Developing Critical Thinking Through Budgeting

Summary

At Texas A&M University, I have developed critical thinking skills that I expect will help me succeed in the legal field. Attorneys must use critical thinking skills to analyze the evidence for and against their clients, construct a case, and explain the matter to judges and juries. My experience through my Public Budgeting Capital Improvement Plan Project allowed me to develop these skills, including analysis, evaluation, and explanation.

Analysis

Attorneys must use analysis to filter the evidence and facts of a case to determine which evidence helps their client and which evidence hurts their client. The analysis process involves collecting and processing information and knowledge, which are vital parts of the critical thinking process. Through the completion of a capital improvement plan in my public budgeting class, I developed valuable analytical skills. Our professor gave us a scenario of Captown, a fictional town in which the city council asked the budget department to recommend a list of capital improvement projects. We were tasked with creating a framework to analyze the projects and create a capital improvement five-year plan by selecting which projects to complete and when to complete them according to that framework. To begin our analysis, we reviewed the information given about each project, including cost, time to complete the project, and any fiscal or social benefits the project would reap. The team also used data from the scenario to create a five-year budget for Captown. We then researched the perspectives and priorities of different demographic groups, such as high school students and the elderly, in comparable towns, to create a list of the most important factors in a project. After grouping individual preferences by category, we created a list of the essential criteria to consider when evaluating a project. Our final list of the criteria to be considered included social impact, fiscal impact, cost, time to completion, and community benefits. I believe it was our reliable analysis of the facts and our ability to find the parts of the scenario that aided our project the most, which helped us select the best projects in our final plan.

Evaluation

After attorneys analyze the facts and evidence of a case, they must use evaluation skills to build a cohesive theory on behalf of their client. Evaluation involves making decisions based on the available information. Through the development of our capital improvement plan, I also strengthened my evaluation skills. After we analyzed the facts of the scenario and created the list of criteria (above), we applied the criteria to each project. We plugged in the costs and benefits of each project into the budget to determine which projects the city could complete when. We drew conclusions logically based on our analysis of the eight best projects and recommended that the city pursue town projects in a specific order, which was determined as a result of our investigation. Our strong evaluation skills contributed to our successful plan.

Explanation

After attorneys have analyzed the evidence and evaluated the facts to create a case theory, they must explain their findings to the jury on behalf of their client. Explanation involves coherently communicating your results and reasoning. Following the completion of our capital improvement plan, we explained our policy and answered questions from a mock mayor and city council. We clearly explained why we made specific cuts to the city budget and why we prioritized particular projects. Throughout the analysis and evaluation process, we created a chart detailing the fiscal and social impacts of each option that assigned overall value to each potential project. Below is a copy of the table we created, which helped us explain our prioritization. During our presentation to the city council, we also used our budget to show where the funding and resources would come from while acknowledging that additional analysis could be required if new emergency spending requirements came up. Based upon our review and evaluation, we recommended that the City complete eight projects over five years. Our explanation helped convince the mayor and city council members that our capital improvement plan would be in the best interest of Captown.

Critical thinking skills will serve me well in the legal field

Through my experience, I have learned valuable critical thinking skills, including analysis, evaluation, and explanation. These skills will help my future career as an attorney as I analyze evidence, build a case theory, and explain the facts on behalf of my clients.