Strategic Plan leadership team updates

While the entire college should play a role in the implementation of the College of Technology 2009-2014 Strategic Plan, more formal responsibility for direction has been placed in the hands of seven leadership teams. Each of these teams have been assigned key strategy areas of the plan. The teams are charged with overseeing action plans, establishing metrics, identifying challenges, and tracking progress toward goals in their assigned areas.

The leadership teams have been meeting regularly over the past year and have begun reporting their progress through written quarterly reports and through college-wide presentations.

Following are short updates from each team. [Read the full reports for fall 2010 - Click on “Fall 2010 Reports”]. We invite you to read through each report to see the progress that is being made in each area. Feel free to offer your comments to the team leaders, who are identified below.

Discovery with Delivery – Technology Transfer, Commercialization and Entrepreneurship

Team Leaders: Matt McKillip, Lonnie Bentley, Eric Dietz

This team is charged with finding ways for faculty to make their ideas and research marketable to a broader audience. Metrics have been established to track the number of disclosures, provisional patent applications, patents filed, patents issued, and licenses. The team will also track student enrollment in entrepreneurship classes. Much of the past year have been devoted to gathering data from government and industry sources, researching universities who are excelling in tech transfer, developing a model to convey our current vision of Innovation to Commercialization, and establishing partnerships with the College of Engineering and the Office of Technology Commercialization to collaborate on improving processes.

Read the story highlighting the team's recent work.

Discovery with Delivery – Research Areas and Funding

Team Leaders: Melissa Dark, Steve Cooper

The team is charged [1] To investigate and report the extent to which the signature areas are achieving their stated criteria and to identify factors contributing to progress in the signature areas as well as factors that are preventing/deterring progress in achieving the above criteria. [2] To make recommendations on how to improve the conceptualization and implementation of signature areas so that they better serve the CoT programs and stakeholders.

The group is undertaking an evaluation of the college’s signature areas to determine the extent to which they are serving research growth in the college along with enhancing our educational mission. At this juncture, the college is undertaking a self-study to determine if the college is better for having signature areas, as well as to determine how we can improve the implementation of signature areas so that they help the college achieve its strategic goals.

Meeting Global Challenges – Partnerships

Team Leaders: Don Buskirk, Robert Cox, Robert Herrick

This team’s accomplishments include establishing the plan strategies that best align with the team’s mission and creating a set list of attributes for the definition of global challenges. Efforts are underway to create a mindset of globalization within the college. Among activities planned are the formation of an international student organization, the launching of workshops and events aimed at global awareness, the establishment of a clearinghouse of global activities, and inclusion of global awareness in the core curriculum. Data is being collected to report faculty activities and create a central report of Globalization Activities for the entire college.

Launching Tomorrow’s Leaders – Recruitment

Team Leaders: Duane Dunlap, Christy Bozic, Alka Harriger

More info available here.

The team has gathered benchmark data on current recruitment and retention activities across the college and has established a set of dashboard metrics to track progress in areas of retention, incoming student demographics, and incoming student quality. A survey instrument to gather qualitative data on CODO movement has been created and will be implemented later in the semester. Plans are underway to gather department benchmark data on incoming students, to create an implement a qualitative survey for incoming students and initiate department yield plans for spring 2011.

Launching Tomorrow’s Leaders – Undergraduate Curriculum

Team Leaders: Mary Sadowski, Marvin Sarapin

The team has met and worked with the Core Curriculum group and has submitted a Curriculum Policy to the Educational Policy committee of the COT faculty Senate. The three core courses have team leaders and the outlines are being prepared to present at the November college Faculty Senate meeting. The goal is to launch the Core Curriculum fall 2011, with the Honors Curriculum slated to start in fall 2012.

Launching Tomorrow’s Leaders – Undergraduate Research

Team Leaders: Brent Bowen, Kathy Newton

The team established a number of metrics designed to track student involvement in research activities. These metrics include tracking participation in the Purdue Undergraduate Research Symposium and other Purdue, regional and global symposia, tracking the number of students in capstone research projects, tracking students funded internally or externally, and tracking graduate school applications and the correlation between participation and undergraduate research projects and applications to graduate school. The team’s next steps are to begin processes to integrate undergraduate research into the structure of each department. Additionally, the team will work with the communication and development offices to increase highlights of undergraduate research in multiple college events.

Launching Tomorrow’s Leaders – Graduate Education

Team Leaders: Gary Bertoline, Kathy Newton

The team finalized its set of strategies, requested creation of department recruitment plans, created a Technology Graduate Student Advisory Committee (TGSAC) that actively reviews the curricula, implemented a comprehensive evaluation plan related to measuring program outcomes through a series of evaluation forms, offered workshops for graduate faculty to improve graduate education in the college and recognition by faculty of the support services that exist for them and their students, and created a new college Graduate Faculty Handbook to increase awareness of graduate process, policies and services. Next steps for the team include investigating ATMAE accreditation for our graduate programs and ProSTAR and continuing to work with the Graduate Education Committee to assist with the strategies.