Name: CHE Virtual Forum Durable Skills
Uploaded: 2026-06-01T16:25:25.180Z
Duration: 1 h 1 min 43 s
Description: CHE Virtual Forum Durable Skills

Transcript for "CHE Virtual Forum Durable Skills": Durable skills are in demand by employers. Seven out of 10 of the most requested skills and job postings are durable skills. Employers seek these skills nearly four times more frequently than the top five technical or hard skills. Those findings are from a report by America Succeeds and MC Burning Glass, which analyzed 82,000,000 job postings over two years. That report is from 2021, and the expectation is that the demand for these skills likely increased due to the emergence of generated artificial intelligence and other factors. So the demand seems to be there, but what are these skills? Why do employers seek them? And what can colleges do to better instill such competencies in their graduates? Hi, everyone. I'm Ian Wilhelm, an editor with The Chronicle. I'm gonna be your moderator for this session today. Thank you very much for being here. We've got a great panel to discuss this topic today, and I look forward to hearing from all of them. And, of course, I look forward to hearing from all of you out there in our audience. Be sure to put your questions and comments in the q and a. I plan to include as many as I can in the conversation today. Just to let you know, we do read all of them as well. I do share them with my colleagues here at the Chronicle, and they do help shape our coverage of this topic as well as future sessions like this one. So please don't be shy. Let us know what you're thinking about this topic, and let us know in the q and a your questions and comments and even advice about how best to teach these skills. I wanna thank our sponsor for today's session, which is Acuity Insights. About halfway through the session today, my colleague Brock Reid will interview Kelly Dorr. She's cofounder and the vice president of science and innovation at Acuity. I also wanna mention that Kelly is a cognitive psychologist with a PhD in assessments in higher education. She's also an adjunct associate professor in the department of medicine in the division of education and innovation at McMaster University. So really appreciate Kelly's involvement with this session today as well. Now let me introduce our panel so we can get into the conversation. I'm gonna introduce them in alphabetical order by last name. First is Kristen Fox, the chief executive officer at the Business Higher Education Forum. Next is Rajendra Gill, chief executive officer of essential skills and program manager for economic mobility post secondary and workforce systems for WestEd. Next is Natasha Plow, talent and recruitment consultant for BRIT Talent Strategies. Thank you all for being here. You might as well come on screen. We can join the conversation. I wanna ask each of you a little bit about your background and how you relate to this topic. Because one thing I think is really valuable, Jay, is the the fact that all of you sort of sit in an interesting space. You look more from some of the employer perspective. Obviously, some of you work with colleges directly too. But I think you're there's an opportunity here for, our audience in higher ed to hear a little bit more about what the employer perspective is and how you build that connection between what employers are looking for and what colleges do to teach their students and make sure they have the right competencies for the job market. Natasha, could I start with you just so you give us a little bit about your your background, and how you approach this topic? Absolutely. Good to see everybody today and looking forward to a great discussion. Natasha Stau. I am currently a talent and recruiting consultant really focused on the next generation of future leaders. My background is primarily in talent acquisition. And prior to my consulting role, I served as one of the America's recruiting leaders at where I was responsible for a team of close to 300, and we hired over 11,000 early careers, entry level, and MBA hires. I feel like I have seen it all in twenty to twenty five years of working in professional services and banking, all really focused on that early career talent pool. And today, really, my goal is to help companies solve their biggest HR related issue. How do we work with leaders to really better align their overall business strategy with their talent strategy and, really understanding a lot of those workforce dynamics, the generational shifts that influence, and certainly all that is happening today, as we look at skills and certainly the rise of, just better, smarter, more efficient technologies. And, and I have a particular passion really around this discussion of skills and how do we really start to understand the skills that are critical for various roles, durable skills, as you're describing them, Ian. And I really view my role being that, you know, trusted adviser and having the opportunity to help companies really shape the future of work for their professionals. So I'm excited for the road ahead. I know it's not easy, but really looking forward to, a great discussion today. Yeah. Thanks for being here, Natasha. I appreciate you bringing that perspective from the, sort of the talent acquisition side of things. That's right. Kristen, once you, let us know a little bit more about the forum, something I think some people probably know pretty well when it comes to higher ed, who have been involved with it, but just curious about how you would describe it for folks who may not be as familiar. Yeah. It's great to be here with all of you, and thanks so much for bringing this conversation together. My name is Kristen Fox. I'm the CEO of the Business Higher Education Forum. We're a national nonprofit network that brings together higher education leaders, so community college through r one institutions, as well as corporate leaders. So from leading, national employers, all focused around how do we build better talent pathways, and connections and co develop solutions to ensure that we are creating, a set of graduates, that are entering into needed careers and professions that have the skills and credentials, that enable individual success, as well as economic success and and meet the needs of our, business partners. So we do a lot of cocreating, of different types of credentials, understanding, and and really synthesizing and translating, right, the skills that employers need, and how higher education institutions can better prepare and embed those into credentials that are that are valuable. We, in terms of my background, prior to, taking this role and leading the the great work that we do across our network at the Business Higher Education Forum, I was a strategy consulting firm where I worked with many institutions around, really thinking about, how to ensure student success, how to ensure workforce alignment, and how to think about scaling experiential learning. And before that, I was an adviser at Northeastern University where I did a lot of work around bringing industry into the classroom, thinking about how to disaggregate, the coop model for different learner populations that were not all full time residential, and really thinking about, you know, how do we bring the best of durable skills, technical skills, and career readiness, to to all students. So really excited about our conversation here today and to be with a great set of co panelists. Thanks, Kristen. I appreciate that. Ginger? It's great to, be here with everyone today. So I represent kind of the, educator lens, I think, on the panel today. My background is that I was in the California Community Colleges system. And about ten, fifteen years ago, we cofounded the New World of Work program. It was focused specifically on being able to provide classroom based curriculum and video based training that could be used to teach the twenty first century skills is what it was being called at that time. And so, what was fantastic about that is that program went to scale across the 116 California community colleges, but also it involved components of also early digital badging for skills and also employer engagement and then looking at the