2009 UNH Strategic Planning
Working Group Charges
Watch the video of the March 31 Open Forum
March 31: Open Forum
Dimond Library, Fifth Floor Reading Room
11:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. — Informal Question Period
12:30 to 2:00 p.m. — Join President Huddleston and others for a Formal Question
Period
2:00 p.m. to 3 p.m — Informal Question Period
All are invited to come to an open forum for more conversation
about the ideas coming out of Working Groups. Please come and share your
thoughts. Please read summaries of the top ideas which
have emerged from the Working Groups' consultations across campus. These
summaries are posted below. Then come, meet your
colleagues, ask questions, and share your thoughts. If you are unable to
attend, please feel free to post your comments.
Strategic Planning Working Groups Updates
Your feedback and suggestions are very important to your colleagues in the working groups, and we hope you will participate in this electronic forum. Throughout the planning process we will be receiving comments and posting them on this Web site. We will be posting all comments with the name of the person submitting
General Charge to all Working Groups
Below are the criteria
the Working Groups will follow in developing their submissions to the Strategic
Planning Steering Committee.
- Major initiatives should draw on the University’s capacities and strengths, in areas where UNH is poised to make a significant contribution, in scholarship, in teaching, and in service of our land grant, space grant, and sea grant missions.
- They should be initiatives that enhance the quality of education for undergraduate and graduate students.
- They should foster integration, collaboration, and productive partnership, both within the UNH community and across our many and varied alliances.
- They should draw faculty, staff, students, and infrastructure from across the university to address institutional or societal needs in ways that exceed what each could do alone.
- They should foster and advance the University’s commitment to achieving excellence in all we do through diversity and inclusion.
- They should be initiatives that impart a competitive advantage to the University, and demonstrably benefit the University, its students, and those it serves.
- They should inspire the passion and support of those who live and work
in the University, and those who are stakeholders beyond our campuses;
and they should speak to generosity of spirit and the quality of our
shared intellectual life.
Each Working Group will address specifically what would be needed to achieve the goals of a given initiative, and the material changes that would be needed to make each “big idea” a sustainable and workable reality. They will consider, then:
- What new or renovated administrative structures would be needed?
- What new or renovated facilities would be needed?
- What new models for hiring, faculty or staff roles, responsibilities, and rewards would be needed?
- How might one use the academic calendar and our material infrastructure in new ways?
- How would we ensure financial sustainability? Can we generate/sustain income?
1. Breaking Silos, Scrambling Categories: Integrating the Academy Horizontally and Vertically
Co-chairs: Mil
Duncan, Director, Carsey Institute
Kevin Gardner, Associate Professor, Environmental Research Group
To state the obvious: the intellectual, cultural, global, technological
and financial contexts in which the modern university exists have changed
radically over the last few decades. The academy, however, continues
as an institution highly resistant to change: departmental structures,
definitions of scholarly work, pedagogies, and relationships with the
public have, with some notable exceptions, remained static, often in
spite of calls for more innovation from faculty, students, and the scholarly
community. This working group is charged with taking
seriously the task of re-conceptualizing how UNH integrates teaching, scholarship,
engagement, and service missions. Integration can be defined in a number
of ways. First, it can be across disciplines, departments, and colleges: for
example, how can we foster more interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary work? It
can also be across educational levels: for example, how does the University
better integrate general education with our commitments to students in majors,
and the undergraduate educational mission with our obligations to graduate and
professional students? It can be across our multiple missions: for
example, how might faculty bring their research into their classrooms, at all
levels, or involve their students in the engagement and outreach that mark our
land grant mission? It can be across the constituencies that comprise UNH’s
extended communities: for example, how do campus activities, mission, and resources
extend to UNH’s partners in the state and elsewhere? Finally, and
significantly, it can and must involve both the intellectual and the financial
structures that give shape to the University.
2. Research: New
Frontiers and Old Challenges
Co-chairs: Sherry
Vellucci, Dean, University Library
Jan Nisbet, Director, Institute on Disability
Both the context for and support of academic research have changed and
will continue to change over the decades ahead. New disciplines are
emerging, old disciplines are reshaping themselves, and multi-,cross-,
and inter-disciplinary work is increasingly the norm. Shifting funding
patterns are similarly affecting research questions and practices, often
redefining what is and is not important in ways that are at variance with
the long term interests of the university. This working
group is charged with considering the changing context of academic research.
