Many planning offices are experiencing an identity crisis. Before the recession, their role was clear: provide colleges and universities the analytical support needed to develop academic programs and expand facilities. For more than a decade, planning offices were the workhorses supporting ambitious growth strategies. New and improved programs and…

Over the last 40 years, the mission statement has been consistently viewed as an indispensable management tool for organizations in both the public and private sectors. In addition, there is a plethora of popular management literature that puts mission identification as the first and most important task of an organization's leadership. Strategic…

How do forward-looking institutions with rich landscape and architectural heritages integrate contemporary programming and design? This article explores the evolution of the Mills College campus and compares it with two larger western universities: the University of California, Berkeley (UCB) and Leland Stanford, Jr., University (Stanford…

Over the past decade, the growth of widespread understanding and implementation of sustainability principles on college and university campuses has been astounding. In this article, the author notes a few of the more powerful forces behind this effort and suggests that these forces have created new opportunities for the Society for College and…

Linear planning and decision-making models assume a level of predictability that is uncommon today. Such models inadequately address the complex variables found in higher education. When academic organizations adopt paired-down business strategies, they restrict their own vision. They fail to harness emerging opportunities or learn from their own…

Even as technology and globalization are changing the way one lives and views the world, colleges and universities have become increasingly interested in preserving historic campus buildings and sites. Heritage has become more important to students, faculty, and staff, as well as to alumni, who have often been its prime supporters. This article…

The University of Mary Washington (UMW) in Fredericksburg, Virginia, was founded in 1908. This article describes the process that led to the UMW preservation plan. Unlike most preservation plans, the UMW plan was developed in-house with limited funds. Furthermore, the catalyst for the plan was a grassroots effort on the part of students and alumni…

From its founding as a Quaker school for boys to its evolution into a military school and, ultimately, into the thriving coeducational civilian institution it is today, Widener University has been no stranger to change and transition. It may come as a surprise, therefore, that although it had a mission statement and goals, prior to 2004 the…

A consortium of 10 Canadian research-intensive universities launched a data exchange program in 1999 to share information that could be used to identify and evaluate the best practices of each institution and to help each institution position itself strategically to achieve its mission. One part of the program was devoted to collecting…

This article examines the strategic planning process at Cleveland State University, a large metropolitan state university in Ohio. A faculty-administrative team used a communicative planning approach to develop a collaborative, ongoing, bottom-up, transparent strategic planning process. This team then spearheaded the process through plan…

This article suggests that developing a strategic plan, even through a highly participative and data-driven process, is not sufficient to sustain change if implementation of the plan is not monitored as an organizational change event. To the degree that a strategic plan is institutionally transformative, monitoring change during implementation…

Strategic planning is critical to ensuring that institutions of higher education thoughtfully and systematically position themselves to accomplish their mission, vision, and strategic goals, particularly when these institutions face a myriad of risks that can negatively impact their continued financial viability and compromise their ability to…

Multiple rounds of budget cuts have created tensions on many campuses, prompting questions from faculty about whether institutions are using resources wisely and spending funds appropriately (Minor 2003). As institutions respond to fiscal challenges, it is important that administrators and faculty have a common understanding of budget issues and…

The purpose of the Getty Foundation's Campus Heritage Initiative was to assist colleges and universities in the United States in managing and preserving the integrity of their significant historic buildings, sites, and landscapes. The projects supported through this initiative focused on research and survey of historic resources, preparation of…

At the conclusion of the 2007-08 academic year, the City of Keene and Keene State College (KSC) began to celebrate the college's 100th anniversary. Keene is the 23,000-person hub of a 70,000-person county in southwestern New Hampshire. The history of a supportive town-gown relationship began prior to the college's founding in 1909. The city had…