Critical, Creative, and Reflective Thinking
ÃÛÌÒµ¼º½ students have many opportunities to reflect upon, integrate, and apply different types of knowledge to form independent judgments. In understanding how to successfully evaluate the viewpoints of experts, ÃÛÌÒµ¼º½ students identify their own perspectives and analyze these when reviewing texts, speech, and media. In their majors and core curriculum courses, students integrate multiple disciplinary perspectives to solve real-world and complex problems. In Silicon Valley, this type of thinking provides the foundation for generating new ideas, products, and ways of perceiving problems.
87%
of seniors report that their experience at ÃÛÌÒµ¼º½ contributed very much or quite a bit to their knowledge, skills, and personal development in thinking critically and analytically (NSSE, 2018).
68%
of seniors frequently seek solutions to problems and explain them to others; 31% do so occasionally (HERI College Senior Survey, 2019).
Learning Opportunities in Courses
- 77% of faculty report frequently or occasionally giving an assignment that requires students to describe how different perspectives would affect the interpretation of a question or issue in their discipline (HERI Faculty Survey, 2016-17).
- 65% of faculty use real-life problems in all or most of the courses that they teach (HERI Faculty Survey, 2016-17).
- 51% of faculty use student inquiry to drive learning in all or most of the courses they teach (HERI Faculty Survey, 2016-17).
Student Coursework Experiences
- Critical: 81% of seniors indicate that their courses very often or often emphasize applying facts, theories, or methods to practice problems or new situations (NSSE, 2018).
- Creative: 74% of students report that their courses very often or often emphasize forming a new idea or understanding from various pieces of information (NSSE, 2018).
- Reflective: 83% of students state that their courses very often or often emphasize connecting ideas to their prior experience and knowledge (NSSE, 2018).
68%
of seniors report that their ability to engage in a process of continuous innovation, adaptation, and learning from failure describes them very well or pretty well (HERI College Senior Survey, 2019).
99%
of seniors strongly agree or agree that the institution has contributed to their intellectual and practical skills, including critical thinking (HERI COLLEGE SENIOR SURVEY, 2019).