ways in which educators can actually co train with workforce development staff so that you could have your local workforce development boards using the same skilled language as your partner colleges and even your k 12. And so that way, you had that kinda common language that was being used as those individuals were going out and seeking employment or trying to upscale. So from that program, we actually went into the essential skills program, which was really in response to the pandemic. And I've seen some things coming in chat already around what what were some of the big shifts, and I think probably my fellow panels will agree. Really having to take what sometimes was a very classroom and in person based format because these are the interpersonal skills. That's the durable skills. And how do you teach those in a way that might be hybridized and really thinking through how that could be done. That was a big focus in the essential skills program ongoing. And then, as my cofounder in such essential skills and I, came into WestEd, it's now looking at that other element which is around skills and data and how you can actually unlock very similar to the, report reference for America succeeds. How you can actually leverage skill data to be able to better inform educational institutions around those skills that are required not only in, kind of across industries, but also particularly maybe in certain regions and across different, job sectors and then dovetailing that with the kind of teaching and, and education component of it. So I'm really excited to be able to dive into the rest of the panel today. Yeah. Thank you all very much for that introductions to your your work around this area. And we already got some questions coming in as Virginia mentioned. Some of you were asking about what I was citing earlier from America succeeds. We put that in the chat. We're also gonna submit to you, by email as well, which gets into that report. And Amy here is also asking how are you all defining durable skills? Let's dive into that because I do think that's an interesting area to talk about. Just to let you know, in that citation above America succeeds, this is how they define durable skills. They say they are a combination of how you use what you know, skills like critical thinking, communication, collaboration, creativity, those c c's, as well as character skills like fortitude, growth mindset, and leadership. It's still pretty broad. And I realize they've got a lot of terms here sometimes. I I've heard that, you know, referred to soft skills, and people say, well, I don't love the soft skill because it sounds not as important. Essential skills, certainly, noncognitive skills as well. Now I think this sort of phrase of durable skills is becoming a little bit more because I think it's a good, it's a good rebranding perhaps of, other than saying their importance. We can place it in an hour defining these skills going through them, but I do wanna make sure that we give a chance for all of you to kinda weigh in on how you see them, and how you understand them, and what you wanna highlight from them. Natasha, I'll start with you, then I'll move around to the rest of you to kinda just have a quick definition if you can. Again, I know it's not not necessarily a fair question. Yeah. I'll, I will cover this as quick as possible, but I there's no secret here, right, that pace of change and innovation moves quickly. It has increased, and now the workforce is really operating in how I describe it as a constant state of transformation. And it's the new normal. And, really, what we, I think, need today is for graduates to operate with that mindset. So when I think about the critical skills, those durable skills, I would say agility, flexibility, curiosity, critical thinking, a growth mindset. Those are sort of a bundle of some skills that are centered around growing and changing and this new normal of just constantly evolving. So a student today may accept a job and they see that job description, but when they actually start that job, it may be different, and it will continue to evolve. So I put that bucket of sort of growing, changing, and being agile, in one category. And then I would also say the teaming, leadership, and collaboration also is critical because of those changes, because of the there there will be a need to adapt whether they're learning new skills, whether they're reskilled. They're going to be in this constant learning mode. Being able to work with different individuals, adapt to a new team, a new client, a new demand is going to really serve them well in this sort of new world of work. So I put those all in that category of durable skills. I would also say, right, we know that that foundational knowledge, that domain knowledge is still very important, But now I think it's looking at those credentials coupled with the skills that I mentioned are really now starting to be where employers are taking, a much more sort of broader view than, great. They've got this degree in major. Wonderful. No. I need to make sure they can really come in and be thoughtful and flexible and adaptable. And if we pull the rug out from under them and say, we're gonna move you to this team this week, they say, great. Let me call that new manager and jump right into the the the next ask, right, from, from my team. I appreciate for the as you mentioned at the top there, Natasha, the constant state of transformation. I think we're all feeling it within higher ed. But beyond that, I'd say that journalism feels it as well and having to be able to to roll with that, is important, but I think a lot of industries, obviously, as you mentioned, and that's really important. We've got 764 folks who are who joined in. Let us know how you think about these skills. I'm really curious. We got a couple of people who are saying they use the phrase power skills. Or even get a bigger rebranding perhaps, Kristen, on this, sort of durable skills. But, you know, Natasha did a great job of sort of, I think, framing it. Anything you there you'd like to emphasize and then, Virginder, your next, on this idea? What are these skills that we're talking about? I realize each one requires a deeper dive in order to get into layers of pedagogy and how to teach them. But just for the top level of how you think about what the the folks at the forum are looking for when it comes to those at that employer side at least. Yeah. I would I mean, first, I would agree with and I like how Natasha framed some of those categories as well. We, from an employer and business perspective, also think about it in in some similar groupings. One being kind of the the human skills, around adaptability, communication, collaboration, conflict resolution, leadership, you know, problem solving teams. Right? So kind of these first two categories that that I think you talked about. Really important. Also, and we'll talk about this more, really hard to measure because in different context at different levels in a career. So what does that look like, and and how do we and and we'll get into this in the conversation. What what does that look like in, you know, one context? How do you port it over? And how do you make sure that that learners themselves are aware, that Yeah. How they've developed those skills? A second category that we think a lot about and hear a lot about from our, employer partners is around kind of the business enablement skills. So think about those being things around, customer service. You need that in all sorts of context, whether you're in a sales or client service role or not. How to communicate using data and information, how to manage projects, how to think about business development, sales and marketing. Right? Again, those are more business specific but still durable, transferable skills across any role, industry, or sector. And then last but not least, and I saw a question or comment in there around, you know, is AI literacy becoming a durable skill? And my answer would be wholeheartedly yes, a really important one, another topic that I'm sure we'll unpack a little bit more in this this discussion. But those kind of technical data building blocks skills around analytical thinking, AI