CURRICULUM
1. Purpose: The U.S. Army Inspector General School's curriculum for the three-week Basic Course represents the training requirements for all new Inspectors General and how those requirements derive from the critical tasks an Inspector General must be able to perform prior to assuming his or her duties in the field.
2. Course Map: The prioritized, logical sequence to the primary blocks of instruction appears in the course map (see below). This course illustrates the mandatory flow and logical teaching sequence of each block (or lesson) and serves as the model for the class schedule. This course map also prescribes the required order in which the students will learn the Enabling Learning Objectives (ELOs).
3. Critical Tasks: The Inspector General (TIG) has approved 12 critical tasks that, have resulted in the Terminal Learning Objectives (TLOs) that form the foundation of the school's Academic Program. The current appoved task list, with appropriate task numbers, is as follows:
15-007-0001: Resolve a systemic issue in a functional area.
15-007-0002: Advise the command on the Army inspection principles and the Organizational Inspection Program.
15-007-0003: Resolve complaints and issues for an individual using the Inspector General Action Process.
15-007-0004: Resolve allegations of impropriety against an individual.
15-007-0005: Verify that U.S. Army organizations are conducting intelligence operations in accordance with law and policy.
15-007-0006: Gather information from groups of individuals in support of the Inspector General Inspections, Assistance, and Investigations functions.
15-007-0007: Resolve allegations of Whistleblower reprisal using the Inspector General Action Process and Department of Defense guidance.
15-007-0008: Support a command or organization as part of an Army Inspector General Office in a wartime operational environment.
15-007-0009: Support a Joint Task Force as part of a Joint Inspector General office.
15-007-0010: Support a command or organization as part of an active-component, Army National Guard, or Army Reserve Inspector General office.
15-007-0011: Comply with the Army's ethical and moral standards.
15-007-0012: Conduct teaching and training throughout a command or organization.
4. Learning Objectives: The learning objectives that an Inspector General must achieve to perform all IG functions successfully in all environments appear as Enabling Learning Objectives (ELOs) in the Advance Sheets booklet. These ELOs support the overarching training requirements — or Terminal Learning Objectives — for each block of instruction. Each functional area — and that functional area's supporting blocks of instruction — has ELOs that an IG student must learn to be successful as an IG. These ELOs fall into two categories, Knowledge and Application, and allow the students to achieve the orverarching Terminal Learning Objective for each major block of instruction (or lesson).
Knowledge represents the learning and understanding of key terms, methods, and concepts while Application is the use of those methods and concepts in new situations to solve problems or apply processes. These two categories represent two of the major competencies outlined in Benjamin Bloom's Taxonomy. Bloom designed this taxonomy to help categorize the different levels of test questions an instructor can use to evaluate a student's performance. Comprehension applies but is embedded — for the school's purpose — in the Knowledge category. Analysis also applies in some cases but is embedded once again — for the school's purposes — in the Application category. The complete taxonomy lists these competencies in the following order: Knowledge, Comprehension, Application, Analysis, Synthesis, and Evaluation.
Bloom's Taxonomy is useful as an approach to the different levels of learning such as crawl, walk, and run. The Inspector General School applies two of these competencies in sequence — Knowledge and Application — to cover the crawl and walk aspects of IG training. The school touches upon the other competencies such as Analysis and Synthesis (the creating of new ideas from old ones) but, due to time constraints, relies strongly upon experienced IGs in the field to mentor the course graduates further to acheive this final level of education in the IG system. Therefore, the school's primary focus is on teaching the IG students to crawl and walk (Knowledge and Application), which will allow the students to run (Analysis and Synthesis) after some further mentoring in a field environment. Even in the absence of further mentoring, graduates of the school will still learn the techniques and processes necessary to serve as successful IGs in the field immediately upon the arrival at their new duty stations.