College-Wide Learning Outcomes

NorQuest College is a unique and inclusive post–secondary institution that serves individuals and communities by functioning as a catalyst for change through learning. College–wide learning outcomes reflect the essential skills, abilities, and attitudes that NorQuest promotes in its programs and culture. Students, faculty, and staff have opportunities to progress in these areas–to enrich their learning experience, to benefit the workplace and community, and to effect transformative change in their lives.

Creative and Critical Thinking

The thinking process requires learners to analyze, create, and reflect as they broaden their knowledge and enhance their reasoning skills. Learners will engage in the following types of practices to develop and expand on their creative and critical thinking abilities:

• Acquire and implement study and learning skills.
• Use imagination and innovation to arrive at creative solutions.
• Identify, locate, evaluate, and effectively use information and information technology to advance learning and solve problems.
• Incorporate ethical considerations into research and thinking processes.
• Recognize the value of and engage in lifelong learning for ongoing personal and professional development.

Inclusive Culture

Learners will appreciate the rich and diverse manner in which individuals from various backgrounds enhance our overall culture and environment, and will show this in the following ways:

• Acknowledge and engage with people of other cultures, races, generations, religions, genders, sexual orientations, and ability levels.
• Keep current with significant world events.
• Develop intercultural competencies, including an appreciation for other ways of learning and knowing.
• Challenge personal culture-based assumptions.
• Support the blending of groups and cultures that takes place in classroom and online learning environments, and in the workplace.
• Appreciate how contributions from many people enrich the educational experience and the wider community.
• Demonstrate respect for self and others.

Community Citizenship

NorQuest is part of the broader community, and is enriched by interactions with others–inside the college and beyond in the communities it serves. Learners will develop both personal and social responsibility through the following attitudes and actions:

• Recognize how community includes multiple groups – from the individual and family to local, urban, provincial, national, and global communities.
• Identify with and be involved in the learning community, as well as cultural and geographic communities.
• Examine community issues and events as they unfold and understand their significance.
• Engage with the wider community in the exchange of knowledge and ideas.
• Support and enhance connections between the college and the wider community.

Communication and Collaboration

Learners will enhance their skills in all aspects of communication to share ideas, acquire new information, and pursue common goals. This includes focus on the following abilities:

• Determine the purpose and context for communicating.
• Follow accepted communication conventions to minimize barriers.
• Effectively communicate in many forms, such as written, oral, numeric, musical, and visual, using appropriate technologies.
• Apply effective techniques for working in a group and dealing with group dynamics.
• Settle conflicts using clear and fair resolution strategies.