literacy, basic coding even, right, and, you know, data analysis and research. So as we look across one of the ways that we look at, skills within jobs is how are they diffusing, right, across roles. And so one of the things that you will see, and and I can put some links into some reports on this, that are freely available on our website, are that their, you know, AI, for example, is a skill that if you look ten years ago, it was only in certain, you know, small number of roles. Right? Now you're hard pressed to find many roles, right, where some form of AI literacy is is not showing up. So I think another way that I would also think about and encourage us to think about durable skills are those skills that, show up and persist across different roles, occupations, and industries. And so in that way, the power of them, is around, you know, in terms of that power scale element, is in that not only can they be helpful in getting that first job, although I I will we do see a little bit of contradiction from employers in that that, again, we can talk about more. But they also become the most valuable skills in getting your next jobs and that help and support you throughout the longevity of your career. So, that's how we think about it based on, how most of our employer partners think about it. And I'm curious to hear from, from you. Yeah. This is really interesting. I mean, some of the things you've raised here about this sort of the how to measure them, how to sort of articulate them, I think I definitely wanna get into sort of the AI component. We see a lot of questions coming in around this. And, Kristen, you and I had a brief email exchange before this about how we talk about that as well. I think that's important to get into. But, Rajinder, I wanna bring you into this conversation about how you think of that. As you mentioned, you had worked with the California Community College System, where you were talking about twenty first century skills. I realized twenty five years in, we can't talk about twenty first century skills being a new thing since we've been here for a while. But I see other folks talk about transferable skills, core skills. You know, I think it's also some of the things that Kristen talked about sort of like, it's not just one thing. It's a thing it's sort of these things meeting together too. It's not just these things being one or one and done certainly. I'm curious how you think about that as well, Reginder. Yeah. We always had to find them as the interpersonal and intrapersonal skills that individuals need. And I'm probably one of the the, you know, still on the camp of thinking that soft skills is an okay way to refer to it because I always thought of soft skills as similar to software because you constantly have updates. And that's the way we really look at durable skills as well and kind of to get to the point Natasha had made and Kristen echoed is that these are skills that go across your lifetime. So these are opportunities for being able to reengage with education for that idea of lifelong learning around these skills. But they're also the skills that once you are entering into employment are primarily the ones that are looked at when people are getting promoted. Oftentimes, it's very much based on those interpersonal skills as interpersonal skills because you can think about there's always the idea in in, you know, education settings and projects and work settings. There's the process and there's the outcome. Right? The outcome usually is the product. The outcome is usually the decision that needs to be made, but the process is really, really where those soft skills, those interpersonal skills, those durable skills come in because that is what gets you to that outcome and that's what employers are looking for and, honestly, that's what educators are looking for when they're teaching their coursework as well. So I think that that's really a good point to make and the other is really along those lines of AI. These are the skills that cannot be automated. These are the skills that are unexpected in the best possible way because you can have somebody who comes in with really great durable skills, and they could bring something from ten years ago to play into a current project. They could think very creatively. They could be great problem solvers. It's that agility, again, that was mentioned. Oftentimes, you'll see groups will have, like, their top 10 list of skills, and it's really, again, to create a general understanding of what are those skills that can't be automated, that require kind of ongoing input, and really come down fundamentally to a person's, kind of self awareness and their ability to bring that out into a social setting. So that's oftentimes the way we would frame it, especially, for our our learners who are just coming into this space. It's really important to know that these are the skills that can be taught, that can be practiced, that can be mastered, and that continually can grow rather than the ones that you feel are going to keep you stuck in a particular place, in a particular job. So these are your moments of being able to really, really be able to have that longevity that we all need because it is not the world anymore where you get into one job and you have it for thirty years until you, you know, neatly retire. So I think these are absolutely, as we say, essential skills that we all have to have, in this moment even more so than ever. I I appreciate that, Roger. Natasha, I wanna come back to you and sort of open up this question about okay. We know that these skills seem to be needed. Employers are asking for them. Are colleges providing them? It's a really hard question to answer because we're, like, which type of college are we talking about? What level are we talking about? What type of degree? But for you, I wonder, how did you as a since I've got you here as someone who looked at talent, who was on campus recruiting, what did you look for? How did you measure it? Because, obviously, we've heard that the the, you know, the degree is not the greatest signal at the bachelor's associates. It's not the best signal anymore for having achieved some of these, these skills potentially. Again, I wanna be careful what depends on the type of institution. It probably depends on the type of degree for sure. But for you, when you were a recruiter, did you think colleges were graduates had these skills, or how did you make sure that you you evaluated them in the sense that you had a good sense of whether they did or did not? Yeah. You know, it's a it's a wonderful question because I I it's it's an ongoing, I think, journey, and that's why I was so enthusiastic about joining this panel is, you know, if you take a step back and look where companies are today as they truly I I sort of define it as many are at this critical inflection point where they're trying to bring in great talent, better prepared talent, but these organizations themselves are changing and growing. They're looking internally at their own infrastructure, defining the roles themselves and the skills within those roles and looking at their own inventory of critical skills. So you have this internal transformation happening, which is wonderful because I do think it will lead to, more mobility across an organization, and it will also translate to more upskilling and reskilling of current employees. So let's go to your question then. Right? Then how does it translate to getting to the talent on campus and better preparing those students? I think companies now are starting to feel more comfortable with the skills and capabilities that are critical, that are those durable skills. But don't get me wrong. They're they are getting their house in order, and I think that's so important to recognize because the internal work influences the external work. So I think what we'll start to see is clear job descriptions, Ian, that better outline some of those skills and capabilities. Yes. That domain knowledge. Right? I may want a certain degree for a highly regular, you know, regulated role or company, but I'm gonna start to be better at describing those skills and capabilities. And what I may find as an employer is those