Carnegie Mellon University

Eberly Center

Teaching Excellence & Educational Innovation

Dietrich College of Humanities & Social Sciences – Learning Objectives Samples


36-149 The Statistics of the Gay and Lesbian Population (complete set)

Upon successful completion of the course, you should be able to:

  • List and discuss statistical and foundational issues that impact research on LGBT topics.
  • Discuss features and limitations of various sampling procedures and research methodologies.
  • Perform simple calculations and statistical analysis.
  • Represent simple data in the appropriate graphical form.
  • Interpret statistical output in terms of the original research question.
  • Do library research using print and online resources as appropriate.
  • Evaluate the content of research and popular press articles, and websites by combining all the previous skills.
  • Draw informed conclusions that reflect an understanding of multiple (and sometimes conflicting) sources of information.
  • Communicate orally and in writing your knowledge, thoughts and positions about scientific LGBT issues.

36-309/749 Experimental Design of Behavioral and Social Sciences (complete set)

Students should be able to design an experimental study, carry out an appropriate statistical analysis of the data, and properly interpret and communicate the analyses.

67-250 The Information Systems Milieux (Jeria Quesenberry) (complete set)

  • Identify the fundamental concepts and key issues of the Information Systems discipline and the role of information in the enterprise.
  • Describe various information systems within an enterprise view including the enterprise strategy, business, application, information, and infrastructure layers.
  • Discuss and analyze linkages between business/organization process and information strategy and how enterprises can achieve competitive advantage with strategic deployments of Information Systems.
  • Analyze enterprise case studies that focus on issues of the strategic value of Information Systems in order to evaluate costs, benefits, and risks of projects and determine the effectiveness of different applications or technologies in a particular context.
  • Apply structured approaches and techniques to design and build a front-end web prototype.
  • Design and build a database and analyze information for enterprise decision-making.
  • Demonstrate your responsibilities and contributions in a team-based environment based upon pre-negotiated group timelines, roles and deliverables.

76-271 Introduction to Professional and Technical Writing (complete set)

This course is designed to prepare you for professional writing experiences.  By the end of the course, you should be able to:

  • Identify the primary and secondary audience(s) of a text.
  • Craft texts which take into consideration the needs of your primary audience(s).
  • Write in an array of genres for a variety of purposes.
  • Identify different rhetorical strategies and appeals in the writing of others.
  • Use various rhetorical strategies and appeals to make arguments in your own writing.
  • Appreciate the requirements and limitations placed on different types of writing by their unique rhetorical situations.
  • Craft texts which consider the requirements and limitations of their unique rhetorical situations.

79/88-202 History of Public Policy in the United States (excerpt)

  • Describe past public policy debates in the United States that exemplify a broad range of historical and contemporary concerns.
  • Analyze these debates using theoretical frameworks provided in class.
  • Describe some aspects of the expansion and contraction of federal intervention in social and economic life over the past 200-plus years, and evaluate arguments for and against these actions.
  • Critically apply the lessons learned in this class to other history and SDS courses.
  • Advocate for particular policy choices using the knowledge and skills gained in this course.

79-212 Disastrous Encounters: Technology & the Environment in Global Historical Context (excerpt)

By the end of the class students should be able to:

  • Explain the scientific principles behind “natural” disasters, including cyclonic weather, global climate change, volcanoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, river flooding, famines, and diseases.
  • Analyze to what extent a given disaster is in fact “natural” at all, but rather was either caused by or exacerbated by human actions.
  • Draw connections between different types of disasters, recognizing that major disasters often produce predictable secondary disaster effects.

79-263 Energy and the Environment in the Americas (complete set)

Students should be able to:

  • Describe broad trends in energy use over time.
  • Identify variations in energy use based on region and socio-economic status.
  • Identify specific environmental “costs” associated with different forms of energy.
  • Analyze the historical forces that caused shifts in energy production and consumption.
  • Analyze and synthesize scholarly writing focused on energy and the environment.

79-276 North of the Border: Mexican Immigration Past and Present (complete set)

By the end of the course, students should be able to:

  • Discuss in detail why Mexican immigrants cross significant cultural, linguistic and geographic boundaries to migrate to the United States (based on international migration theory and the perspectives of authors we read in the course)
  • Discuss how the history between the United States and Mexico (from 1821) has impacted and continues to impact Mexican immigration and responses to it
  • Identify recent trends (post-1965) in Mexican migration to the U.S. (including patterns of migration and new destinations), the reasons behind these trends, and the potential impact of this information on policy decisions
  • Articulate and debunk some of the common myths about Mexican immigration
  • Compare and contrast the impact of migration on both the sending and receiving communities
  • Define and discuss agency (i.e., degree of self-determination) as it relates to Mexican migrants
  • Discuss reactions to Mexican immigration and the reasons behind the respective reactions
  • Discuss the phenomenon of return migration and its potential impact on policy decisions

79-312 Medical Anthropology (excerpt)

With a reasonable effort on your part, by the end of the semester you should be able to:

  • Explain how health and illness are socially constructed, by comparing and contrasting the ways in which different cultures conceptualizethe body, perceive the human life cycle, and explain and treat illness.
  • Identify and describe the three basic etiological systems and assess each in terms of different dimensions of medical efficacy.

80-244 Environmental Ethics (Mara Harrell) (complete set)

By the time you finish this course you should be able to:

  • identify and analyze the ethical aspects of particular problem situations in the domain of environmental policy;
  • describe and explain how each problem situation would look from various points of view, with a full and fair-minded understanding of how each point of view makes sense on its own terms;
  • describe and explain how ethical frameworks have bearing on each problem situation;
  • effectively collaborate with others in analyzing problem situations and in generating several distinct options; and
  • present a critical consideration of each option that is well-balanced and theoretically informed.

80-254 Analytic Philosophy (Ruth Poproski) (complete set)

Upon successful completion of this course you should be able to:

  • articulate and critically analyze positions held by Frege, Russell, and members of the Vienna Circle;
  • assess the contributions of early analytic thought to a variety of trends in contemporary practice and thought;
  • formulate (at least a sketch of) your own theory of the connection between meaning and truth;
  • defend a position regarding the role of philosophical thinking across the disciplines.

82-141 Elementary Spanish I (complete set)

By the end of the course students should be able to perform a variety of communicative functions with a novice level of accuracy and fluency.  Some of these functions include:

  • Introducing oneself appropriately with different levels of formality according to the situation.
  • Talking about daily routines and educational experience.
  • Describing family relationships and members.
  • Communicating about preferences, likes and dislikes.
  • Participating in a situation where items are bought or exchanged.
  • Describing and ordering food.
  • Talking about celebrations and personal relationships.

Students will learn about some of the different practices, beliefs and attitudes that characterize Spanish-speaking cultures and contrast them with English-Speaking cultures.

82-345 Migration and exile: economic and political movement of people (excerpt)

Students should be able to:

  • Identify, describe and explain different positions/perspectives in the immigration debate through reading and analyzing a variety of texts, visual and musical artifacts.
  • Articulate in oral and written form their position on immigration.

85-211A Cognitive Psychology (Anne Fay) (complete set)

By the end of the semester you should be able to:

  • Recognize and recall major terms and concepts in cognitive psychology
  • Describe and explain major methods and theories
  • Compare and contrast alternative theories or approaches in terms of their underlying
  • processes and predictions
  • Evaluate major studies in terms of their methods, results, conclusions & implications
  • Apply theories or findings to real world situations
  • Generate and explain examples that demonstrate or test theories or concepts
  • Analyze and synthesize concepts and theories across topics, readings, and discussions
  • Communicate ideas in writing in a clear, coherent, and logical style