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Strategic Planning

  1. CCRI
  2. Strategic Plan
  3. Goals
  4. Language Updates and Rationale

Language Updates and Rationale

 

Goal 1: Drive student success, experience, and completion

2018-21 Language
Maximize college readiness by expanding engagement with high school students and adult education students
Assess college readiness in various ways through the use of multiple measures and Prior Learning Assessment (PLA). 
Deliver a holistic, student-centered system of onboarding, orientation and ongoing advising.
Continue to define and broaden efforts to improve and accelerate pathways through developmental education.
 
 
2018-21 Language 2022-27 Language Rationale
Implement guided pathways, including the establishment of meta majors.  Ensure every student selects an Academic and Career Path. Lots of positive feedback about Academic and Career Paths, updated language to reflect the focus on having every student select a path. Changed term 'meta majors’ because we use Academic and Career Paths.  
Create pathways that include multiple on and off ramps.  Expand participation in pathways with K-12 schools, noncredit programs, and postsecondary partners that lead to graduation, transfer, and careers.  Feedback received was that ‘multiple on and off ramps’ was vague and there needs to be more faculty and student awareness, edited language to be more specific. 
Establish course schedules and course offerings that align with student demand and support the guided pathways structure.  Increase opportunities for student exploration of Academic and Career Paths in application process, first-term courses, work-based learning experiences, and transfer and career planning.  Added language to be specific about student exploration, in original language it was implied in 'on and off ramps' but wanted to highlight how students can explore paths. 
Establish seamless transfer pathways for our top five transfer majors to Rhode Island College and University of Rhode Island.  Drive redesigned General Education program to maximize transfer for (a minimum of) our top five transfer majors to University of Rhode Island and Rhode Island College.       There were questions about why only five transfer majors are listed, the reason is because this is the Office of Postsecondary Commissioner (OPC) policy, added 'a minimum of' to refect that we will work towards more. Language edited to reflect the emphasis on aligning GenEd programs and OPC policy. 
2018-21 Language 2022-27 Language Rationale
Standardize the process of curriculum design and review to ensure quality, rigor and continuous curricular improvement.  Prioritize academic program review to ensure quality, rigor, parity of outcomes, and continuous academic improvement.  There were concerns about the term 'standardize' and the updated language reflects the intent to ensure learning outcomes, not to imply that all teaching should be the same.
Enhance the process for assessing student learning.  Conduct annual assessment of student learning through technology-based systems. The college has made a lot of progress around enhancing the process for assessing student learning through technology systems, this tactic combines actions from two original tactics. 
Develop a technology-based system to capture and analyze assessment data to inform continuous improvement of teaching practices.  Provide faculty-supported professional development focused on closing equity gaps. There was feedback that faculty should be more involved with professional development, and this is happening with the creation of the Center for Teaching Excellence (CTE), a faculty-led PD resource among other initiatives, and wanted to highlight this here.  
Implement faculty professional development program that focuses on best practices related to student engagement and active learning.  Deliver high-impact teaching through various modalities that is responsive to the needs of our students.  The CTE focusses on high-impact teaching, also want to highlight how we've adjusted to student need especially through the pandemic. 
  Foster inclusive teaching and learning environments that contain culturally responsive curriculum and pedagogy. There was feedback that we want to better incorporate work to support DEI work, included tactic to address this in curriculum and pedagogy. 

