General Education Philosophy

General Education is that part of a student’s education that goes beyond learning technical skills and allows students to become well-rounded, higher-functioning citizens of the world. As an institute of higher learning, Mitchell Tech is committed to the inherent value of general education and knows that critical thinking ability, communication skills, information literacy, math and problem-solving skills and more, are crucial for graduates’ success in their future technical careers.

Mitchell Tech also recognizes that an Associate’s degree or diploma at Mitchell Technical College must mean something more than job skills. Students must become lifelong learners with the ability to adapt to a changing world and ever-increasing job expectations. To this end, general education requirements are identified in the South Dakota Administrative Rule 24:59:01:07 as follows:

Each Associate of Applied Science degree program must include a minimum of 15 credit hours of general education courses from a minimum of four of the following categories:

          (1) Communications
          (2) Social sciences
          (3) Mathematics
          (4) Computers
          (5) Arts and humanities
          (6) Natural sciences

Source: 15 SDR 64, effective November 2, 1988; transferred from § 24:10:38:03, 20 SDR 223, effective July 7, 1994; repealed, SL 1995, ch 86, § 6, effective July 1, 1995; readopted, 22 SDR 13, effective August 9, 1995; Readopted from § 24:10:43:03, 44 SDR 184, effective June 25, 2018; 45 SDR 130, effective April 29, 2019.
General Authority: SDCL 13-39A-18.
Law Implemented: SDCL 13-39A-16, 13-39A-18, 13-39A-42.

Mitchell Tech requires all students to take at least one (1) math and one (1) English course to satisfy the general education requirement.