skills are across many different roles within an organization. So I hope we're gonna start to see more streamlined job descriptions, maybe a little less from some of the larger employers. Right? So instead of seeing 50 different jobs available, you start to see a smaller number, and it's more fine tuned with a focus on some of those skills. And then students are able to better articulate, do they have those skills and capabilities aligned for some of these more specific roles? With that being said, I do think we have to enable students to be able to talk more specifically about how they have learned these skills. So how does experiential learning right? How does team projects, how does solving real client issues in the classroom, how can we help them talk about that experience and the skills they gain? Maybe as a faculty or an administrator, you threw a disruption in the middle of a project, and then you talk to them about how their ability to be more adaptable and agile, how to team and work together, how that then translates to the real world. So I do think some schools are doing a remarkable job at really preparing their students. Some probably have a little ways to go. Right? Just, you know, it's different. It's new. And sometimes we really like our credentials, and we're really comfortable with that. So I think we have to help our students better articulate, right, those skills and capabilities that they are building. Because I'm confident in many programs. They are gaining these skills. We just have to help them shift their thinking and how they talk about this and how they describe that experience and the skills that they have. So I think that's where we can work together as employers, as educators, as not for profits, and different organizations to better help our students articulate those skills and capabilities that they have. I appreciate that. I have to say that at the Chronicle, we went through an exercise of trying to as an employer, defining some of those skills around what does it mean to be a good journalist? What it mean to be an editor? What does it mean to be a writer? And it was a really interesting conversation because it forced us as journalists to kinda look at ourselves a little bit more. Again, back to your point about what employers need to do in terms of creating inventory of what they really need. And to your point, it isn't all just on higher ed to kind of do better, and create these skills. It it is this other conversation that employers are having. And, Chris, I'm curious I'm curious about how you think about that, that these that both sides are changing and needing to change in order to meet each other perhaps. Sometimes I've just thought of sort of semantic thing about when they say talk about critical thinking. What do they really mean by it? But there's more going on here, obviously, than just the the wording. Kristen, I'm kinda curious how you react to what Natasha was saying about how both sides are kind of need to change in some ways to get to meet in the middle of it. Yeah. And I think your example is a good one, right, that updating job descriptions and taking a skills focus is actually really hard. And and and that's why I saw a comment in here somewhere. You know, employers have been saying for five years, these are the skills they need, and we're not making the progress and measuring and and thinking about how to, you know, to best, equip students with them. And that and that's because this is important and and hard. I think, you know, you you also ask this question of, you know, are they being are these skills being taught? Right? Are are colleges teaching these skills? And I think it's the question is maybe less that and and more about are they being taught in ways that students are internalizing them in a way that translate to employers, and and our employers, right, seeing that. We see that often skills are too granular, right, of a of a measure, especially when we're talking about things like leadership, critical thinking, etcetera. Degrees are too, are too blunt a measure. So it's in that in between, right, around well designed credentials and skills kind of clusters that I think is important. Right? So I think that's a that's a key in terms of this translation gap. You know, and I hear that directly from employers around, some of the progress around, like, digital wallets, and things like that. Great potential, but what really does leadership mean in a digital wallet? Like, how do I in what context, etcetera. So it is around, you know, well designed skills clusters and credentials. It is also around experiential learning. I think that is a really important component to this. I I did see somewhere, in the comments as well, you know, what are validated, you know, instruments and and survey tools that enable some assessment of that. And I know there's some that are in development, there are some that are out there. I I also, though, do you think in terms of if we go back to students being able to articulate and demonstrate, you know, it is about, experiential learning. It is around work based learning. And there's a role that, you know, employers and higher education need to play together, especially as we look at the potential impact that we are seeing on early careers and entry level roles. You know, there's a new way that we need to partner together to ensure that students are getting those experiences in professional context, that they are aware of them, and that's gonna look different than it did, you know, for me, twenty five years, you know, or more ago when, you know, I was in an undergraduate setting. So, that those are some of the things that that we are hearing and seeing, from an employer perspective as it relates to how we assess, how we demonstrate, these skills, and how we equip an individual with the agency around, you know, or and and lifelong learning throughout their career to articulate, upscale, etcetera, around those. That's a that's a key that's a key part of it. Chris, I appreciate all that, and I think about that a lot with my, young kids. I've got my my oldest is going to high school next year, and the way he's gonna look at not only will he live in high school but beyond, you know, it's gonna be very different to the accumulation of different credentials, different degrees, different ways of thinking about articulating again those skills in a way that perhaps can benefit employers. I felt like we've also heard this talk for a while, and so I am hoping I think we're kinda at a place where things have are changing for a little bit. Now, Rajendra, I wanna bring you into that conversation. I do need to go in a few minutes to our break with, Kelly Dorr and Brockery. But, Rajendra, I want you to weigh in this because you have talked about and you've worked on things like digital badging, you know, very specific modules around teaching some of these types of skills. So I would definitely wanna hear you weigh in. Are things changing? Do you think that that we're on a on a path to where the employers and, colleges are talking better together and students can better articulate, and, credentialize what they've learned through these skills lens? I definitely think so. I think there is quite a big corollary movement because you have, you know, as opportunity at work is charting, we have over half of the country has actually passed legislation to have Skills First hiring as a focus in their state. Removing degree requirements, focusing more on those skills, especially in public sector jobs. So you have then a response system that's happening from education systems moving more and more into competency based education. So some are actually full competency based education institutions and some are actually full competency based education institutions and some are looking at how can they pilot that so that they can start looking at defining skills and then capturing that on, a transcript so that you do have it kind of in a more formal format of a a record that education institutions are used to and the employers are used to seeing. But you also then have this very cool, influx because of of these technological platforms that we have now where you can have