Goal 2: Expand partnerships and programs

Empower students to identify personal, career, and economic goals.
Facilitate connection to employers and programs and increase access to employment opportunities especially for students from underrepresented backgrounds.
Utilize labor market data to forecast demand, build relevant academic and workforce programming, and communicate insight with students, faculty, staff, and external audiences.
Review and strengthen curriculum by engaging college departments, advisory boards, adult education, employer partners, economic development agencies, and community organizations. 
Increase alignment between Divisions of Academic Affairs and Workforce Partnerships to build stackable credentials that lead to program completion, advancement, and transfer.
Align master schedules and curricular offerings with student and employment demands.
Deliver demand-informed programs that continue to position CCRI as the leading workforce provider in the state. 
Expand community partnerships to meet students' non-academic needs.
Expand student services and community partnerships to remove barriers to student success by supporting financial, housing, food, childcare, transportation, mental health, and college access needs. 
Empower families to enroll in college by delivering programs and services that champion educational and employment pursuits for high school students, recent high school graduates, and new and returning adult learners. 
Provide equitable opportunities for work-based learning, internships, and professional skills development.
Strategically engage stakeholders to promote CCRI and its value through our community and external relations programs. 
Grow philanthropic resources by advancing the Foundation’s fundraising and engagement efforts to support students, alumni, faculty, staff, campuses, and college innovation. 

Goal 3: Strengthen institutional effectiveness

2018-21 Language 2022-27 Language Rationale
Build an ongoing collegewide program devoted to enhancing collaboration and respect Provide a welcoming and inclusive environment where students, faculty, and staff can be authentic and openly learn, work, and engage.  Updated language to focus on aspects of an inclusive community and learning environment.
  Develop campus communities and physical spaces that enhance student experiences and promote high-quality work and serve our students.  New tactic to highlight our campus communities and capital improvements. 
Clarify and strengthen internal processes to ensure timely, clear communication among faculty, administration, staff and students Provide robust channels of communication to share and receive information across the college community.  Feedback was that this was lengthy and lacked clarity. Updated language to focus on communication instead of process. 
  Advance communication, collaboration, and decision-making through shared governance.  New tactic to incorporate work and impact of governance. 
  Strengthen strategies to increase the pipeline, recruitment, and retention of diverse faculty and staff.  Want to highlight efforts to have faculty and staff more representative of our student body. 
2018-21 Language 2022-27 Language Rationale
Build a robust onboarding process for new employees that focuses on college culture, essential skills and ongoing professional development opportunities Build a comprehensive onboarding process that focuses on essential skills and college culture so faculty and staff can successfully begin work and serve students.  Updated language to mirror student onboarding in Goal 1. 
  Provide education and training that promote shared language, behavioral norms, and concepts centered on building an inclusive and equitable culture.  New tactic to incorporate trainings on principles of DEI work. 
Implement a comprehensive professional development program that includes institutional and individual plans that contribute to improving the overall performance at our college Deliver professional development, trainings, and programs to meet the needs of faculty and staff. There was positive feedback about professional development already happening for faculty, with added training for staff.
  Commit to providing and receiving feedback, professional development, and annual performance reviews.  There were comments about having managers provide feedback to help employees develop their performance. 
From the institutional to the individual level, identify goals that are clear, measurable and advance the mission of our college. Develop individual, division, and institutional goals that are aligned to the strategic plan. There were comments around desire to track performance and metrics aligned with strategic plan. In previous plan, this tactic was in strategy A, moved to B as it relates to professional development. 

2018-21 Language 2022-27 Language Rationale
Utilize predictive analytics to assist in understanding our student population, their goals, and potential challenges.  Use analytics to understand student needs and eliminate institutional barriers to student success.   Revised to incorporate eliminating institutional barriers. 
Develop a system for regularly reviewing technology and organizational operations to improve institutional efficiency and effectiveness.  Regularly review organizational operations and leverage technology to ensure institutional efficiency and effectiveness. Removed language about systems to focus on task. 
  Develop a technology foundation that is cost-effective, secure, scalable, and responsive to the evolving needs of the organization. New tactic to recognize work of new CIO and team to understand and build technology structure and practices.
Develop an annual budget process and resource allocation plan that aligns with strategic goals. Build an annual budget and sustainable financial model that supports students and aligns with strategic goals. Removed resource allocation plan because that is part of the budget.
Utilize technology for communicating organizational and individual key performance indicators. Apply data to performance metrics and regularly communicate progress towards goals. Revised to incorporate use of data and importance of regularly reporting out progress.

Question form

Do you have questions about the strategic plan or the process? Please submit questions through this form and they will be answered through direct follow up, announcement in CC Daily, or in a staff presentation.