an Associates Degree: 

• Communication
• Critical Thinking
• Global Awareness
• Information Management
• Personal & Professional Development 

The team analyzed current syllabi to see how these competencies were being 
addressed in the classroom and developed three levels of mastery to identify the 
level of course or program complexity. Miramar developed ways to measure 
student learning outcomes for the entire learning experience and specific 
outcomes for disciplines and programs. The team held workshops to educate 
faculty about alternative methods for assessing student learning, such as project 
presentations, team demonstrations, and e-portfolios. The team met with 
individual faculty members to help them assess their courses and created an e-
portfolio for faculty to share activities and curricular components that address 
learning outcomes in one or more of the core competencies.  

In spring, 2003, the counseling department, including general counseling, EOPS, 
and DSPS, met with the team leader to review the institutional core competencies 
and adapt them to the counseling department. In several session during the 
spring semester, the group defined what the institutional learning outcomes 
meant to the counseling department and how the counseling sessions were 
contributing to the students overall educational experience at Miramar. The 
group agreed on specific counseling program outcomes for each of the 
institutional outcomes. They expect students to achieve both the institutional and 
program learning outcomes during each scheduled counseling appointment. 
The team has received considerable training  and coaching from the League for 
Innovation Project. By 2006, eighty percent of the college’s courses and 
programs expect to have developed student learning outcomes.

RESOURCES FOR DOWNLOAD

• >> Miramar Core Competencies  (MS Word, 45.00 KB)
• >> Miramar Counseling Competencies  (MS Word, 32.00 KB)
• >> Miramar SLO website
• >> 21st Century Learning Outcomes Project website

EVIDENCE OF IMPACT/SUCCESS

The counseling department created a student survey with questions relating to 
institutional and program outcomes and piloted it in fall 2003. Both the survey 
creators and department members will review the survey results and modify it if 
needed. Students will complete the survey annually. The department will use the 
data to analyze its effectiveness in helping students achieve both institutional and 
program learning outcomes.