Comments

Assege HaileMariam, Ken Baker and I invite the campus community to participate in the 2011 strategic planning process. We hope to have stimulating, productive discussions that will prepare us to educate the next generation of students and help us build a sustainable future for EIU. William Weber

First Session
Attendees self-selected a strategic theme to begin developing goals for each theme.  Each group presented the suggested goals to all participants.  Then, participants prioritized the suggested goals.

Attendees at a Table Whiteboard with Notes Barbara Burke writes on whiteboad

Second Session
Each group created detailed action plans for their two top-priority goals (including three steps toward implementing goals, resources needed, time frame, a person who is responsible for the successful completion and those who will assist, description of what success would look like, and potential hurdles); the action plans were presented to the whole group for constructive feedback. Finally, each group incorporated the feedback to refine the action plans and gave a report, see below, to the large group.

Academic Excellence | Marketing & Communication | Campus & Community Life | Financial Stability | Emerging Technologies | Global competition & Changing demographics

Campus and Community Life

  1. Create collaborative landscape/streetscape plan from Neal Center to KFC to connect campus and community to be more welcoming (35 votes)
  2. Establish a symbolic campus landmark to generate tradition and school pride across campus and community (25 votes)
  3. Enhance community collaboration through service and engagement (22 votes)
  4. Enhance participation in campus activities (21 votes)
  5. Campus and community collaborative event planning (21 votes)

Ranked Goal #1: Create a collaborative “streetscape” plan from Neal Center to KFC to connect the campus and community, to be more welcoming, and to stimulate the local economy.

Steps/Timeline:

  1. Identify who in community and campus is already working on this/ April/May 2012
  2. Est. a campus/com. Coalition to identify/prioritize needs/resources/ June/Dec 2012
  3. Create a phased plan for improvements/ 2013

Resources:

  1. EIU & community members willing to donate time
  2. Construction/landscaping co’s in Coles County
  3. Local alum and community

Who needs to be involved?

  1. Partners – NWC, Wal-Mart, Ameren, VFW
  2. Owners –Marty’s, Jerry’s, Midas, Styx, Jimmy John’s
  3. UMAC, Coles Together/Angela Griffin, John Inyart, Scott Smith (city), Chamber, Rachel Fisher, FPM Bob Martin Athletics, Senates, Student Affairs, and Alum Assoc.

Goal Champion’s

  1. Dr. Perry
  2. Mayor John Inyart

What does Success Look like: A more appealing street scape!

Hurdles:

  1. Not finding a group that is passionately committed to doing the work
  2. Not enough commitment to economic development
  3. Not getting sufficient funding


Ranked Goal #2: Drawing on campus and community involvement, establish a symbolic landmark to generate tradition and school pride

Steps/Timeline:
  1. Create strategy/theme for the making of an exciting engaging and campus wide symbol that’s “phenomenal”!/ Spring 2013
  2. Conduct process of designing/selecting the landmark/ Fall 2013
  3. Construct landmark / Graduation 2013
  4. Create campus events around symbol to increase school spirit/2014-2015

Who is involved: Student senate, FPM, Fundraiser, UMAC

Resources:

  1. High level of student buy in
  2. Creative people
  3. Small highly enthusiastic com.
  4. UMAC
  5. Marketing involvement
  6. Campus events around symbol

What does Success Look like: 5 Years from now

  1. Spontaneously engaging w/landmark
  2. Students, faculty and staff know the story of the landmark

Hurdles:

  1. Overcoming the artificiality of the process
  2. Keeping students engaged in the process and beyond
  3. Failure to raise funds

Goal Champions:

  1. Incoming student senate, exec. Members
  2. John Coit
  3. Dan Nadler

Feedback Themes:

  1. Doubt/questioning relevance of these projects to EIU’s mission
  2. Too many stakeholders/there won’t be buy-in
  3. Strong enthusiasm and willingness to help
  4. Extend the streetscape vision beyond Hwy 16 in Charleston (e.g., to I-57, the square)
  5. Create traditions around existing campus landmarks


The work created during the Goals Conference will serve as the foundation for our strategic plan, and the Strategic Planning Steering Committee will seek further input from the campus community develop and refine these ideas in the coming weeks. In accordance with the guidelines that President Perry established when we began the planning process, the new strategic plan will be presented to the Board of Trustees at its January 20, 2012 meeting.