Durable Skills at Weber State
Durable skills are the enduring abilities you will develop throughout your education at Weber State that will help you succeed in college, your career, and your life. While technical or discipline-specific skills may change as industries, technologies, and workplaces evolve, durable skills prepare you to adapt to new challenges and remain valuable no matter where your education and career take you.
Durable Skills
Critical Thinking
You will learn to analyze, evaluate, and synthesize information so you can make logical, informed, and evidence-based judgments and decisions.
Creative Thinking
You will learn to generate original ideas, explore different perspectives, and develop innovative approaches to complex questions and challenges.
Problem Solving
You will learn to identify and define problems, analyze relevant information, evaluate possible solutions, and use effective strategies to achieve your goals.
Communication
You will learn to express your ideas clearly and effectively through oral, written, visual, and digital communication while adapting your message for different audiences, purposes, and situations.
Collaboration
You will learn to build positive relationships, contribute effectively to teams, value different perspectives, and work with others toward shared goals.
Leadership & Professionalism
You will develop the integrity, accountability, initiative, ethical decision-making, and professionalism needed to lead yourself and work effectively with others.
Information & Tech Literacy
You will learn to locate, evaluate, create, and responsibly use information and technology to solve problems, make informed decisions, and communicate effectively in a digital world.
Metacognition & Growth Mindset
You will learn to reflect on your own learning, seek and apply feedback, adapt to new challenges, and continue developing the knowledge, skills, and habits you need for lifelong learning.
How Does This Connect to My Education?
Durable skills are not necessarily learned in a single course or major. Instead, you will be introduced to and have opportunities to apply these skills in General Education and other foundational learning experiences, and then practice and refine them in your major. Durable skills also are infused in authentic experiences outside the classroom that enrich your learning.
Introduce & Apply
You will be introduced to and have opportunities to apply durable skills in your General Education and other foundational learning experiences. You also will have opportunities to apply critical thinking, communication, collaboration, problem solving, and other durable skills in authentic out-of-classroom experiences, such as undergraduate research, internships, community-engaged learning, leadership experiences, and study abroad.
Practice & Refine
You will practice and refine your durable skills through increasingly advanced coursework and experiences within your major. Your major will bring disciplinary knowledge and durable skills together both in and out of the classroom, helping you to prepare for professional success, lifelong learning, engaged citizenship, and a life of purpose.
Faculty Perspectives
Durable skills build better employees and better neighbors. By completing Weber State's general education program, students graduate with a toolkit of essential skills designed to help them thrive in both their careers and personal lives.
Students in Gen Ed come from all walks of life with a variety of goals and personal stories. Gen Ed provides space for students to sit with people who are different from them, and democratic citizenship is the ultimate durable skill.
Durable skills are really about the heart and purpose of a university education. They create the thread through which students learn to think deeply, communicate effectively, connect meaningfully with others, and engage thoughtfully with the world around them.
