Wiley: Help implement strategic plan

Chancellor John Wiley is asking the university community to help implement a new strategic plan meant to guide the university to a new level of greatness.

“This is your university, and the legacy of greatness that we must carry forward belongs to future generations,” Wiley writes in “Connecting Ideas,” an essay being sent to all faculty, and academic and classified staff that explains the priorities contained in the strategic plan.

Wiley asks the campus community to review “Connecting Ideas,” and determine what they can do to forward the strategic plans’ priorities.

“This plan is not intended to prescribe any one person’s place or function,” Wiley writes. “But instead to challenge each of us to identify ways in which we can contribute to the university’s future course that we have all, in our collective judgment, helped to outline.”

The strategic plan builds upon a three-year study completed in 1999 that was used for the university’s 10-year reaccreditation. That study, titled “Targeting Tomorrow,” listed five strategic priorities for the coming years: promote research, advance learning, accelerate internationalization, amplify the Wisconsin Idea and nurture human resources.

The strategic plan lays out a series of goals meant to address each priority, such as improving campus climate and diversity, and providing better resources for instruction and research. The goals should guide the schools, colleges, departments, programs and individuals as they work to advance UW–Madison.

“We need to cease doing what has not worked and be willing to shift strengths and try new approaches, and to meet new needs and demands with innovation,” Wiley writes.

In addition to “Connecting Ideas,” the chancellor’s Web site contains the full strategic plan. It also features a guide that will help colleges, programs and other academic units relate their individual plans to the goals of the entire university.