Learning Outcomes:
Division of Social Sciences

Anthropology

• • Students will articulate the ways that anthropologists in different subfields of anthropology study human beings and human variation as socioculturally, biologically, linguistically, and historically situated in different contexts.

  • Students will demonstrate knowledge of key theoretical perspectives and concepts in anthropology.

  • Students will design and execute an anthropologically-oriented research project.

  • Students will demonstrate and understanding of ethical and professional responsibilities to address questions of concern to humanity.

  • Students will articulate how anthropological approaches can assist them in their careers.

Criminal Justice/Forensic Science

• • Students will demonstrate knowledge of the American Criminal Justice System.

  • Students will analyze, interpret, and use criminal justice and/or forensic science data.

  • Students will demonstrate knowledge of key theoretical perspectives and concepts in the fields.

  • Students will demonstrate the qualities of a responsible practitioner.

  • Students will demonstrate critical thinking in the field.

Environmental Studies

• • Students will be able to understand environmental relationships, challenges, and approaches to them.

  • Students will be able to engage environmental conflict.

  • Students will be able to develop and evaluate different modes of adaptive co-management of environmental systems.

  • Students will be able to use field practices and adapt them as necessary under changing conditions.

Graduate Paralegal Certificate

• • Demonstrate competence in key foundational areas of U.S. law including mastering knowledge of the structure, components, and functioning of the U.S. legal systems.

  • Find, synthesize, and explain the reasoning and rules contained in legal authorities and apply them to a variety of legal situations using rule based reasoning.

  • Master appropriate strategies and technologies to retrieve, use, and manage research materials and digital information effectively and efficiently, including effective legal citation.

  • Understand and fulfill ethical obligations required of professionals who work in legal environments.

  • Apply advanced legal knowledge and skills in legal practice experience.

History

• • Students will identify, analyze, and construct historical arguments

  • Students will generate a coherent historical narrative of a society/region/nation over several centuries

  • Students will examine a specific historical event, individual, theme, or other,  in its complexity and contingency

  • Students will present historical analysis in a variety of written and oral forms for a variety of audiences

  • Students will do effective, discipline-specific research; compile a comprehensive, correctly formatted bibliography on an historical topic

Legal Studies Major

• • Demonstrate analytical and critical thinking skills appropriate to the study of legal issues and legal problems in the United States.

  • Demonstrate a broad understanding of public and private law across the curriculum including courses that emphasize diverse perspectives.

  • Investigate and explain current legal issues using appropriate legal research methodology and legal writing skills.

  • Communicate effectively in writing and in speaking with diverse audiences in a variety of formal and informational legal settings. 

MSL 

• • Identify and apply strategies to discover and achieve objectives in a particular area of substantive concentration.

  • Advocate, collaborate, and problem-solve effectively in formal and informal dispute resolution processes.

Political Science

• • Students will write clearly, effectively, and in an organized way about domestic and international politics.

  • Students will speak clearly, effectively, and in an organized way about domestic and international politics.

  • Students will demonstrate knowledge of and critical thinking about major theories, concepts, qualitative or quantitative methods of political science, and their application in political practice.

  • Students will complete a political science research project using appropriate methodological tools and research materials

  • Students will identify and critically analyze differences across cultures, genders, religions, or other value systems in the study of politics

Public Health Sciences

• • Students will be able to describe the multiple determinants of health and the interconnected relationships among physiological, sociocultural, and environmental aspects of health and disease.

  • Students will be able to identify factors underlying health disparities and propose strategies for change.

  • Students will be able to analyze, summarize, and communicate the public health issues of local, national, and global communities.

  • Students will be able to locate, assess, and synthesize information from interdisciplinary sources to understand and act upon population health problems.

  • Students will be able to conduct and interpret ethical quantitative and qualitative research on public health issues.

Social Justice

• • Students who complete a Social Justice major or minor will demonstrate a basic understanding of social injustices and inequities, and proposed approaches to their remediation and/or resolution, drawn from a variety of historical, cultural, and geographic settings.

  • Students who complete a Social Justice major or minor will demonstrate an understanding of the distinct roles social science, historical precedents, social theory, culture and ethics play in the development of an informed approach to social justice.

  • Students who complete a Social Justice major will demonstrate  a working knowledge of social scientific tools pertinent to the study of social structures and change.

  • Students who complete a Social Justice major will demonstrate significant expertise in an “area of concentration” that can serve as a basis for continued vocational development.

  • Students who complete a Social Justice major will gain significant practical experience doing social justice service and/or advocacy work.

Sociology

• • Students will describe basic sociological theories

  • Students will demonstrate one’s “sociological imagination” by connecting individual experience to larger social theory, issues, and/or structure

  • Students will demonstrate the ability to conduct ethical quantitative and/or qualitative sociological research

  • Students will locate and assess relevant scholarly literature on a sociological topic

  • Students will demonstrate an understanding of the complexities of social diversity, especially race, ethnicity, class, gender, and nationality