a badge for a skill. And in it, it can have the metadata that says, here's how the skill was defined. Here's how the skill was learned. Here's the verification that this really happened. It's not self attested. That can go into people's resumes, into their LERs, and it becomes a really nice link between that education space and that employment space. And I'd say, you know, that's all the stuff that's happening kind of at the big level and also involving technology and advancements. But at a really pragmatic level, I think you have education institutions that are able to think intentionally now about, okay, I'm assigning a course, I'm doing a lab, but if I put in the student learning outcomes and say you are going to be doing these activities, this is the outcome of the course, this is the outcome of of the assignment, but these are the skills that you're actually going to be learning in tandem. So when I, you know, when I went through my English classes, if I had had that shift, it would have meant that when I was being told to write an expository essay with a strong theme, I would also be told that the skill that I'm developing is the ability to synthesize information, share it back out in a clear way, and that that is something that employers are looking for all the time because I use it at WestEd every day. I look at themes before we present out to clients. So I think that, for educators who are new to this space, that's a really easy place to start is, you know, at every assignment, you have your section of what skills you're learning and what is the activity. And then you also have the ability to get further and further into this as you can define, as you can capture on transcripts, as you can capture in digital badges, put them into learning and employment records. So I see it as you can find your spot on the continuum right now and you can start there and you can move that forward. So I do see that as a very exciting thing that's going with corollary legislation in The States. I appreciate that, Reginald. I also appreciate you mentioning sort of competency based education. Susan, Sabato Moyer in the that q and a mentions, Ian, durable skills are formed and learned through all different mediums, including from personal connections and not just an education setting. That's really true. There's a lot of prior learning, a lot of other ways that we can learn some of these skills, and that should be I know that's a goal of some of the articulation within some of these, digital badging and other things like it in order to try to articulate that. I do wanna turn things over to my colleague, Brock Reed, in just one second here. But before that, I do wanna ask the audience a question. Just basically, you know, does your institution, your college, your department, depending on what level you're at, does a does a good job teaching these durable skills to your students? I know that's a tough question to answer for a whole institution, so this is why I phrase it this way for you to kinda answer at whatever level you know best. But let me know in the poll, and let me know in the q and a why you answered the way you did and whether you mean sort of like, hey. Yes. I think our college does this going well, or, hey. I think our department has been talking about this. I'm really curious about how you answer that, and we may bring some examples out during the second half of this session. I'll be trying to read more, questions from all of you, out there in the second half to our panel. Now let me remind my panelists just to turn off their video for a few minutes and go on mute while I welcome Brock Reid. He's a Chronicle deputy managing editor and Kelly Doerr of Acuity Insights. Acuity Insights, of course, is the sponsor for today. Over to you, Brock. Thanks so much, Ian. Hi. I'm Brock Reid. I'm deputy managing editor of the Chronicle of Higher Education, as Ian said. Thanks to Ian and all the panelists for a great discussion so far. Thanks to all of you in the audience for attending and bringing your questions and comments. And thanks, of course, to Acuity Insights for making this whole event possible. Glad to be speaking today with Kelly Doerr. As Ian said, she's the cofounder and vice president of science and innovation at Acuity, and she's, also an adjunct associate professor in the department of medicine, of education and innovation at at McMaster University, up in Canada. So, Kelly, thank you so much for being here with us today. Thanks, Brock. I I'm so excited to come and talk about this topic. It is something I have been studying and working on for over twenty years. So, you know, I and I I think it's been such a great discussion so far as well. It has. Well, let's get into let's let's build off of that a little bit. You know, I know we started the discussion today by talking about, you know, how the panelists interpret durable skills or essential skills or power skills, and about collaboration and adaptability and conflict resolution. And then as Ian put it, the big question is, okay. We know what skills, employers want. Are colleges instilling those skills? So maybe a good place to start is by asking how should colleges approach the tasks so they can answer, yes, we are, instilling these skills? Yeah. I think it's right now, it's such a hard question for colleges to answer because we've been so focused on the knowledge and technical skills and providing those as a unique source of information. And, you know, as we've talked about and has been talked about a lot in the q and a, with this era of AI, you know, the nature of jobs change and is changing rapidly as well. And so we have to be constantly asking ourselves, what does it mean to be work ready? You know, what is important in our skills? And I will give you the extreme example as I was at the Canadian Embassy talking to a group of physicians. And, you know, there was somebody who postulated that AI will replace physicians, in the next twenty years or something. I'm sure this is a stimulate conversation. And the answer was no. There's actually a whole bunch of aspects of physicianship that are not covered under the aspects that might get covered under, AI. And I sort of describe them as the humanistic skills. You know, it's another way to think of durable skills, and it does vary a little bit by profession. There's certainly some consistency, but it does vary a little bit. And I think, you know, that's a good way for us to to think about is that these are the things that move with you, across different jobs and different skill sets. It might shift a little bit the priorities or values, associated with them. You know, one, your communication skill might be really, really important. Another, it might be important, but maybe less so than critical thinking. And it's that flexibility in how they all work together that becomes so important. I I like I like that notion too, that you just shared on the, right, the importance of humanistic skills, which is a great phrase. You know, for physicians, for example, I think we can probably all remember examples where someone had a bedside manner that made a massive difference. Right? Yeah. I think that's a great way to think about it. We've all had a friend or family member or ourselves, who have gone to somebody whose maybe knowledge or technical skills were incredible. The reality is we probably couldn't assess that ourselves, but we could assess their bedside manner. And it's those aspects that make you wanna go back to that physician or, you know, really trust their advice, adhere to their advice as well. And the same is true across so many different professions, whether we're talking about engineering or business or, you know, hairdressing or other things. You know, it all plays a role in the success as an employee, but also, you know, the way you interact with your customer or a patient or whoever that is. That that you Rajendra just made a great point that I wanted us to kinda circle back on a little bit. You know, one thing we hear a lot, I think, from professors, teachers, of any stripes, look, it's one thing to teach students a skill. It's another thing to make sure that they actually understand that they're picking up