The Liberal Studies Program (LSP) is the common curriculum taken by all students in the traditional undergraduate colleges at DePaul University. Overall, the LSP is designed to develop students’ writing abilities, mathematical and technological proficiencies, and critical and creative thinking skills.  Some LSP courses serve to introduce the institution’s unique Catholic, Vincentian, and urban mission and identity, and as such may include an emphasis on social justice and community service. While the LSP curriculum itself is quite varied, the program as a whole shares these four learning goals: 1) Reflectiveness; 2) Value Consciousness; 3) Multicultural Perspective; and 4) Creative and Critical Thinking.

LSP courses are characterized by an emphasis on reflectiveness which encourages students to not just learn scholarly concepts and theories, but be able to apply them to the real world. Value-consciousness further stimulates a sense of personal responsibility for creating a more just and humane world.  A multicultural perspective demands that students grapple with the plurality of world views, and enhance their awareness of the experiences, contributions, and concerns of diverse communities, in both contemporary and historical times. Given DePaul's Catholic, Vincentian character, religious world views, as well as secular ethical systems, are emphasized using different methods of inquiry and disciplinary perspectives. At the same time that the LSP curriculum stresses reflectiveness, value-consciousness, and multicultural perspective as foundations of intellectual inquiry, it fosters the development of creative and critical thinking. These essential skills are reinforced through reading, writing, project, and performance assignments, as well as in-class dialogue, field observation, laboratory research, and more.

Ultimately, LSP courses are collectively designed to promote the capacity for self-critical and autonomous thinking, lay the groundwork to discover, transform, and create knowledge, and to instill a thirst for lifelong learning.