Critical thinking focus of presentation

Brian Kanouse, Ph.D., of the University of Nebraska at Omaha’s Critical and Creative Thinking Program will lead a workshop, which will include some small group activities, from 5:30 to 7 p.m. Wednesday in Durham Research Center Room 1002 as part of the UNMC Office of Graduate Studies’ series of programs on transferable skills.

Eleanor Rogan, Ph.D., chairwoman, department of environmental, agricultural and occupational health in the UNMC College of Public Health, said Dr. Kanouse’s session will be the first of three on critical and creative thinking, with the subsequent events scheduled for the spring semester.

“Critical and creative thinking were two topics that were identified as being of great interest to students,” Dr. Rogan said. “Faculty also felt that students would benefit from some explicit information and training in these areas.”

The Office of Graduate Studies is working to develop programs that help students recognize and develop important transferable skills that will prove useful regardless of their chosen career track. Additional attention focuses on helping each student identify his/her primary skillset and the careers that might best be suited to that skillset.

The first transferable skills workshop, focused on writing, was well-attended, Dr. Rogan said. This week’s event, like the first, is scheduled in the evening so graduate students and doctoral candidates can work around their research and laboratory responsibilities.

“Critical thinking is very important in doing any kind of research,” Dr. Rogan said. “Critical thinking could be defined as the ability to take information, evaluate it and apply it in diverse ways. As you develop certain kinds of information, then you need to take that information and apply it to the next set of questions.”

Dr. Kanouse is a member of the UNO faculty for the Critical and Creative Thinking Master’s Program, making him a well-qualified expert to address the topic, Dr. Rogan added.