This strategic plan is designed to give Swarthmore a broad vision, guiding principles, and recommendations for our future together. It is meant to be an organic document that can adjust both to additional community input and new challenges or opportunities as they arise. During the coming weeks and months, on-campus, and alumni communities will be encouraged to respond to this plan by attending community forums, posting suggestions or responses on this website, or by directly contacting any of the members of the Strategic Planning Council.
After we discuss the plan, what are the next steps? How do we translate these ideas into action?
1. The Board will evaluate the plan during winter 2011–2012. If the plan is approved, we will develop a detailed plan for implementation. If we encounter questions or issues that warrant additional research or conversation, we will take the time to address them.
2. Charge existing committees and groups such as the Council on Educational Policy, Staff Advisory Committee, the Sustainability Committee, the Alumni Council, and others to study relevant recommendations. We will also organize new committees, task forces, and study groups to study other, specific recommendations in depth. The plan includes many recommendations for new or existing groups to study proposed initiatives or review the effectiveness of existing programs. Many of these should be formed expeditiously, as their work will inform the development of longer-term plans.
3. Develop an overall prioritization and implementation plan. A coordinated effort to prioritize, integrate, and implement the recommendations will begin. This effort should include not only detailed plans for specific initiatives, but some broad College studies as well. A campus facilities master plan should provide an evaluation of existing facilities and the need and shape of new facilities. A financial plan should quantify the costs of specific initiatives and integrate them into several comprehensive scenarios for the future. A diversity plan should be developed to further advance the College’s enduring mission to create a wholly diverse, engaged, inclusive community. A capital campaign should be designed to excite donors, encouraging them to engage with us to achieve our vision for the future and to commemorate the College’s sesquicentennial.
President Chopp’s talk at the Black Stone Hotel in Chicago last week was illuminating. I was a little sorry she put so much emphasis on forming “community” as the third pillar for liberal art education, when it is really the individual that it has done most to promote. Especially today when the world has become so internationalized, we ofton find ourselves in situations where there is very little connection to the community at large. I spent many years employed in China. While the Chinese were very accommodating from a business point of view, understandably there was very little real connection with the “community”. I feel the strong liberal arts education back ground I have helped me act as an independant individual within their community and helped me maintain a set of values without the necessity of continual reinforcement from those around me.
Peter Landeck 81′
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I do not believe this draft strategic plan is ready for Board consideration. My feedback is based on years of experience as a program manager at a national laboratory. The set of next steps should be modified. The draft plan should be revised to include high level priorities before it is sent to the Board. This is a difficult step. It is relatively easy to come up with a wish list of new things to do. The tough part is making choices that are forced by limited resources that every organization has. This process includes establishing prioritization criteria and then applying them to recommendations, which become programs. All recommendations/programs – existing and proposed – should be on the table for prioritization. This includes the possibility of cutting some existing programs. (Hence the difficult part.) Even at this early stage in the planning process, the Board needs this information if they are to make an informed decision about a realistic strategic program that will be implemented successfully.