Using the report of the Blue Ribbon Panel on Research as a foundational
document, the group should develop new initiatives that support the university’s
mission in research, scholarship, and creative activity and that can help
reinforce our position as a research-intensive institution. The result
of its efforts should be a focused set of initiatives that support and
extend UNH’s established
and emerging research strengths, while simultaneously focusing on how the
benefits of active research programs might be extended across the campus,
to students at all levels, to faculty in all disciplines, and to the energy
and intellectual engagement of the campus. How might UNH have a broader
understanding of the full range of scholarly work that is done on campus?
How might those ventures be better integrated with the University’s
teaching and service missions, and what material or financial infrastructure
would be necessary? How should
UNH generate and protect intellectual property? How can we ensure that
extramural research funding opportunities are fully exploited? What
roles might new modes of scholarly communication—open source, open
access, open science, for example—have in how the University both
shapes and funds its commitment to cutting edge research?
Comment
3. Teaching and Learning: Modalities, Technology, and Contexts in the 21st Century
Co-chairs: Paula
Salvio, Professor, Education
Ross Gittell, James R. Carter Professor, Management
Many, both inside and outside higher education, argue that the nation’s colleges and universities should, and will, dramatically reconfigure how students are taught, how they learn, and what they are expected to do with the perspectives, skills, and competencies they acquire throughout their university educations. This working group is charged with re-imagining the University’s teaching and learning—its practices, functions, and structural requirements. How will the evolving research on cognition affect what faculty do in our classrooms? What is known about UNH students, whether undergraduate, graduate, or professional, and how can that be used to improve the quality of the education UNH provides? What facilities, infrastructure, technologies, and colleagues will be needed to improve student learning? How can both faculty and staff better integrate what they do in order to foster a more robust intellectual engagement that links teaching, learning and research? What co-and extra-curricular activities, facilities, and support can enhance how and what UNH students learn? The result of this working group’s efforts should be a focused set of initiatives that clearly suggests the path UNH should follow in re-imagining the University’s teaching and learning functions.
4. Affordability and Access: Developing a Sustainable and Socially Responsible Business Model for UNH
Co-chairs: Mark
Rubinstein, Vice President, Student and Academic Services
David Proulx, Assistant Vice President, Financial Planning and Budget
As a public university, UNH’s first responsibility is to provide a high quality, affordable education to the residents of New Hampshire and, by extension, to their New England neighbors. At the same time, the University, as a steward of public resources, has an equal responsibility to expend its funds in ways that are both socially responsible and economically sustainable. The events of the last decade have made clear that meeting these twin challenges will require a basic rethinking of how UNH operates—how it sets tuition and fees, compensates faculty and staff, funds financial aid, seeks external funding, encourages philanthropic support, and funds major capital projects. The task of this working group is to consider each of these issues and then propose a coordinated set of initiatives that will help the University revise and adjust how it operates as a complex, publicly chartered enterprise in increasingly uncertain and competitive times. In developing this set of initiatives the working group on Access and Affordability will need to keep in close contact with the working groups focusing on Research and New Markets, particularly as the efforts of those working groups impact the revenue streams that will allow the University to develop a sustainable and responsible business model.
5. New Markets: Generating Resources to Meet Core Missions
Co-chairs: Jim
Varn, Assistant Provost, Director, Master of Public Admin. Program
Frank Wells, Senior Vice President, Hoyle, Tanner and Associates, Inc.
While UNH will continue to press its case for more state funding, to increase its externally funded research, and to advocate for philanthropic support, the University will have to develop new educational and service programs if it is to fulfill its mission and fund its ambitions. These programs must be in keeping with the University’s public and academic missions; they will also, in all likelihood, need to be self-financing. The first task of this working group is to consider the range of new markets the University needs to explore: for example, masters and related programs of professional education, distance learning, satellite instruction, and/or educational partnerships with other New England institutions and agencies. Second, the working group may want to propose the launching of specific new educational/service ventures (both non-credit and credit bearing). Finally, this working group will need to propose a set of initiatives that encourages individual units within the University to develop new educational and service programs that are in keeping with the University’s mission and that will likely prove self-financing. This set of initiatives should speak to questions of incentives, start-up funding, revenue sharing, and to tests of financial sustainability. In this latter regard, the working group on New Markets will need to keep in close communication with the working group on Access and Affordability.
6. Student Experience: UNH as a Student-Centered Institution
Co-chairs: Vicki
Banyard, Professor, Psychology
Mick Walsh, Ph.D. Candidate, Biological Sciences
Alissa Marchant, Undergraduate, Student Senate
UNH has long been committed to providing students with an environment that
supports their educational aspirations and their individual development.
