Life Experience & Action Dimension (LEAD)

Students gain knowledge and put it to work in three areas: community building, lifelong career management and financial sophistication.
Practical and meaningful life skills enable students to adapt to changing environments, make good decisions in difficult situations and pursue short- and long-term goals successfully.
Activities are hands-on and interactive.

LEAD is organized around three themes and the underlying questions each theme generates.

Building Inclusive Communities: Who am I? Who are we? What are my strengths and weaknesses? How can I use these strengths to better work in teams or support my community?
Managing a Lifelong Career: What am I going to do? What are my passions and interests? How can I integrate those passions and interests into my career? Looking beyond graduation, where do I see myself in 5 or 10 years?
Gaining Financial Sophistication: How will I start to pay back student loans? How much money will I need to study abroad? What are job benefits, and why do I need them? How can I get my credit report?

LEAD: Four Years at a Glance

All incoming students will take the MBTI, a personality assessment test, online before arriving on campus. This assessment is interpreted in the CORE courses and gives students a tool to better understand their personality styles, which can help in communicating with others and working in groups.
Engage in experiences that will broaden cultural and/or community awareness:
- Cook a meal at the Ronald McDonald House
- Volunteer for COTS (a homeless shelter)
- Participate in Tent City, a homelessness simulation event on campus
- Mentor a child as a part of the DREAM program
- Attend a facilitated dialogue about a controversial current affair or community issue
- Attend a cultural simulation and enter a world completely different than your own
- Propose an activity of your own design
- ...and so much more!

Attend Sophomore Symposium, a conference-like program with a professional keynote speaker and breakout sessions on lifelong career management topics. (Learn more about Sophomore Symposium here.)
Learn how to strategically market yourself by attending a workshop with students in similar majors, facilitated by the Career Counselor from the student's division.

Expand ability to build a career by choosing from among many professional workshops - social networking, online job research, interviewing skills, etc.
Develop basic financial literacy skills through in-person seminars and online activities - managing a budget, understanding credit, buying a car, leasing an apartment, repaying loans.