General Education, Natural Sciences Goals

Issues in today’s world require scientific information and a scientific approach to informed decision making. Therefore, the goal of the Natural Science requirement is to guide students toward becoming scientifically literate. This scientific understanding gained in these courses enhances students’ ability to define and solve problems, reason with an open mind, think critically and creatively, suspend judgment, and make decisions that may have local or global significance. To achieve this outcome, students will demonstrate the ability to do the following.
I.	Conduct an experiment, collect and analyze data, and interpret results in a laboratory setting.
II.	Analyze, evaluate and test a scientific hypothesis.
III.	Use basic scientific language and processes, and be able to distinguish between scientific and non-scientific explanations.
IV.	Identify unifying principles and repeatable patterns in nature, the values of natural diversity, and apply them to problems or issues of a scientific nature.
V.	Analyze and discuss the impact of scientific discovery on human thought and behavior.