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Big 10 Leadership & Change Competencies

Students at College Unbound earn credit as they demonstrate the skills and capacities needed to lead change: Accountability, Advocacy for Self and Others, Collaboration, Communication, Creativity, Critical Thinking, Intercultural Engagement, Problem Solving, Reflection, Resilience. For examples, guidance on demonstrating the Big 10, and more, please see the Big 10 Resource Page.
Accountability: Demonstrates the ability to meet or exceed agreed upon expectations, taking ownership of all that happens as a result of personal choices and actions, and looking for solutions when there is a problem.
  • Demonstrates personal responsibility – acknowledges and corrects mistakes.
  • Practices integrity – walks their talk.
  • Effectively prioritizes and manages life and learning goals.
  • Is accountable for deadlines, results, and end products.
  • Seeks feedback and is open to constructive criticism.
  • Demonstrates preparedness.
  • Is punctual and honors meeting commitments.
 
Advocacy for Self and Others: Actively negotiates positive change for self and/or others, clearly seeing both sides of the issue and proposing new processes or parameters that more effectively meet the needs of all stakeholders.
  • Makes own decisions about short and long term plans.
  • Practices assertive communication.
  • Fosters group responsibility of welfare of selves and others.
  • Works for positive change.
 
Collaboration: Deliberately partners with others, negotiating, challenging, and being challenged on issues of partnership, in order to produce something together.
  • Engages effectively with the members of his/her Personal Learning Network.
  • Ensures contributions of self and others.
  • Objectively listens to dissent and alternate points of view, engaging in dialogue rather than debate.
  • Negotiates and manages conflict.
  • Offers and receives constructive criticism.
 
Communication (Written, Oral, Visual): Constructs sustained, coherent argument or presentation on issues and processes in more than one medium for general and specific audiences, adapting behaviors and goals to meet the needs of interaction and achieve shared meaning.
  • Uses knowledge of audience and context to shape communication.
  • Articulates and defends a compelling controlling idea clearly and effectively.
  • Uses sources and evidence effectively.
  • Demonstrates control over organization, voice, word choice, and conventions of English.
 
 
Creativity: Consistently brings into being products, processes, or thoughts that did not previously exist, merging ideas and making connections between seemingly unrelated phenomena to generate solutions.
 
  • Demonstrates imagination and innovative thinking, suggesting new solutions to old problems.
  • Takes risks.
  • Demonstrates fluency and flexibility in brainstorming.
  • Embraces contradictions.
 
Critical Thinking: Engages in evidence-based practice, able to identify the issue/dilemma/problem, frame it as a specific question, explore and evaluate information relevant to the question, and draw conclusions, applying conscientious, explicit, and judicious use of current best evidence.
  • Accesses, analyzes, and connects information, considering its relationship to context and evidence.
  • Identifies and considers the influence of bias and others’ assumptions.
  • Develops an informed and effective position based on relevant criteria.
  • Reconstructs one’s beliefs on the basis of wider experience.
 
Intercultural Engagement: Continuously improves capacity to identify own cultural patterns, compare and contrast them with others, engage in respectful dialogue, and adapt empathically and flexibly to unfamiliar ways of being.      
  • Understands own cultural identity.
  • Open to others.
  • Considers multiple worldviews.
  • Challenges cultural misperceptions.
  • Actively advances social justice.
 
Problem Solving: Identifies and analyzes problems and uses prior knowledge, logic, and imagination, weighing the relevance and accuracy of information to develop, recommend, and implement alternative solutions.
  • Identifies and defines the problem.
  • Asks the right questions.
  • Identifies strategies for solving the problem.
  • Proposes, evaluates and selects from among alternative solutions.
  • Implements solution.
  • Evaluates outcomes.
 
 
Reflection: Engages in an intentional process of continuous learning, consciously analyzing personal decision-making and actions as well as the reactions they prompt in themselves and others, drawing on theory and experience, and modifying actions as for the benefit of themselves and the communities they serve.
  • Connects learning experiences and growth, acknowledging and articulating changed
    perspectives.
  • Engages in honest self-appraisal, analyzing performance with the goal of improving.
  • Displays curiosity.
  • Manages impulsivity.
  • Uses self-awareness to guide choices and behaviors.
 
Resilience: Able to maintain effectiveness, remaining focused, composed, and optimistic when faced with time pressures, adversity, disappointment, or opposition, and recovers quickly from setbacks and failures.
  • Persists in finding necessary resources to accomplish goals.
  • Demonstrates flexibility and adapts readily to change.
  • Develops and accesses a system of supports.
  • Breaks an initially complex task into manageable steps.
  • Uses humor to maintain perspective.
  • Enjoys learning.