Big W!N for TH!NK

A campus-wide focus on enhancing students’ critical and creative thinking skills paid big dividends last month when a regional accrediting agency reaffirmed the university’s accreditation for 10 years.

NC State’s five-year Quality Enhancement Plan, cleverly dubbed TH!NK, was instrumental in helping the university successfully navigate the accreditation process. The plan identifies student learning outcomes related to higher-order thinking skills, including the ability to understand the intellectual standards for critical and creative thinking.

“Critical thinkers raise vital questions; gather and assess relevant information; reach well-reasoned conclusions and test them against appropriate standards; consider alternative systems of thought or points of view; and communicate effectively to others the analysis or solution to problems,” the plan says.

The intellectual standards of critical thinking include clarity accuracy, precision, relevance, significance, depth, breadth, logic and fairness.

SACSCOC, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges, is the regional accrediting organization for the Southern states. The commission’s principles of accreditation require each member institution to be engaged in an ongoing quality enhancement program.

As part of NC State’s reaffirmation of accreditation, the university will report the results of a full year of academic program assessments to the commission in September. A more detailed report on TH!NK will be delivered to the commission in five years.