Dear Colleagues and Students,
Welcome to the spring 2024 semester! I’m hopeful that you were able to rest over the winter break and are feeling ready for an exciting new semester ahead. After a productive winter break, I look forward to writing soon with a more thorough campus update. Today, I have important and timely news to share regarding our comprehensive strategic planning process.
In October, the Strategic Planning Steering Committee shared draft 1.0 of the mission and values statements with the community, along with a survey to provide feedback. Open listening sessions with faculty, staff, and students provided additional valuable feedback. Drawing upon those reviews, the steering committee made several revisions to the statements, culminating in this draft 2.0 of the mission and values statements. This communication includes an FAQ identifying the most prominent themes from the feedback and how the steering committee attempted to resolve them.
We encourage community members interested in providing feedback on draft 2.0 to do so by Tuesday, February 6th using this survey. The steering committee will compile and review the results from the survey to make any necessary final revisions. Next month, the committee will then share the final document with the community as well as present it to the Board of Trustees at its February meeting to begin the approval process.
As the above process brings the work on our mission and values to a close, the Campus-Wide Working Groups are fully underway. They began meeting last week, and will meet at least bi-weekly throughout the semester. Their charge is to develop goals and actions to recommend to the steering committee around the five planning themes shared in December: Learning at Lafayette, Working at Lafayette, Enriching the Student Experience at Lafayette, Connecting Beyond Lafayette, and The Lafayette Campus. As they work on their respective themes, the working groups will continue the process of gathering feedback from the College community. By May, the steering committee will begin pulling together the working groups’ recommendations into a draft plan, which will be refined over the summer and released to the community for adoption in the fall 2024 semester. We will continue to provide regular updates and opportunities to gather feedback on emerging drafts throughout the semester.
On behalf of the steering committee, I would like to thank all who have taken the time to engage in this most important process–from our listening sessions almost one year ago, to the surveys and sessions we will have this spring. Your thoughtful input has been and will continue to be vital to creating a plan that helps lead this College into its third century.
To great things ahead!
President Nicole Hurd
New items shared within this message:
Items shared previously:
Campus-Wide Working Group Themes (December 2023)
Draft 1.0 of the Mission Statement and Values (October 2023)
Strategic Planning Steering Committee and Charge (March 2023)