Leland stresses growth, learning
President Dorothy Leland delivered the annual University Convocation to GCSU faculty, staff and students in Russell Auditorium last Monday afternoon.
Leland began her address by thanking the faculty and staff “who have encouraged, counseled, coached and challenged (the) students.”
“Such actions exemplify the pride, commitment and creative spirit that have long sustained this university and shaped its character,” Leland said.
Last year’s University Convocation focused on the theme of change and the importance of securing GCSU as Georgia’s public liberal arts university. Over the past year, GCSU has focused on two “pillars of distinction” which centers heavily on “learning beyond the classroom.”
“This, no doubt, is why (GCSU) already offers students significant opportunities to participate in field-based experiences, study abroad, internships, mentoring programs, faculty guided research and creative projects and service learning,” Leland said.
The focal point of the second pillar is the residential college setting in Milledgeville. Participants with the strategic focus initiative have urged GCSU to link living and learning, and provide “meaningful out-of-class interactions between faculty, staff and students.”
The strategic focusing initiative also attempts to identify what academic programs could possibly reach national recognition as exceptional. Those related to the undergraduate student learning are still being examined by planning teams.
Funding strategies are also in the process of being identified, which will aide in the assistance of academic program enhancements.
The Board of Regents has recently adopted a new strategic plan for the University System of Georgia which will significantly impact GCSU.
“This goal is to ‘renew excellence in undergraduate education to meet students of the 21st century need’,” Leland said.
This first goal plans to include a system-wide focus on improved academic advising, as well as improved student retention and completion.
The plan also seeks new opportunities to compete for funding, to improve this first goal. A related objective also seeks to international education and study abroad.
“This objective seeks to increase the number of students who participate in study abroad and provides incentives for internationalizing the major,” Leland said.
The plan also calls for a “reconstructing of the core curriculum to focus on a common System set of competence that reflect the knowledge and skills expected of an educated person in the 21st century.”
The second goal of the new plan is to “create enrollment capacity.” This means the University System of Georgia hopes to increase the student population by 100,000 by the year 2020. This would represent a 40 percent increase in capacity.
While some faculty members agree with Leland that there will be an increase in student enrollment they do not believe it will significantly affect the Milledgeville campus.
“Clearly Georgia College is somewhat limited by our historic location, and our historic campus so I don’t think we can take in 2,000 more students, unless we do something like develop the West Campus more or like what the president was talking about, making the Macon campus be the barer of most of those extra students, in which case I think it’s probably a positive thing for us,” Associate Professor of English Dr. Mary Magoulick said.
Dr. Hedwig Fraunhofer, associate professor of French/German, also agrees saying the increase is not going to impact GCSU to a large degree.
“We have a unique mission in the university system-our enrollment. We are not enrollment driven,” Fraunhofer said. “That’s one our signs of distinction- we are small, and we have small class sizes, and it’s more interactions with the professors.”
Although the exact growth percentages are not specified in the Systems’ plan, Leland predicts GCSU will “continue to limit growth on our Milledgeville campus, and focus instead on moderate growth at the graduate level in Macon.”
The plan also hopes to put a strong emphasis on distance learning. This is a challenge for GCSU, as our campus strongly focuses and specializes in face-to-face instruction and hands-on involvement.
The University Systems plan calls for developing an “RFP (request for proposal) process award ‘franchises’ to particular institutions for specific on-line degree programs.”
Another objective would include establishing a need-based financial aid program, which would benefit students from economically challenged families.
The Systems’ third goal is to increase the “participation in research and economic development to the benefit of a Global Georgia.”
While the details of this goal are still in the works, objectives include “incentives for federal and industry research funding, developing a plan for improving graduate education in targeted areas, and including a system-level academic program plan for workforce development related to Georgia’s strategic industries.”
The Plan hopes to “partnership with the K-12 and technical education systems.”
The final goal of the Strategic Plan will impact the institutional support of our university. Objectives for this goal include “energy conservation, employee training and development, and a process improvement program focused on Lean Six Sigma.”
Leland predicts that GCSU will withstand the pressures of increases enrollment, by focusing on the quality of our undergraduate program. Our strategic focus on the strength of our reputation will continue to grow with an increase in study abroad, undergraduate research, field experience, internships and the core curriculum.
“Our retention and graduation rates continue to climb upward, our students will become increasingly competitive,” Leland said. “The University System of Georgia’s Strategic Plan frames our future, and that future remains outs for the making.”
Posted by Colonnade Archives
on Oct 12 2007. Filed under News.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0.
You can leave a response or trackback to this entry
