1. To offer quality career programs at the associate and technical baccalaureate levels.

2. To offer quality transfer programs articulated with appropriate baccalaureate programs.

3. To provide an appropriate general education component in all degree programs as an essential part of students' learning experiences.

4. To offer professional certificates.

5. To offer credit and non-credit courses that meet the needs of non-matriculated students.

6. To provide student services that address the needs of all students.

7. To offer necessary classes and provide learning support services and technologies for students at all levels of academic preparation.

8. To maintain an excellent teaching faculty who are actively engaged in furthering knowledge through scholarship, research, and assessment of student learning.

9. To engage in active partnership with community groups and to involve them in appropriate areas of decision making.

10. To serve the community through faculty and staff expertise and college resources.

11. To engage in and support assessment throughout the college.

Approved by the RWC Faculty April 29, 2004

PHILOSOPHY

The Philosophy of Raymond Walters College is based upon the core values that guide the College in its decision making. Most important are those core values pertaining to high quality instruction and academic excellence, which are the primary focus of the College and the foundation for all the efforts of faculty, administration, and staff. The College believes that students learn best in small, student-focused settings, where they are respected as individuals and have an opportunity to contribute to the learning environment. The College strives to provide a general education which promotes tolerance, lifelong learning, and a devotion to free inquiry and free expression, producing graduates who are individuals of character, sensitive to the needs of community, competent to contribute to society, and civil in speech and action. Simply put, the College works toward the creation of an informed citizenry with the ability to think critically, communicate effectively, and solve problems.

The College also participates in the advancement of knowledge for the common good through academic scholarship, which supports good teaching. As a result, the College functions as a cultural and intellectual repository, making the knowledge and experience of faculty and staff available to all its constituencies. In addition, the College provides lifelong learning opportunities for the purposes of job preparation and mobility, the pursuit of higher education degrees, and personal enrichment. The College aims to facilitate a total learning environment which fosters both personal and intellectual growth. To maintain quality, the College engages in a regular comprehensive assessment of its programs, courses, and services and their outcomes.

The College believes in openness and accessibility, including shared ownership, responsibility, and active participation in decision making among all of its various constituencies--students, alumni, community, faculty, staff, and administration--in order to foster mutual respect, academic freedom, loyalty, and commitment. Integrity and ethics provide the foundation of shared ownership and guide the College’s daily interactions with students, the community, and internal constituencies. The College also incorporates diversity in its policies and practices and supports efforts which cultivate and foster respect for all people as unique human beings. The College believes in increasing access to higher education and providing support services to assist in each student’s attainment of individual educational objectives.

Finally, the College recognizes that it is a part of an extended community. First, it benefits from its identity as a substantially autonomous college of the University of Cincinnati in providing access for its constituencies to all the resources and educational opportunities of a major university. Second, because education is a continuous process, the College believes in developing interactive relationships with its community, including schools and businesses, and responding to changing needs by providing quality programs and courses, cultural enrichment, lifelong learning opportunities, and contributions to the economic growth of the community. Ultimately, the College prepares its graduates to be effective, productive members of an increasingly global environment.

Approved by RWC Faculty 4/25/95
Approved by RWC Staff 4/21/95