The Skills Book

Used by tens of thousands of high school and college students to obtain the skills they need to have a successful career and make a better world. Award-winning college professor and student adviser Bill Coplin has helped students get great jobs. Here, he lays down the essential skills you need to survive and succeed in today's job market based on his extensive interviews with employers, recruiters, human resource specialists, and employed college grads.

Jobs are skills, not majors.
Karen M. McGee, Assistant Dean for Student Affairs,S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications.
Coplin's theories are brilliant and dead on. I can't remember the last time someone asked me my GPA or major, but I use parts of these ten skill groups every day in my job at Disney.
Jim Gallagher, Senior Vice-President of Creative Advertising, The Walt Disney Company

Recent Blogs

It’s A Wonder They Can Teach At All

April 23, 2012

Coplin’s Principles for Undergraduate Teaching

April 20, 2012

1. When designing a course, decide whether or not you want to treat students as scholars within your field or as users of your knowledge and skills outside of the field. In most cases, you can’t do both.

2. Clearly Distinguish between Stuff Goals and Skill Goals

  • Skills require modeling and student practice
  • Stuff can be delivered through lectures, reading, videos, simulations and research

3. Always start with the concrete; never start with the abstract

4. Use a two-fold grading system

Excel Alert

April 19, 2012

I have written before about the importance of Excel and how it is neglected in many of our high schools and even colleges as a necessary part of the curriculum. My recent experience in front of 800 parents and newly admitted students in the College of Arts and Sciences at Syracuse University suggests that things are getting worse.  I asked the students to raise their hands if they could use Excel.  Less than 20 percent of the students who were good enough to be admitted to the University raised their hands as their parents watched in horror.

Skills Versus Stuff: The Citizenship Vacuum

April 18, 2012

Just about everyone laments over the vast majority of high school and college graduates who know very little about American government. Students do not know such facts as the number of Senators in the U.S. Senate, and they have little understanding of the broader organization of federal, state and local governments. Many also whine over the apathy that leads to low voter turnout and the selfish behavior of citizens at all levels and ranges of education, social statuses and political parties.

Read more blogs