Oct 12, 2024  
2022 - 2023 Undergraduate Bulletin 
    
2022 - 2023 Undergraduate Bulletin [ARCHIVED BULLETIN]

Signature Learning


Chair:  Nate Whelan-Jackson 

 


 

Capital University is committed to a liberal education that readies the student for every arena of life.  Liberal education develops intellectual skills, expands the breadth of learning through exploration of several modes of inquiry, and challenges students to examine foundational ethical and cultural assumptions. It enables students to think critically and reflectively on vocation, citizenship, service, and religious and ethical commitments.

The Capital curriculum is structured around Program Learning Outcomes that are delivered through majors, minors, foundational courses, and co-curricular experiences. 

The 7 Program Learning Outcomes:

  • Represent what students are able to do at the conclusion of a program.
  • Are broader than course and co-curricular outcomes
  • Are achieved as the culmination of multiple course and co-curricular activities.

Signature Learning Program Learning Outcomes and Descriptions


Students apply the skills of a liberally educated person to investigate problems and questions.

The liberal arts include a set of subjects, practices, and investigations that orient each student’s life-long growth and sense of vocation. Through inquiry and reflection across the student experience, students integrate and apply critical thinking, effective communication, cultural awareness, and ethical sensitivity to progressively challenging situations and contexts.

Students explain how their choices affect goal achievement across a variety of domains (e.g., professional and personal relationships, finances, mental and physical health, etc.)

Students identify and reflect on physical, intellectual, emotional, and social components of life transitions. Students develop goals for future personal, social, and professional wellbeing.

Students access, evaluate, interpret, and produce quantitative and qualitative information to solve problems.

Students are empowered to create and use information to achieve their personal, social, educational, and professional goals. Students recognize gaps and limits in existing knowledge. Students effectively access, organize, evaluate, and interpret data to produce information for solving problems and drawing conclusions.

Students articulate basic principles, methods, and societal effects of natural and social sciences 

Students identify and practice methods of inquiry in social and natural sciences, including laboratory methods. Students develop scientific literacy by practicing reasoning skills and applying major scientific paradigms. Students explore the impact of science on society.

Students speak, write, read, and listen effectively

Students actively listen, process, and critically evaluate information. Students use information ethically and with integrity. Students practice effective written and oral communication strategies for multiple audiences in various modes.

Students analyze, contextualize, and engage with human cultures.

Students engage with varied artistic, religious, and historical cultural products and systems. Students produce art in different forms. Students appreciate the moral implications of engagement with human cultures in a global context.

Students interact knowledgeably and ethically with people and ideas from many cultures, religions, and identities.

Students use and critically evaluate different moral frameworks that inform their lived experience. Students identify themselves to be members of diverse communities, analyzing sources of misunderstanding, conflict, and injustice. Students develop an appreciation for diverse ways of life. Students develop ethical sensitivity that informs thought and behavior in personal, communal, and global contexts.

Pathways:

The Signature Learning curriculum mapped below includes course requirements, sequences, and options. Some course options are University Core courses (UC) and other course options are offered within majors. For example, students majoring in mathematics meet the Quantitative Reasoning requirement and satisfy a major requirement by completing Calculus I.

In This  Year
Students Take a Required Course In:
These are the Course Options that    Fulfill the Corresponding Course Requirement:

First

First Year Seminar

First

 

Reading and Writing

Advanced Placementt 

English Language & Composition Exam (Score of 4 or higher required)           

Course Requirement: ENGL-111 credit awarded (4 credits awarded)

ACT English 28 or higher 

Students with an English ACT of 28 or higher, or a SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing of 640, are waived from the Reading and Writing requirement.

Course Requirement:  Requirement waived (no credit awarded)

ACT English 18-27:

Students with an English ACT of 25-27 or higher, or a SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing of 441-640 can take ENGL-111.

Course Requirement:  ENGL 111 Academic Composition  

ACT English <18:

Course

Students with an English ACT lower than 18 or an SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing lower than 440 are required to take ENGL 100: Basic Writing prior to ENGL 111. These students should enroll in ENGL 100 and UC 120 in the Fall Term of their first year, followed by ENGL 111 in the Spring Term of their first year.

