Navigating

Sorry for the long hiatus. It's been a busy month what with the start up of the new term and the need to navigate our way through the various drafts of the Academic Plan. A quick update:

All 26 academic units have been visited; we've also consulted with the library, TCSA and college cabinet members, the exec committees of CUPE and OPSEU, as well as the TIP Office. Still to come are the various other stakeholder groups--grad students, student affairs (including the Registrar's Office), TUFA exec, a town hall for all and sundry, and the SEM Committee. The Provost's Planning Group has begun discussing intersecting issues such as the upcoming mandate meetings with government, new program proposals, and the staffing plans for 2012-2013. Kudos to all the colleagues who provided candid and honest input. I especially enjoyed the thoughtful recommendation to abolish all administrators at Trent. Really.

I started drafting the plan from the first day of meetings and as each consultation ended the draft would undergo a variety of revisions. At 35 pages I decided it was time to test the waters with the committee who are now, at my request, critiquing the draft. Once we have a draft that we're comfortable with I hope to post it as a discussion paper on the intranet so that all members of the community can wade into the discussions. We're aiming to have a version ready for initial discussion at Faculty Board in November and/or December, an advanced draft for the Board in early December, Senate (which has exclusive authority over the academic parts) in January. with a final version ready for the Board to approve the fiduciary/financial parts in February.

The title, "Navigating," has been chosen deliberately. The plan is developing in an environment of incredibly radical changes on the horizon. We have government talking of three new "teaching only" undergraduate campuses being built in Ontario; HEQCO is just about to release its second volume on restructuring the post-secondary sector, entitled Academic Reform, and both MTCU and the Council of Ontario Universities are struggling with the complex issue of "learner outcomes". Not to mention mandate meetings between MTCU and the Universities to discuss "differentiation" and possible new funding formulae not based on growth; and being beaten up in the Globe and Mail and Toronto Star for not providing a good "return on investment" in the marketplace. Writing our plan in this environment has hardly been a cakewalk; au contraire, it's beena difficult navigation amongst competing interests, colliding expectations, and impinging external and internal pressures. But I digress.

Short version: we have a fantastic community who cares deeply about this beautiful little quirky gem of a university. We have brilliant committee members who are working extremely hard on developing the best plan possible; we have students who are unabated in their passion for this place; and colleagues across the board who really do want this thing to work. As someone very wise remarked today, "I'm beginning to feel optimistic again. Sort of." Stay tuned.