UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — To realize a new vision driven by purpose, agility and opportunity, Penn State is embarking on the second phase of its strategic planning efforts.
Grounded in President Neeli Bendapudi’s six priority areas, the new strategic plan will position the University to enhance student success; grow interdisciplinary research excellence; increase land-grant impact; foster diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging (DEIB); transform internal operations; and strengthen health care through academic and clinical synergy.
“Together, we can continue to build on the immense successes of our University to create new opportunities and experiences to enable students, faculty and staff across our campuses to achieve their full potential,” said Bendapudi. “This strategic plan will be the way we chart a new future for the University and will empower units to contribute to the vision of a truly transformational Penn State experience.”
As part of a five-phased approach, phase one established foundational knowledge and benchmarking across key peers, and findings were shared with the community in fall 2023.
Beginning this month, phase two will bring together a new group of University leaders and community members to use the learnings from phase one to formulate Penn State’s next institutional strategic plan. The goal of this phase will be to translate overarching goals and focus areas into measurable and actionable objectives and strategies that leverage the strengths of the entire organization. These proposals will be shared with the University community in the summer, with feedback being gathered into the fall.
After phase two is finalized, colleges, campuses, and administrative and academic support units will then each develop their own strategic plan to ladder back to the broader plan. Guidance and information on the unit-level planning process will be shared in the future.
“Our goal is to craft a dynamic strategic plan that is both relevant and adaptable to the ever-evolving landscape of higher education and reflects Penn State as a truly unique institution,” said Executive Vice President and Provost Justin Schwartz. “It would be unrealistic to capture all we do; this plan will reflect the priorities and goals that we must focus on to achieve our mission to strengthen our community, commonwealth and global society.”
Phase two will have two concerted efforts to build out the goals and focus areas of the plan starting with the student success and DEIB goal groups then shifting to developing the interdisciplinary research and land-grant impact goal groups later in the semester. The timelines will be cascading to allow for greater partnership and cohesion between complementary groups with overlapping priorities coming out of phase one.
The two strategic objective groups focused on optimizing internal operations, led by Senior Vice President and Chief of Staff Michael Wade Smith and the newly formed Office of Enterprise Change and Transformation, and transforming health goal will pursue a unique path to implementation. This reflects efforts to address internal operations that are currently underway, in tandem with the University road map, and the later introduction of the transforming health goal after the planning process began.
Drafts of strategies and measures will be shared with the University community starting in the summer and going into fall semester to solicit crucial feedback from faculty, staff and students across the commonwealth. Contributions from the Penn State community will be used to help finalize the new strategic plan for Penn State.
While the strategic plan and the Academic Program and Portfolio Review are distinct, both efforts are focused on advancing the University's mission and commitment to academic excellence and innovation.
Structure and committee membership
Phase two goal leaders — representing academic and administrative leaders and faculty and staff subject matter experts — will oversee four strategic objective groups and collect feedback from the Penn State community to develop the strategic plan. Daniel Newhart, assistant vice provost for planning in the Office of Planning, Assessment, and Institutional Research (OPAIR), will facilitate this process, along with members of OPAIR.
“As we enter this critical phase, I’m grateful for these Penn Staters who are dedicating their expertise and perspectives,” said Smith. “With the invaluable work completed in phase one, we are ready to develop a strategic plan that reflects both our community’s inherent strengths and our bold aspirations. We are looking to these new teams to lay the groundwork for how we will move our organization forward, envisioning the challenges we’ll face and the opportunities ahead.”
The following are members of the student success and DEIB goal groups and executive and steering committees. The members of the interdisciplinary research, land-grant impact and transform health goals will be named later this spring.
Enhance student success leads
- Stephanie Preston, associate dean of graduate educational equity and chief diversity officer for graduate education
- Darcy Rameker, interim associate vice president for Student Affairs
- David Smith, associate dean for advising and executive director of the Division of Undergraduate Studies
Foster diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging leads
- Victoria Sanchez, associate dean for educational equity in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences
- Evan Williams, director of the Paul Robeson Cultural Center
- Boni Fernandes Wozolek, director of the Office of Inclusive Excellence and associate professor of early childhood and elementary education at Penn State Abington
Executive committee members
- Neeli Bendapudi, president
- Justin Schwartz, executive vice president and provost
- Michael Wade Smith, senior vice president and chief of staff
- Sara Thorndike, senior vice president for Finance and Business/treasurer
- Andrew Read, interim senior vice president for research
- Margo DelliCarpini, vice president for Commonwealth Campuses and executive chancellor
Steering committee (includes executive committee members and goal leads) members
- Jeff Adams, interim vice provost and dean for Undergraduate Education
- Kathy Bieschke, vice provost for Faculty Affairs
- Andrea Dowhower, interim vice president for Student Affairs
- Larry Terry, vice president for Outreach
- Marcus Whitehurst, vice provost for Educational Equity
- Jennifer Wilkes, vice president for Human Resources and chief human resources officer
Phase two charge
During phase two, the executive and steering committees will focus on setting the stage by:
- Recruiting strategic objective groups that will determine how to engage the University community in contributing to the strategic plan’s development;
- Establishing key objectives for each goal area, building a bridge between vision and impact; and
- Developing high-level key performance indicators (KPIs) for each identified objective to track progress and assess performance.
Following these initial steps, the goal leads and strategic objective groups will be charged with:
- Outlining a University implementation strategy and action plan, detailing actionable steps, projects and programs to pursue the identified objectives. An analysis of relevant data, trends and the current work of units across the University related to each objective will be part of this work. Each group will consider how to leverage the strengths of the range of academic, student support and administrative units and will consider the resources required for successful implementation, potentially including areas where existing work may be stopped to accommodate growth into more strategic areas.
“Equipped with this foundation, units will then have a roadmap to capture their unique activity, achievement and ambitions within their own objectives, KPIs and implementation plans that calibrate with University efforts,” Schwartz said.
Community engagement
In addition to the strategic objective groups that will be formed, the goal groups will also seek broad community input, including engagement of the University Faculty Senate, University Staff Advisory Council, University Equity Leadership Council and others.
Information about progress and opportunities to participate will continue to be shared with the University community during phase two and beyond. More details will be forthcoming on how individual community members can provide their feedback.
Throughout this process, the Penn State Values and guiding principles of sustainability; efficiency and effectiveness; and diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging will be meaningfully integrated and embedded into each goal area and unit-level plan.
Future vision phases
Emerging and evolving over the next few years, the vision phases are focused on:
- Phase 1 (complete): Benchmarking and exploring the current state of Penn State for each goal area through an agile information-gathering exercise;
- Phase 2 (in progress): Developing the next institutional strategic plan;
- Phase 3 (future): Developing unit, college and campus plans that align with broad institutional plans;
- Phase 4 (future): Implementing institutional and unit, college and campus plans; and
- Phase 5 (future): Continuously evaluating and recalibrating plans and efforts based on progress and outcomes.