Strong planning for a third century

Provost Lauren Robel and her team have impressed me.
I have spent almost four years on this campus advocating for a stronger student presence in its governance, but even I can admit that a strong, robust administration is necessary to the creation of things like the Campus Strategic Plan draft that came out of her office.

The plan focuses on areas like multidisciplinary programs; “high-impact” practices like internships, research and study abroad; student accessibility in a large and growing University and diversity.

The plan uses three main mechanisms to achieve these aims, sometimes alone and sometimes in combination.

IU will use technology, establish new University institutions like an Arts and Humanities Council, and leverage programs that already lead their field to position itself for its third century.

Obviously, I can’t summarize the entire report here.

You should read it — it’s a short 21 pages and the language and structure is straight-forward, accessible and engaging.

It’s necessarily vague on many points, but if it wasn’t it would be 600 pages and no one — except, possibly, me — would read it.
If you’re seeking specificity or more concrete methods, I would encourage you to read some of the reports from the teams that contributed the report.

Of particular interest are the reports on undergraduate education and diversity, which are both equally accessible, innovative and interesting.

At times it might read like a rosy wish list of everything we could have in a world without student loans or ill-disposed legislators, but this, too, should be understood as a strength rather than a weakness.

We need something to strive for and to focus our energy on. Obviously, not everything in this plan will realistically become fact and we might find some of our goals have to be scaled back. But that shouldn’t be a reason to scale back our ambitions.

Put the goal on the table. If it’s a good one, we’ll work for it. Even if we don’t succeed, we’ll likely get something valuable out of the attempt.

In all, I was pleasantly surprised to put down the Robel’s new Campus Strategic Plan on Friday and realize I had no major issues with what she and her team proposed to do. The plan represents an ambitious, comprehensive, forward-looking and exciting opportunity for the University.

As I prepare to leave IU, I find myself beginning to think about my relationship with the University going forward.

One of the implicit goals of the undergraduate education team’s report is the creation of “indelible connections between undergraduate students and the campus.”

Reading these reports, I found myself almost jealous of the IU students of 2020 and beyond, seeing for them an even more transformative and intense experience than the one I have had. The successful implementation of this report will create for them an exciting, innovative and well-positioned University.

That connection feels pretty indelible to me.

­— drlreed@indiana.edu
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Drake Reed on Twitter @D_L_Reed