General education is a crucial part of the curriculum at USC Salkehatchie. It is defined as a set of skills and a collection of knowledge in different content areas; the institution insures that students develop those skills and gain that knowledge through taking courses in its required core curriculum.

Indicators: USC Salkehatchie uses many indicators to assess general education, including current student and alumni satisfaction with their general education experience, comparison of predicted and actual grade point ratios, the performance of Salkehatchie students after they move to another institution, and the evidence of student writing and critical thinking skills on essays written for sophomore-level and above courses.

USC Salkehatchie annually surveys its students and every two years surveys alumni. Among the items on both surveys are questions related to general education. The campus Office of Institutional Research annually prepares studies of predicted versus actual grade point ratios. Columbia regularly provides data showing how Salkehatchie students perform after moving to another USC Campus, which are studied to assess general education. Finally, the Salkehatchie Assessment Committee analyzes the level of writing and critical thinking skills in essays written for courses taken by students who are sophomores or above.

USC Salkehatchie assessment of general education is multi-faceted. Since a primary mission of the institution is to provide the first two years of a four-year degree, we see much of what we do as related to the fulfillment of our general education mission.

The annual student satisfaction survey has several items related to general education. Students seem generally satisfied with their experience. This table shows a sample of the results of the past four years.

The survey administered in 1995 to alumni who graduated in 1991 - 1992 shows an extremely high level of satisfaction with general education at USC Salkehatchie. The following percentages were satisfactory or very satisfactory: general education program (89%), general education instruction (89%), and overall academic experience (93%). In 1996 the results were general education program (90%), general education instruction (89%), and overall academic experience (91%).

As for studies of predicted versus actual grade point ratio, students generally continue to do much better than predicted. We see this data as reflective of student performance in general education core courses. More than 60% of our 1995 - 96 students do better than they are predicted to perform. This is remarkable, considering we serve predominantly nontraditional, first generation students, and the SAT levels of our students are generally low.

Periodically the institution reports separately on transfer student achievement. However, since much of what students take at USC Salkehatchie is general education, how students perform later indicates their preparation in general education at Salkehatchie. Assessment of student performance when they move to a senior USC campus reveals that they make very good progress, especially remarkable since only 35% of those moving to Columbia and 8% of those moving to Aiken originally met those Campuses' admission eligibility requirements.

Summary results include the following. With regard to progress to upper class status, by Spring 1994 86.5% of Salkehatchie students enrolled in Spring 1992 and moving to USC Columbia had attained junior or senior status, while 80.8% of those moving to Aiken had attained that status. As for aggregate GPR by Spring 1994, those students moving to Columbia had attained a GPR of approximately 2.74, while those moving to Aiken had a GPR of approximately 2.71. The figures are within a hundredth of a point for 1995 -96. Thus we believe that their general education experience at USC Salkehatchie prepares students well to succeed in their baccalaureate work.

The institution's Assessment Committee evaluated essays submitted to several fall 1995 classes taken by sophomores and above. The courses were in business, English, psychology, and sociology. Writing and critical thinking skills were assessed on a 5-point scale (5 - outstanding, to 1 - inadequate). Average writing scores for the 50 essays reviewed were 3.6 and average critical thinking scores were 3.8. Thus students in these courses show generally effective writing and critical thinking skills. Two skills our general education curriculum is designed to enhance. A slight reduction in writing scores suggests an area of future focus.

USC Salkehatchie is generally very satisfied with the above assessment results. Student satisfaction with their general education experience has improved recently, a result of continued and renewed emphasis at faculty meetings and across the institution on our general education mission, on quality teaching, and on writing and critical thinking skills. Recent expansion of EW offerings in Business and Criminal Justice is offering new opportunities for a wide range of student interests. Written survey comments stressed small class sizes and student/faculty interaction as the strongest aspect of our education program. Our findings suggested we needed to offer more help to developmental students. We applied for and received a TRIO grant of $186,000.00 with the outcome of an Opportunity Scholars Program, which is offering special tutorial, cultural, and counseling services to qualified freshmen.

We will continue to emphasize general education as a prime focus of the mission of USC Salkehatchie.