We believe that our people are the backbone of the college. We will create a work environment where our people thrive professionally by supporting and valuing faculty and staff across all ranks and missions, recognizing and celebrating excellence, creating clear pathways for advancement, and creating communities where people have a voice in generating new opportunities that build a culture of support and continuous improvement.
We Will Forge a Shared Sense of ArtSci Identity and Connection Among Faculty and Staff
Actions:
- Facilitate the development of communities that span departments and activities
- Organize interactive town halls to provide open forums for faculty and staff
- Create and promote informal engagement opportunities such as lunch-and-learns
- Provide support and visibility for faculty and staff across all ranks and missions
- Facilitate meaningful interaction between faculty, former students and advisory councils
- Develop and incentivize activities that promote interdisciplinary teamwork
We Will Amplify the Recognition of Faculty and Staff Excellence
Actions:
- Create annual plans for identifying and nominating faculty and staff for awards
- Identify and acknowledge underrecognized contributions and develop new awards
- Offer programming to support effective nomination writing for awards
- Design an annual calendar of major award, event and process deadlines
- Engage past award recipients to support strong nomination development
- Create a committee to coordinate nominations for highly competitive external awards
We Will Increase Awareness of Academic Professional Track (APT) Faculty Roles
Actions:
- Offer programming for APT faculty to build a sense of identity and community
- Standardize appointment letter clarity on faculty titles and assigned responsibilities
- Ensure annual reviews include actionable feedback regarding promotion readiness
- Create cross-department mentorship opportunities among APT faculty ranks
We Will Build a Culture that Values Staff Contributions and Career Succession
Actions:
- Develop a strategic staff hiring plan that aligns with peer and aspirant institutions
- Address staff salary disparity and compression issues
- Launch a Career Paths Project to understand desired career paths for staff
- Create a comprehensive training and leadership development program for staff
- Enhance professional communication between staff and leadership teams
- Create a Staff Council to facilitate connections among administrators, faculty and staff
- Develop best practices to facilitate interaction among centralized staff members
Success Metrics and Milestones:
Assessing Progress in Valuing Faculty
- Attain an 85% positive response in the areas of engagement, shared governance and job satisfaction using periodic surveys
- Reach 98% annual retention rate of tenure-track faculty and APT faculty on multi-year appointments
- Reduce APT faculty time-to-promotion across ranks and disciplines, with goal of six years maximum between promotions by FY28
- Establish unit-level recognition plans by FY27
- Increase number and percentage of faculty nominated for and receiving internal and external awards
- Increase number of faculty participating in college-sponsored networking events, workshops, town halls, and other community building events
Assessing Progress in Valuing Staff
- Implement processes to achieve staff salaries at least 90% relative to salaries at market value by FY30
- Establish Staff Council by FY27
- 50 staff members complete intensive leadership training by FY31
- Achieve 85% positive feedback on mentoring and community-building efforts through post-event surveys and periodic assessments with analysis of perceived value, sense of belonging, and support for professional development
- Increase the number and percentage of staff receiving internal and external awards