Course RequirementENGL 100 Basic Writing

Requirement: ENGL 100 Basic Writing 

 

First

Oral Communication

Do not take in the same semester as    UC 110 / ENGL 111

First

Quantitative Reasoning

First

Ethics 

Second

Cultural Pluralism 

Second

Religion

Second Fine Arts
Second Social Sciences
Second

Natural Science and Society

Students must take a minimum of SIX (6) credit hours of Natural Science course (the combination of the Natural Science and Society requirement and the Laboratory Science Requirement).

 

Second

Natural Science Laboratory

Students must take a minimum of SIX (6) credit hours of Natural Science courses (the combination of the Natural Science and Society requirement and the Laboratory Science requirement).

Third Humanities
Fourth Global Systems

 

Ways of Fulfilling some Signature Learning Requirements:


Transfer Work


Students also can fulfill some Signature Learning requirements via transfer course work. Courses transferred to Capital University that align with the transfer agreements will automatically be taken as having met the appropriate requirement.  More information regarding transfer equivalency courses are available on the Capital University Web site (http://www.capital.edu/transferring-college-credit/).

Students can be waived from First Year Seminar requirements if they have completed 31 credit hours of study on a college campus.

Coursework that is not specified in the equivalency guides may sometimes be used to meet a Signature Learning requirement, subject to review of the course syllabus. Transfer students may combine several courses from several different prior universities to petition for a substitution. Please, use the General Education Waiver form to petition for this kind of substitution.  Attach all syllabi to the General Education Waiver form, and submit the petition to the Registrar’s Office. Petitions submitted after April 15 may not be processed until the next academic year.  All petitions for transferred course work should be submitted prior to the last semester before graduation.  Transfer students with completed baccalaureate and/or master’s degrees from regionally accredited colleges or universities are waived from the Capital University Signature Learning requirements effective fall term 2004. Students who earn an associate degree from a regionally accredited institution and complete the Signature Learning requirements outlined in the Ohio Transfer Module* are presumed to have met Capital University’s Signature Learning requirements with the exception of Religion (UC 220) and either Humanities (UC 320) or Global Systems (UC 370).

*The Ohio Transfer Module contains 54-60 quarter hours or 36-40 semester hours of course credit in English composition (minimum 5-6 quarter hours or 3 semester hours); mathematics, statistics and formal/symbolic logic (minimum of 3 quarter hours or 3 semester hours); arts/humanities (minimum 9 quarter hours or 6 semester hours); social and behavioral sciences (minimum of 9 quarter hours or 6 semester hours); and natural sciences (minimum 9 quarter hours or 6 semester hours). Oral communication and interdisciplinary areas may be included as additional options. Additional elective hours from among these areas make up the total hours for a completed Transfer Module. Courses for the Transfer Module should be 100- and 200-level Signature Learning courses commonly completed in the first two years of a student’s residency. Students completing a technical associate degree may complete the transfer module, but will likely have to take additional Signature Learning courses beyond those required for the applied associate degree. Alternatively, students may transfer individual transfer module courses without completing the entire module (http://regents.ohio.gov/transfer/policy/transfer_policy_d2aa.php).

 

Course Curriculum


Successful completion of University Core courses (UC) are taken as meeting these goals. Some Goals also have Cognate courses that have also been determined to meet the requirements of these Goals.

Assessment Testing


Students may demonstrate that they already possess the knowledge or skills delineated by a Goal. Assessment procedures are available for each Signature Learning goal. Students who are interested in this option should contact Academic Success at http://www.capital.edu/Academic-Success/ or 614-236-6327 prior to enrolling in a course that has been approved to satisfy that particular Signature Learning requirement. A waiver indicates that the requirements for a Signature Learning Goal have been met and no further courses are needed. Receiving a waiver is not the same as receiving credit for a course. Students should not schedule a Signature Learning course until after the waiver process for that Signature Learning requirement is completed. Normally students can attempt to waive a Signature Learning requirement only once.

