On Friday, October 27, 2023 members of the Eastern Washington University Community were invited to participate in Town Hall 2 to review the draft statements of mission, vision and values developed by the Strategic Planning Committee (SPC). In addition, attendees’ were asked to comment on the five goal categories for the plan developed by SPC. Over 150 participants attended the town hall. An opportunity was presented for participants to attend a zoom session at the Spokane Center and approximately 35 participants attended via zoom from other remote sights. Participants at the in person session were divided into groups of 4-8 participants.
Participants were asked to comment on the drafts developed by the SPC. A copy of the draft statements are attached. The consultant, John Welty, reviewed and summarized the comments which appear below. If more than one group indicated similar comments, the number of groups so indicating appears in parentheses at the end of the statements. Comments are divided into two sections. One section gives specific suggestions made by the groups and the second section includes general comments made by the groups.
VALUES
SUGGESTIONS
- Accessibility – Should include mental health, DSS services (3)
- Add “Scholarship” as a value (3)
- Add “Academic Excellence” as a value (3)
- Student Success should be listed first (2)
- Add : Life Long Student Success” as a value
- Add “Community of Care” as a value
- Add “Comfortability for Student Safety” as a value
- Add “positive Regional Impact” as a value
- Add “Encouraging Student Success” as a value
- Add “Affordability” as a value
- Add “High Quality, Relevant Instruction Leading to Student Success” as a value
- Add a “Sense of individuality and direction” to make it clear
- Drop Accessibility, Sustainability and Stewardship as value statements
COMMENTS
- Are Sustainability and Stewardship the right words? What do these statements mean? They are “clunky” (14)
- What does Accessibility mean? (12)
- Agree with draft value statements –They are strong (8)
- There is no mention of students, faculty and staff (4)
- What does Student Success mean? (4)
- Where does relationships and collaboration building fit? (2)
- What does Belonging through justice, equity, diversity and inclusion mean? (2)
- What does Regional impact and contribution to the community mean?
- No mention of transformation/transformative
- Sustainability and stewardship are distinct from each other
- Regional impact is critical. Being in Spokane is important
- Regional impact is a goal not a value
- Values mean nothing if they are not lived out with action
- Be more forward facing
- Are any of our current values missing?
VISION
SUGGESTIONS
- Change Affordable to “Value”, “Attainability”, or “Accessible” (9}
- Change Diverse to “an Inclusive” (7)
- Add “High” in front of quality (5)
- Add “Positively Impacts” in the Pacific Northwest (3)
- Add “Equitable” after quality (2)
- Add “Academic Excellence” (2)
- Add “catalyze” or “Change/Improves “ higher education in the Pacific Northwest
- Add “Nimble, Able to Pivot Quickly”
- Add “Prepare Students for Success in the Region”
- Add “ Everyone Belongs”
- Add Experience after Education”
- Education should emphasize Social Justice and Equity
- Change Pacific Northwest to “Region”
- Add “Faculty/Student Scholarship”
- Change “will provide” to “serves”
COMMENTS
- Vision statement is not forward looking and inspirational (8)
- Too much focus on affordability (3)
- Affordable keeps us accountable (2)
- Is this only about students? What about faculty and staff? (2)
- Goals are not linked to vision (2)
- What is a quality education? (2)
- Statement needs grammar work
- Does affordable include housing?
- Vision statement does not differentiate EWU
- Sounds like a community college statement
- EWU is not the most affordable
- Diverse student body is a great addition
- Think bigger than Pacific Northwest
- What is a diverse student body?
- Statement needs to emphasize pride and access
- Eliminate antagonism between faculty and athletics
MISSION
SUGGESTIONS
- Replace catalyzes with fosters (6)
- Eliminate “and the world” (4)
- EWU needs mission statement that is forward looking, responsive to regional needs and distinctive (4)
- “Global minded instead of “global citizen” (4)
- Add “through collaborative and caring community” (4)
- Add “life-long learning” (4)
- Add “community/regional engagement” (3)
- Add “diverse experiential learning”
- Add “practice of J, E, D and I”
- Add “international learning experience”
- Replace essential skills with “a strong disciplinary foundation”
- Add “learn by doing”
- Add “produce” to global citizen
- Add “affordable and accessible”
- Add “career readiness” as a skill
- Add “shaping our region and world “ instead of impact
- Add “campus sustainability/stewardship of environment”
- Add “justice, equity, diversity and inclusion”
- Add “faculty and student scholarship”
COMMENTS
- Catalyze is overused word – not understood (6)
- Definition of individual discovery – should it be “personal “ instead? (5)
- Essential skill development is too vague/ trade schoolish (5)
- Can EWU educate a global citizen? (3)
- Conceptually it works – good statement (3)
- Verbiage isn’t inclusive e.g. catalyzes (2)
- Values and mission are not consistent or aligned (2)
- We are different because of rural/urban interface (2)
- Commitment to J, E, D, I should be a value not in mission (2)
- We prepare students to succeed in local jobs (2)
- EWU should be a destination college, not WSU
- Be bold! More Pride! Become a Polytechnic University!
- Student leadership is missing
- Component statements need to be defined
GOAL CATEGORIES
SUGGESTIONS
- Add belonging to student experience (11)
- Instead of human capital state use “Investing in our people” or “Take care of individuals” or “Human Centered Approach” (6)
- Imbed student experience in student success (6)
- Add Physical/Digital access to campus locations/resources (2)
- Add “experiential learning” as a goal category (2)
- Instead of student experience use “diverse experiential learning”
- Add “positive EWU experience”
- Use “student journey” instead of student success
- Combine belonging and human capital
- Human capital category should include students, faculty and staff
- Add sustainability/stewardship goal category
- Add faculty/student scholarship
COMMENTS
- Good goals (5)
- Align goals with vision (2)
- Regional impact is great goal
- Goals feel vague
- Goals seem to only include students not faculty and staff
Updated October 31,2023
