Vice President for Student Life Eddie Knowles gave a presentation on the FY05 Student Life Performance Plan Wednesday, November 12 in the Union. Currently it is a work in progress and will be until February when it is reviewed by the board of trustees for approval. The Student Life Performance Plan is designed to support RPI’s overarching goal “to achieve greater prominence in the 21st century as a top-tier world class technological research university with global reach and global impact.”
Knowles talked about the five of six Institute-wide goals on which the performance plan is centered: Resident undergraduate education, research and graduate education, scientific and technological entrepreneurship, Rensselaer’s communities, and enabling change.
Several first year priorities that Knowles discussed were the biotechnology and information technology initiatives, first year experience goals, and eMPAC. For biotechnology, he said Thomas Tarantelli, director of the Career Development Center, is developing job opportunities in biotechnology and piloting a program in Washington, D.C., with the Washington-Baltimore Alumni Association. Some ideas planned for First Year Experience programs are having smaller sessions and exposing freshman to undergraduate research opportunities.
About eMPAC, Knowles said, “We saw this as an opportunity to elevate the arts at Rensselaer.”
Among additional priorities outlined was improving campus culture. Knowles said, “We’re also looking for significant events in terms of speakers…we want to raise the decibel level in terms of the speakers we bring to campus.”
Another goal cited was to raise retention rates by monitoring students throughout their college career rather than just as freshmen. FYE currently makes calls to freshmen who are in danger of failing classes. Knowles said that the administration is not happy that graduation rates are only in the 88th and not the 90th percentile.
A dean would be responsible for each class, along with an interdisciplinary team who are “essentially a pool of folks from across campus who are committed essentially to the success of that class,” Knowles said.
A question and answer section followed Knowles’ summary of the 43 page document. Many of the questions were directed to members in attendance, such as Lisa Trahan, dean of the First Year Experience. In response to a question about a poor graduate orientation, Trahan said, “We’re now at a place where we’re realizing we have to devote more attention to graduate students,” and went on to explain some improvements that may be made, such as breaking up the session into two days.
A discussion regarding the amount of activities in Troy took place as well as one about finding ways for students to stay informed of these activities. Placing a scrolling banner of events in the Mueller Center was suggested.
Grand Marshal Michael Borzumate said that dotCIO is working on an event calendar just as the Senate is working on a Union calendar. Trahan also said that FYE has plans for an online calendar. One of the problems cited as a reason for the difficulty in creating a calendar was that different groups have different visions of how the content should be displayed and where.
Knowles said the Student Performance plan will be available online for the public to read. Students will then be able to give feedback to the administration for plan improvements.