- Automatic Waivers


Students may receive automatic waivers for Signature Learning Goal Reading and Writing and Quantitative Reasoning based on ACT or SAT test scores.

Reading & Writing Skills

Quantitative Reasoning

  ACT English 28 minimum

   ACT Math 28 minimum

  

  SAT Evidence-Based Reading

  and Writing (SAT EBRW)

 

  SAT EBRW - 640 minimum

 

   SAT Math - 700 minimum

 

 

                       (March, 2016 and after)

                                                                         There is no fee or credit awarded as a result of an automatic waiver.

- Assessment Testing Process


Students will have to complete either: (A) a test developed by Capital Faculty; (B) the College-Level Examination Program (CLEP) test (CLEP Examinations  , CLEP Testing Center ); or (C) an assessment interview with a faculty member (Contact the Student Success office or the appropriate department chair for detailed information regarding this option.) 

- Fees and Credit


Fees must be paid at the time a waiver test is attempted. Credit is not awarded for the A or C waiver process. However, three semester hours of credit is awarded for each CLEP test successfully passed. Credit will be granted in accordance with the policy in effect at the time the exam is administered. All test fees costs, and all fees are subject to change. CLEP Testing availability and related costs must be confirmed with each CLEP Testing Center .

Portfolio Submitted to UCAP


Students may demonstrate that they have acquired the skills or knowledge delineated in a Signature Learning requirement through work or life experience. A student, for example, who has lived abroad for a period may wish to demonstrate that this experience has provided him/her with the knowledge and skills delineated by the Cultural Pluralism requirement. Students complete this by assembling all the materials relevant to be evaluated by a faculty panel assembled for such purposes. More information regarding UCAP can be obtained at Academic Success http://www.capital.edu/Academic-Success/. (See the Undergraduate Academic Policies, Regulations and General Information section for more information.)

Signature Learning Course Requirements Satisifed by Specific Major


Major Curriculum

By virtue of a course required for a specific major a student may satisfy both a Signature Learning and major requirement. For example, students majoring in mathematics meet the Quantitative Reasoning goal and satisfy a major requirement by completing Calculus I. What follows is a list of goals met within the following majors

MAJOR

GOAL FULFILLED

Accounting

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science

Art

Fine Arts

Art Therapy

Fine Arts

Athletic Training and

Athletic Training Pre-PT

Natural Science, Social Science, Quantitative Reasoning

Biochemistry

Quantitative Reasoning, Natural Science

Biology

Quantitative Reasoning, Natural Science

Business Management

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science

Chemistry

Quantitative Reasoning, Natural Science

Communication

Fine Arts

Computer Science

Quantitative Reasoning

Conservatory majors

(BA Majors excluded)

Fine Arts

Criminology

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science

Economics

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science

Economics-Political Science

Social Science

Education

Social Science

Education (Early Childhood)

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science,

Natural Science

     Education (Intervention

     Specialist)

     Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science,

Natural Science

Engineering

(Dual Degree program)

Quantitative Reasoning, Natural Science

English - Creative Writing

Fine Arts

Environmental Science

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science, Natural Science

Exercise Science and

Exercise Science Pre PT

Natural Science, Social Science, Quantitative Reasoning

Financial Economics

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science

      French (major or minor)       Humanities

Health Education

Social Science

History

(only with teacher licensure)

Social Science

International Studies

Social Science

Leadership & Management

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science

Marketing

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science

Mathematics

Quantitative Reasoning, Natural Science

Music Technology

Fine Arts

Nursing

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science,

Natural Science

Political Science

Social Science

Political Science

(only with teacher licensure)

Social Science

Psychology

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science,

Natural Science (Non-Laboratory)

Religion

Religion

Social Work

Cultural Diversity, Social Science

Sociology

Quantitative Reasoning, Social Science

      Spanish (major or minor)        Humanities

Theatre

Fine Arts

 

Three Signature Learning Course Requirements are NOT satisfied by any specific major:

  • First Year Seminar
  • Reading and Writing Skills
  • Ethics