the skill and to understand why the skill matters. And, you know, Rajinder was talking about a great example of how colleges can do this, but I'm interested to hear your view on this. In a moment when these, you know, durable or humanistic skills are becoming more and more, important, maybe more and more like differentiators, what ways do you find effective to be able to convey to students, you know, as they're picking up these skills, that in fact they are picking up these skills? Yeah. I think there's probably two ways to think about it. So first is making sure that they understand these skills are important. We've talked about describing these skills, why they're important to employers, why it will differentiate their success as well. And, you know, I think we talked a little bit briefly about competency frameworks, and I think those are really, really important, not just because they impact and can be useful for students, for schools, but also for accreditation as we push, you know, these competencies in accreditation. It can drive the adoption, and in placement of these more and more in programs and in schools. But I think for students as well, it's really helping them understand as well that this is what's going to create their differentiator and giving them concrete examples of where the skills have made a difference or made an impact versus their knowledge or technical skills, and really helping them that understand that. And part of that is going to be on the schools or programs because constantly, academic colleges and universities are gonna be asked about how they're demonstrating the return on investment for students who are paying tuition. And part of it is job success at the end of the day, whether that's immediate job success or longer term. And these durable skills that we know are differentiators are things that they can start to demonstrate in their graduates that they're building in their students. And the more they're building it in their students, the better. Now, unfortunately, I will say the one way for students to understand the importance of something is to assess it. I know that we don't always wanna come back to assess it, assess it, assess it. But the reality is, you know, so many students is this on the exam. How is this, and so it needs to be part of our core assessments of what we're doing in our colleges and university systems in order to demonstrate its importance to our faculty, to our students, as well as to our creditors. This is a great opportunity to talk about something that I think Kristen had alluded to earlier. There's a there's a sense, and I think probably a reality, that in a lot of ways, some humanistic or durable skills can feel hard to measure. Like, you know, how do you know that someone's gonna be the right kind of leader? How do you know that they handle conflict, appropriately? That's why I know that a huge amount of your work is spent wrestling with this question of how do you measure this stuff. I wonder, you know, what you would say about, right, how colleges can, in smart ways, identify, hey. Are we actually doing a good job of teaching these skills, and are students able to put that information across to employers when they're going out on the market? Yeah. I I think it's it's a great way to think about it is we don't measure these durable skills in a traditional way. Somebody said in the q and a, these don't lend themselves to MCQs, and they really don't because oftentimes, the way I think about it is that there's not a single right answer, for many of these durable skills. There's lots of shades of gray if you think about aspects of professionalism or communication. There's a variety of different ways you can approach it, but it's understanding the why you're taking that course of action that become really, really important. And, you know, I've studied this for a long time whether we're thinking about admissions for, higher ed or admissions as we're thinking about employments and bringing them in. We used to rely on things like personal statements, and those sorts of things that those didn't work well before, AI came into play. And so what can we do? And it's really trying to think a little bit differently. You know, situational judgment tests have been really, really important as one way to measure them at a high stakes, so a summative way, but also a low stakes, nurturing and assessment for learning. But I think one of the other things as we think about is it shouldn't be just one thing or one way in your program. How do you add or implement things that include aspects like, work experience? Now those could be real life experiences where you've got internships or co ops or or mini internships I've seen where it's just a day of experience, and then bring people back to talk about the durable skills they got saw in those situations, or you can do case studies. You know, not every school or classroom has the resources to do, things, nor do students always have the resources to it. So thinking creatively, especially with AI, AI videos, how do you start to create opportunities to show and demonstrate these types of durable skills in the workplace when they go well, when they don't go well, and allow students to start to see those very early on. So they're applying their knowledge, they're applying their technical skills that they've learned at your institution, but they're also starting to get a chance to apply those durable skills in a way that matter in the workplace. Makes a lot of sense. I would love to keep going. This is fascinating stuff, Kelly. I I do wanna make sure we get back to Ian's group. So, we've got a lot of questions that I can get answered. I wanna hear the rest of the discussion. So let me just say thank you, Kelly, for the time you've given us today. Thanks again to Qmede Insights, for making this event possible, and, we'll kick it back to mister Wilhelm and the rest of his panelists. Thanks again. Thank you, mister Reed. Hey, Kelly. Thank you very much as well. I'll invite my panelist back on screen while I share the results of that poll I put up earlier. So it looks like the majority of you, at least 52%, say you have similar degree, that your institution, college, departments, however you define it, does a good job teaching durable skills to your students. I do wanna read a few of your comments as well related to the poll. Darcy writes, I voted that way. I did I voted the way I did because our institution is making durable skills a new initiative of focus campus wide in the coming academic year. Darcy, tell us a little bit more about that, mq and a. I'm curious about that and how you're making that a campus wide effort, but I imagine you're not alone in that. Denise writes, some programs do a great job. At a college level, not so much. So, yes, I recognize it's hard to answer for a whole institution or a whole college, and some programs will vary by for sure. And speaking of what Kelly and Brock were talking about, developing importance to the medical profession in terms of some of these skills, we have one commenter who writes, these skills are critical for our health professions programs and students at our community college. I think my area does a pretty good job, but it's always a big challenge and always the single biggest issue in the clinical setting. So, again, that great bedside manner, which, I think we all know is is key, to, the health professions and having a good experience there. Alright. We've, kinda danced around the AI topic. I kinda wanna go dive right into it, because everyone's asking about it. In some ways, I'm not surprised. I am gonna put into the chat we'll show this by email a story we did not too long ago, by my colleague, Beth McMurtry. Beth is one of our writers on our teaching newsletter. She's been diving into this topic of AI literacy this year. Looking at, like, kind of the question of how you define it. Some of you are asking, certainly some larger questions about how it may affect learning in general. But, Kristen, I'll come to you with this because you were answering some folks' questions on this this issue. I realize this is a big one. But, you know, you mentioned human skills, and I do like that