ABSTRACT
The call for educational reform was sounded loud and clear in 1983, when the National Commission on Excellence in Education, in a landmark report titled A Nation at Risk, warned that this nation was losing its preeminence in commerce, industry, science, and technology to competitors throughout the world and that the primary reason for this was a mediocre educational system. The commission called for greater educational rigor and a stronger international dimension in all levels of education (National Commission 1983). A Nation at Risk inspired a plethora of reports from other national organizations, each of which recommended greater accountability in higher education. The new reports cited the inadequate communication and critical thinking skills of college graduates as examples of the poor quality of American higher education. The authors recommended that college and university educators define the "outcomes," in terms of student performance, that they expect as a result of the courses and programs their institutions offer (National Institute 1984; Newman 1985). The most recent reports clearly call for educational outcomes that include indicators of work-force skills (U.S. Department of Labor 1991; Peterson 1993).
