9TASKFORCES

REPORTS: Task forces provide specific details

strategic planning team expressed the thought that this is an important step in the process.

“Brandeis loves a good, big, compli-cated debate. This kind of open con-versation is, in part, what helps us get closer to the ideal of justice,” said Scott Edmiston, director of the Of-fice of the Arts and cochair of the task force on Integrated Arts. “I think its fantastic how much the community cares about this plan and the passion with which they are discussing it.”

All of the task forces put forth both broad and specific ideas,.

The next step for the planning committee is to gather feedback from the community about the framework in order to start work-ing on the final draft of the plan.

“There are many terrific ideas in the task force reports,” said Daniel Terris, director of the In-ternational Center for Ethics, Jus-tice, and Public Life and one of the cochairs on the Global task force.

“Now the challenge is for the broader strategic plan to capture the zest, specificity, and imagina-tion of the process. This will mean making tough choices—but I am certainly optimistic that we have the intellectual firepower within our community to make this a suc-cess.”

STRATEGIC PLAN TASK FORCE REPORTS

The report from the task force on Facilities and Campus Evolution was rife with specific sug-gestions of special interest to students weary of crowded residence halls and sometimes questo-inable facilities. The report mentioned creating a physical social justice hub on campus, creating outdoor art installations, setting minimum stan-dards for academic buildings and residence halls, adding two parking garages on campus and mak-

ing the loop road two-way, creating a piazza in upper campus and adding 150 new

rooms for students in North Quad or East Quad.

Facilities and Campus Evolution

The task force on Faculty, Scholarship and Research aimed to give the faculty every oppor-tunity for discovery and research, while still en-suring that students are given the best possible education. According to Prof. Robin Feuer Miller (RUS), a senior adviser to the provost and one of the cochairs of the task force, one of the most im-portant details in their report was the effort to ef-ficiently and productively use faculty time. The report also emphasized the need to recruit and

retain talented, top-tier faculty and to increase the diversity of the faculty, to allow

for unique voices from differ-ent backgrounds on

campus.

Faculty, Scholarship and Research

The task force on Academic Innovation urged the strategic planning committee to en-sure that the plan focuses on distinguishing the University and letting “Brandeis be Brandeis.” The group recommended that the University of-fer more twice-weekly classes in order to “free up Fridays” for field trips or workshops. It also recommended a shift to “constructive feed-back” as an alternative to grading, in the mold

of schools like Hampshire College, which of-fers “narrative evaluations” instead

of grades, according to the Hampshire website.

Academic Innovation

The Benchmarking task force focused on comparing Brandeis to similar schools, including schools like Tufts University, Brown University and Washington University in St. Louis. They dis-covered that most of the University’s peers have had huge increases in applicants in the last 10 years, while Brandeis has grown modestly. The task force’s recommendations included big events to get the University noticed nationally and im-proving the graduate and professional schools. The committee noted that Brandeis was the only

school studied that did not have a medical school and one of only two that did not

have a law school.

Benchmarking

The task force on Alumni and Community Building

recommended doubling in-volvement of young alumni and

friends in the next five years, capitalizing on the new figure of Uni-

versity President Frederick Lawrence. The task force also highlighted the need to “train” young alumni to

ensure their commitment to future giving.

Alumni and Community Building

The Global task force was tasked with turn-ing Brandeis into a “global public square,” ac-cording to task force cochair Daniel Terris, the director of the International Center for Ethics, Justice, and Public Life. “We also laid out goals for extending the Brandeis global reach by de-veloping a concentrated set of partnerships and relationships in a limited number of key regions, building on a successful start in Israel and India,” he said. Specific ideas included in-

creasing the number of students who study abroad and who attend the Univer-

sity from abroad.

Global

The Flexible Education Through Technol-ogy task force was tasked with “transform-ing Brandeis so that it will take advantage of radical and disruptive changes in technology while fulfilling its mission of excellence and access,” according to the task force report. Specific recommendations included form-ing an online summer school, raising the school’s online profile through joining sites

like iTunes and partnering with a commu-nity college to offer Brandeis online

courses to community col-lege students.

Flexible Education Through Technology

Finally, the Learning Communities and Student Experience proposed that “a central vision for stra-tegic planning should be that Brandeis students, faculty, staff, alumni and friends will be connected to and infused with pride for the institution,” ac-cording to the report. They suggested creating a physical social justice center, in agreement with the Facilities and Campus Evolution task force. They also suggested more investment in athletics, the arts and competitive teams like mock trial or

ballroom dance. The task force also emphasized recruitment and branding, suggest-

ing an “aggressive Brandeis awareness cam-

paign.”

Learning Communities and Student Experience

CONTINUED FROM 1

INSPIRATION: Provost Steve Goldstein ’78 shows his enthu-siasm while talking about the strategic plan at a feedback session last week.

Photos by Joshua Linton/the JusticeDesign by Nan Pang/the Justice

The Integrated Arts committee wanted to “reimagine the arts at Brandeis for the future and to further restore them to prominence in the university’s identity,” according to cochair Scott Edmiston, the director of the Office of the Arts. Specific ideas largely focused on facilities, with suggestions including renovations to the Rose Art Museum, new spaces on campus for studio arts students to work and the creation of a Center for Creative Collaboration. The task force also wrote about integrating the arts into more corners of

campus, from connecting with alumni to put-ting on Lydian String Quartet con-

certs at faculty meetings.

Integrated Arts

THE JUSTICE ● TUESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 2012 5