phrase, humanistic skills, I think we were talking around as well. And I think it's an interesting moment that we were having this conversation about, hey. What makes, you know, your education important to you and and what you're learning, and why that's important to learners. But AI is really emphasizing this point about, like, okay. There's gonna be a lot of skills that AI can probably do when it comes to some hard skills, writing perhaps. But you still need that human eye. What are the human things that you can do? And I know there are people who are thinking more about this at the that that this moment actually emphasizes that all the things we're talking about. Right? Rajendra was talking about, hey. Being able to draw back on something ten years ago from an experience that may have happened in your educational setting or outside, and that may inspire you or shift how you look at something, that human moment. Along with the way of saying, Chris, what's ahead when it comes to this conversation about durable skills and AI and Natasha and Briginder, I'll come to you with this big question after that. Yeah. And I would be lying if I said I had the full crystal ball. What's the answer, Chris? And yeah. I know. Let me start there, with a little bit of intellectual, humility. But I do a couple of things that that we're really thinking about and looking at that I think are important. So the the World Economic Forum, they have and I I can share a link to this report, following. But they've done some work looking at what are those skills, that are most disrupted or have the potential to be most disrupted, by AI. And the skills that are at most risk, right, are things like reading, writing, and math, marketing and media, programming, right, things that we're already seeing, right, in terms of some of the disruption of the job market. But but things like, empathy and creativity and resilience and flexibility and agility. Right? Those start to become the skills that are that much more important. Right? How do you lead teams? How do you create community? And and things like that. So that's, I think, one one way that we're thinking about it, right, is that how do you then ensure that when some of those more, not only road tasks, but some of those tasks that can be more automated and augmented, it makes those human skills, right, that much more valuable, important, and and really those interdisciplinary skills too. Right? So another thing that we think a lot about, and we actually so we've launched an, AI in the future of talent collaborative. And one of the things that we're producing, I put in the comments, a high level kind of summary of an early view, of a skills an AI enabled professional skills framework, that we're developing with our industry partners. It's it's not a list of skills. Right? That's too static. But it's a a set of capabilities and competencies that we see as being important, and that are adaptable to different levels in one's career and also are adaptable to different roles, and industries. So it's things like AI literacy. Right? So understanding the core concepts and and how AI models work, when an LLM model is a good solution or not, with the ability to think critically around AI generated solutions, ethics, governance, and responsible use. Right? And that's a huge place where you need context. Right? If you are looking at what's coming out of a model, and you're in a banking industry, it's pretty important that you know what the history of redlining looks like, right, and how bias can be baked into, you know, the data models that exist. So this could be a whole topic on its own. I'll I'll I'll stop there and not go deeper, but it's those kinds of, right, things that we will all need as AI enabled professionals in the future. Happy to do another session and talk about that frame. The, the last thing I would also say and and and someone put a a great link to an article in that that chat. But this question, right, there's two things that are true right now. All, you know, I I also have a, you know, freshman in high school. Right? They will need in entering into the workforce to have AI literacy or entire work force does, and there's many that are being left behind. So everyone needs to know how do you generate AI in the workforce. And we also need to make sure that early in your learning process, early in your career, you're not shortcutting important learning moments, you know, the term cognitive offloading, being used more and more that then make it so that in the short term, right, you might be more effective. But in the medium to long term, you don't have the context. You're not as effective. And so I think that's a really important challenge for us to grapple with. That's a place that at our organization, we're spending a lot of time because it's a bigger issue than one company can solve or one institution can solve, which is how do we create that literacy while also ensuring that the deep learning, critical thinking, etcetera, is happening. And that is probably one of the more important, you know, challenges of of our time for us to make sure we get right across the sector. Chris, that's the great way of of saying that that these two things can be true at the same time. You have to think about this intentionality. Like, yes, you need to be prepared, but at the same time, you don't wanna take away those opportunities for peer learning and things where, and the other things like cognitive also. We don't wanna be taking away the learning potential of those students that happen to happen mostly on a peer to peer or a person to person, level for sure. Virginia, how are you thinking about this issue? Again, it's an unfair question to have you answer in the last eight minutes of the session today, but, since it's obviously a burning one, and it does really relate to these skills as we think think about them as they're as they're evolving. I can. I wanna leave time for Natasha as well. So one of the things, especially at WestEd, that we've been looking at around AI and this whole kind of focus on skills is you kind of have three elements. So one is that if you're looking at skills first hiring as a way to create more equity and people being able to get into jobs, you also have to recognize that you can actually increase your AI filters to include skills so that you are not dropping people out of that employment process. So that is a plus. So that kinda correlates back to how we talked about how the education settings starting to define skills and bake that in. Even at the high school level, I'm seeing a lot of that in chat is a really useful thing to do because it gets people kind of through these filters, these AI filters. But the other component is really thinking about that AI is flawed and it pulls that information from everywhere. So it means it has false information. It also has oftentimes a very particular lens to that information because it can only pull from what's available, And it doesn't have the lens of what lived experiences. It doesn't have the lens of, kind of multiple groups and backgrounds and demographics many times. So, again, it's being able to recognize that if you lead with the human first, then the technology should just be, kind of a way of making things easier or more automated, but not a full replacement. I think you see a perfect example of how people are jumping into AI saying that they will replace employees, you know, so therefore, you've gotta train people in a particular way or not train them. Right? And I think Duolingo is a really good example of how much pushback they've been getting because they have replaced their their human elements. So I think that just holistically, I think it's very great for the education space particularly to look at what is the add on that AI does, but not to detract from the focus that they have been doing, which is how do you build a body of knowledge in an individual and their ability to articulate that knowledge and to use that knowledge. And then you can go ahead and look at how is that enhanced with AI. I appreciate that, Rajinder. You know, you make a good point about sort of, evaluating the AI and what it's spinning out. Chris was saying