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Institutional Learning Outcomes

Institutional Learning Outcomes

Institutional Learning Outcomes (ILOs) represent the knowledge, skills and attitudes that all University of Science & Arts of Oklahoma students are expected to acquire upon completion of their degree from USAO.

For more than a century the university’s mission has remained steadfast and consistent with its original motto, “Not for livelihood, but for life.” We value the qualities instilled by the liberal arts and offer the public a distinctive and accessible education that combines an interdisciplinary core curriculum with superior instruction in major fields of study. USAO's core belief states that the best path to a purposeful and meaningful life is an education that integrates knowledge from many disciplines to equip students for the 21st century. Purpose is expressed by tangible outcomes that benefit the people and communities our students engage. Meaning is measured internally through self-evaluation of personal growth, fulfillment, and quality of life. USAO students are lifelong learners who reason, relate, adapt, innovate, lead, and communicate ethically throughout their lives. We are Oklahoma’s public liberal arts college.

Contributes to a life of purpose

Instruction in the Discipline

Students receive rigorous instruction in their major field of study and demonstrate disciplinary proficiency.

Interdisciplinary Values

Students engage in scholarship as civil dialogue between unique individuals and disciplines and acquire broad knowledge and experience in the arts, humanities, mathematics, science, and social sciences.

Skills of Lifelong Learners

Students practice effective and ethical communication, research, creative problem-solving, and scientific reasoning.

Quality of Character

Students recognize and seize the opportunity to act as informed, productive, and intellectually mature global citizens.

Contributes to a life of meaning

Instruction in the Discipline

Students study examples of disciplinary fluency, learn to recognize excellence, and develop a plan to achieve mastery.

Interdisciplinary Values

Students discover the advantages of intellectual curiosity and diversity of perspective while they gain empathy and appreciation for other ideas, cultures, and beliefs.

Skills of Lifelong Learners

Students create original work that exhibits their scholarship, accept critical response, and understand that success requires failure, revision, and growth.

Quality of Character

Students pursue education as their goal and develop integrity, responsibility, tenacity, teamwork, charity, and leadership.