The University’s
commitment to being a student-centered institution is reflected in the
University’s
academic vision of being a university “distinguished for combining
the living and learning environment of a small New England liberal arts
college with the breadth, spirit of discovery, and civic commitment of
a land-grant research institution.” That commitment is more
important than ever—but
it is also a commitment that must be extended to include all UNH’s
educational sites, and all of its students. The first task of the
working group focusing on the UNH Student Experience is, from the perspective
of the University’s
students, to ask “What can be made better?” As part of
this review, the working group should ask two additional questions: “What
(or who) is missing and where?” and “How have changing times
and circumstances altered, perhaps even recast, the hallmarks of a student
centered university?” Based
on this review, the working group should then propose a focused set of
initiatives for improving and expanding the UNH student experience. The
group should consider UNH’s belief in excellence through diversity,
particularly in light of the changing demographics of the state and region.
The working group may also want to consider whether there are one or more
key facilities the University should consider developing as part of its
commitment to enriching the UNH student experience.
7. Communities and Alliances: Expanding and Deepening UNH’s Strategic Partnerships
Co-chairs:
Taylor Eighmy, Interim Vice President for Research
Neil Niman, Chair, Durham Town Council
Even in a world of expanding linkages and interconnected communities, it
is the University’s most immediate neighbors who have a primary call
on the University’s
efforts. UNH, as a public university, is both funded by and indelibly tied
to the State of New Hampshire—its citizens, communities, and interests.
The University has historically enjoyed a special partnership with the
Town of Durham and more recently with the City of Manchester, and with
other towns in New Hampshire that have become nodes on the University’s
educational network. The
task of the working group on Communities and Alliances is to consider how
these partnerships and alliances, along with the University’s partnerships
with businesses, governmental agencies, and not-for-profit entities, can
be strengthened, bringing mutual advantage to both the University and the
New Hampshire communities it serves. Based on this review the working
group needs to develop a set of initiatives for strengthening and expanding
its New Hampshire partnerships and alliances. In developing these
initiatives the working group might also want to consider developing a
set of principles for the operation of these joint and cooperative ventures.
Comment
8. UNH and the World: Advancing a Global Perspective
Co-chairs: Marco
Dorfsman, Associate Professor, Languages, Literatures and Cultures
P. T. Vasudevan, Professor, Chairperson, Chemical Engineering
One of the paradoxes facing all universities like UNH is how to understand,
experience, and preserve the importance of place in a global world. While
the working group on strategic partnerships considers place more locally
(New Hampshire, New England, the United States), the working group on Advancing
a Global Perspective will look for ways to increase UNH’s engagement
internationally, through curriculum, research, service, and engagement.
Central to that, of course, are the study of languages (both European languages
and critical languages like Mandarin and Arabic) and cultures; although
various “Englishes” are
now spoken globally, facility in other languages is increasingly important.
But this working group should consider a full range of initiatives to internationalize
UNH. The challenge is two-fold. One, the work group should
consider strategies and programs that encourage the world to come to Durham,
as students, faculty, visitors, even as tourists. Two, the group
should look for initiatives that would facilitate and expand the engagement
of students, faculty and staff in international work. In part, those efforts
will focus on individuals and individual initiatives. Just as important,
however, will be those initiatives that are truly University based, involving
significant numbers of students, faculty, departments, even schools. Here
the goal should be to make the world part of the University’s organizational
DNA. In developing these strategies and programs this working group will
need to keep in close communication with the working groups focusing on
Research, Teaching and Learning, the Student Experience, and UNH’s
commitment to Affordability and Access.
Comment
9. Sustainability: Extending the UNH Commitment
Co-chairs: Tom
Kelly, Chief Sustainability Officer
Erica Johnson, Interoperability Laboratory
UNH is widely and rightfully recognized for being in the forefront of the “greening” of
American higher education, and for the University’s world-renowned
work on global climate change. The working group on Sustainability
is charged with developing a set of initiatives that will support, extend,
and sustain that commitment across all sectors of the University (curriculum,
operations, research, and engagement), across its many missions, and to
the University’s partners
in the state, the nation, and the world. How can UNH extend its on-campus
commitment to sustainability, in its facilities, curricula, research, and
behaviors? What
structures, investments, activities, and colleagues will the University
need? What curricular initiatives, what research activities, what work
with partners off-campus will best continue UNH’s national leadership
in this critical area?
Comment