something similar. Luciano was asking here that, you know, about the term critical thinking is used so often. It may feel like a buzzword, but, you know, this moment with AI, I feel like we're all saying, okay. This is how we define it in some ways. It's like being able to look at the what is coming out of an AI and being okay. I have have some judgment here. I have to know some facts and some content about history or I have to also know that it's not perfect and have someone's sense of the bias. So, again, putting that critical thinking lens, it's a sort of a perfect example of where that critical thinking needs to be, be used in many ways. Natasha, I know you're not an AI expert, and I'm putting you on the spot here with this question. But I'm curious what maybe not, you know, what are the answers as we said. No one has the answers here. But what are you thinking about here when it comes to your perspective on, on, you know, folks, and how they develop skills, but also how companies kind of are, employing them or hiring them. Yeah. But yeah. I mean, I think there are certainly the experts in AI. Right? At the end of the day, and we've all had a fairly consistent answer, AI is is a a tool in our toolbox. Right? And we all, hopefully, today are leveraging, AI in different ways, but it is a tool and a resource. Now I think it would not be a surprise to most of us. You're more highly regulated industries. There's gonna be a slower move to adoption, right, on a on a day to day basis. But the world of working the workplace, it will be and is today a tool for many professionals. So I do think, you know, at the end of the day, building the skills around leveraging that tool. So you said it. Critical thinking. Right? Ensuring that it's not gonna give you all the answers. It's going to give you some information. And how do you then leverage that information with a more critical eye and a set of questions around what is the output. So I think it's really today ensuring that students start to embrace, leverage these smart and innovative technologies and recognize it is changing the workplace. It's changing the workplace quickly. Right? But think about it more as the tasks versus job sure. It is taking some jobs. Often, those are the jobs that are quite repetitive, probably not that exciting to most, and so that is a win. But I think when we look at a majority of roles that college students are entering in, it will be looking more at the tasks themselves versus the entire role altogether. Appreciate that, Natasha. We've got a quick note of thanks from Jennifer here. She what she's been saying here is what has been heartening about this webinar is the way that all of you responded to the Gen AI narrative. In many higher ed spaces, the institutions are not as nuanced and yet seeing this as this, as the demand from industry. But this panel's challenge the dominant narrative for me. So, Jennifer, I appreciate that. We've been trying to throw, yeah, some more nuance here certainly to a complicated conversation, one that should go on for sure, but we're running out of time here quickly. Well, my panel, I really appreciate it. We've we've touched on a lot of different things. I do wanna give all of you a chance for something of a final word here to to emphasize something we didn't get to today because there are many things I know we wanted to talk about we didn't get to or to reiterate something to make sure that the audience, leaves with, as they go off into their work, in higher education. Kristen, I also start with you in this question. What's something of a final thought for you? Either something we didn't get to today that you wanna make sure the audience leaves with or something you wanna reemphasize, that we may have talked about earlier. Yeah. The one point that I would just love to add that we didn't get to is around just the criticality of experiential learning in all its forms. Right? From, project based learning, group based learning, right, up through co ops, apprenticeships. I think that is a critical piece of this in terms of the reflection, context, and nuance that we're talking about here, and perhaps that is a future webinar. Yeah. For sure. And I appreciate that because, I mean, places like he used to work, Northeast are well known for this. And, certainly, other colleges are thinking about not necessarily a coop model, but certainly thinking about internships and how to expand those opportunities and think differently about them and how to break down the barriers so that more students have access to them because that's also part of the concern. But, that's Kristen Fox with the business higher education forum. Kristen, thank you for being here. Appreciate it. Rajendra, any, final thoughts for the audience today? I think that you don't have to do this in isolation. There are a lot of resources out there, especially those in the chat grappling with how do you define, what do you start with. My program provides free video training and essential skills and soft skills. Many other programs are out there, and I think that that's a great place to start is to be able to look at the resources that are available and how you can contextualize them for your setting. Yeah. I appreciate that note because it can feel overwhelming. Sometimes I feel overwhelming because there's so many we talked about today. Again, so many nuances to this, so many different lenses to this this question of how to provide durable skills. So, yes, you don't have to drill alone. So, Rajendra Guild from WestEd into central skills, thanks for being here. Natasha, we start with you. I'm gonna end with you, today. Any final thoughts for the audience? Really quick because I know we are right at time, and it it builds on Reginder's comment around leverage your resources. Right? I think employers, you know, they are looking to team and collaborate on this, right, as their my comments are, like, getting their house internally in order. You know, they are looking to to help. And as those skills and capabilities are better outlined within their organizations, I know many are happy to bring it to your universities and academic settings. So just keep that in mind. And I saw some great comments and questions in the chat. I did not get too many of the q and a. So feel free to reach out on LinkedIn because I'm I'm happy to connect and and further the conversation. So thanks for the opportunity, Ian. That's Natasha Stowe with Brick Talent Strategies. Just to say, yes. Indeed, we had over a 100 questions and comments today. I'm sorry we couldn't get to more of them. We will be looking at them here at the Chronicle for sure, to kind of share them around and make sure we think about other sessions like this one. So, again, I wanna appreciate everyone who put their, questions and comments in there as well. Just a couple of things before we wrap up today. We'll be sending all of you an email with a link to the recording as well as some of the resource resources we shared today. I know that Kristen just sent over some other ones. We're gonna send those out as well in an email. And please do share that with, colleagues. We think it would be valuable information, for sure. Thanks again to our underwriter for today's session at Acuity Insights. Really appreciate the support for this session as well as other ones we've done around this topic. Thanks again to my colleague, Brock Reid and Kelly Dorr, for their contribute contributions to the session. And just a final note, thanks, of course, to all of you in our audience. Just to say, we here at the Chronicle can't do our work without you, so we really do appreciate you attending today's session. And as I mentioned to all of you who shared your thoughts and comments in the, the q and a, I really do appreciate it. They are very helpful for us to think about this content, as well as things we may do in the future. Like a session on AI and a session on digital badges, I all these things I've been taking notes, we've gotta get to them as well. But, again, thank you very much for everybody for being here. Thanks to my panel. I'm Ian Wilhelm with The Chronicle. Thanks for being here. Stay well, everybody. Thanks, Paul. Thanks, Ian.