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University of Texas: Change Starts Here


crash_davis

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Wonder how the new the proposed Liberty Institute will function in this new strategic plan.

 

https://news.utexas.edu/2022/05/03/ut-will-be-worlds-most-impactful-public-research-university-through-new-strategic-plan/

AUSTIN, Texas — The University of Texas at Austin is launching a bold and unprecedented 10-year strategic plan — called Change Starts Here — to become the world’s highest-impact public research university.

“Now is the time for our university to turn ‘What starts here changes the world’ from a statement into a call to action, as we set a bold but wholly achievable aspiration,” said President Jay Hartzell, who initiated the strategic planning process shortly after becoming UT’s 30th president in 2020, recognizing the pace of change and the opportunities that presents.

Change Starts Here was developed during the past year with thousands of students, staffers, faculty members and alumni providing input through more than 275 group sessions, focus groups and interviews, and 1,500 survey responses. It calls on all UT community members to work collectively and leverage the university’s size and scale to implement more than 40 initiatives — all built on five core pillars that will increase UT’s impact across our campus community, as well as our city, state, nation and world.

As part of the strategic plan, UT is also developing a three-year diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) action plan to foster belonging and create an even stronger community. You Belong Here: UT’s Plan for an Equitable and Inclusive Campus will be released this fall.

“This Plan for an Equitable and Inclusive Campus builds upon the university’s strengths in diversity, equity and inclusion yet encourages us to reach even higher,” said LaToya Smith, vice president for diversity and community engagement. “It reflects an honest assessment of where we are and a commitment to attracting world-class talent from all backgrounds to a campus where everyone feels they belong.”

UT was chartered by the Texas Constitution of 1876 to be a “university of the first class.” Today, it has 52,000 students, 20,000 faculty and staff members, and more than a half-million living alumni. And it is already one of the top universities in the world, ranked consistently among the top 10 public universities in the nation and recently as the 31st university globally.

Change Starts Here is built around five strategic pillars that provide specific direction for an even more impactful future. They are:

People

  • Serve more students and learners.
  • Cover more of their financial need.
  • Aggressively pursue outstanding, high-potential students, faculty and staff.
  • Achieve the objectives of a new, three-year DEI plan.
  • Engage UT graduates for life.

Place

  • Embrace and enrich the spirit of Austin and Texas.
  • Strengthen UT’s leadership in health, entrepreneurship and innovation, talent development, scholarship, and the arts.
  • Simplify and promote new avenues for partners to collaborate with the university.
  • Take advantage of and reimagine elements of UT’s campus.

Experiences

  • Deliver exceptional, transformative experiences for students, staff, faculty and alumni.
  • Offer a vibrant residential campus environment.
  • Provide holistic support to all students, staff and faculty.
  • Create more small communities and shared campuswide experiences.
  • Deliver operational excellence at every touchpoint.

Education

  • Drive educational transformation through new degrees, interdisciplinary education, innovation in pedagogy, and increased linkage between learning and research.
  • Enhance support for academic success for students at all levels.
  • Strategically expand lifelong learning and Continuing Professional Education offerings.

Research

  • Lead the world in research at scale in three broad areas of importance to Texas and the world, while also finding new ways to teach more students about these critical areas.
  • Propel the leading edge of Technology and Society research.
  • Lead the nation in Energy and Environment research.
  • Drive research in Health and Well-Being that transforms quality of care and life.

The strategic planning process was chaired by three faculty members with decades of experience as professors and administrators: Professors Lauren Ancel Meyers from the College of Natural Sciences, Bobby Chesney from the School of Law and Richard Flores from the College of Liberal Arts, who also serves as a deputy to the president. It was overseen by an Advisory Committee comprising leaders from across the university.

To ensure success, specific university leaders will be designated to lead each initiative area. They will be guided by a focused and collaborative Transformation Support Office within the Office of the President.

The strategic plan and resulting impact will also be enabled through UT’s ongoing capital campaign, called What Starts Here, which has a similarly audacious goal that is tied for the largest ever for a public university in the U.S.

“UT is the education, research and health care engine of the most dynamic city in the most thriving state. Now, we have the chance to do even more to change lives, power social mobility, and solve great challenges by creating impact at a scale that few other universities can match,” Hartzell said. “We must audaciously elevate our ambitions while reinforcing our core commitment to UT’s mission and values.”

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bold and unprecedented, highest-impact, change and the opportunities, strategic plan, diversity, equity and inclusion, foster belonging, impact, exceptional, transformative experiences, holistic support, Propel the leading edge, audaciously elevate.

Sounds good, but Jesus what a word salad

 

tumblr_nlex4oiQb61qmogw3o1_540.gifv

 

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3 hours ago, phdhorn said:

Translation: "College is getting real expensive, we need mo' money, Lege isn't giving us as much, so write a huge check asap."

NTTAWWT

Someone posted somewhere that Ohio State spends ~$15M on its "DEI" bureaucracy. Maybe I am wrong, but I never thought most colleges and universities had significant problems with diversity, equity, or inclusion. Did I miss a crisis I should be outraged about?

Pretty sure you could take that word salad for any university at any time and replace the germane buzzwords and get a similar gobbledygook. 

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20 minutes ago, Hook1997 said:

This is part of the sugar coating golf not requiring SAT and ACT scores starting next year?…..

*of*. Driving while posting is bad.  Does anyone know what is actually up with the not taking SAT and ACT scores anymore?  Are they just going to be going by class ranking or what are they going to use as a judgment on who gets in and who doesn’t?

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1 hour ago, Hook1997 said:

*of*. Driving while posting is bad.  Does anyone know what is actually up with the not taking SAT and ACT scores anymore?  Are they just going to be going by class ranking or what are they going to use as a judgment on who gets in and who doesn’t?

many schools have gone away from SAT/ACT tests for admissions. the link below at least frames the idea of why schools are going away from the SAT/ACT. before anyone gets all crazy that by doing so dumbs down UT (which a strong argument can be made that it does), if college admissions were a true meritocracy, across every college campus, there would be even more asians and fewer whites, blacks, hispanics. 

https://www.brookings.edu/research/race-gaps-in-sat-scores-highlight-inequality-and-hinder-upward-mobility/

 

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5 hours ago, Harrison Bergeron said:

Someone posted somewhere that Ohio State spends ~$15M on its "DEI" bureaucracy. Maybe I am wrong, but I never thought most colleges and universities had significant problems with diversity, equity, or inclusion. Did I miss a crisis I should be outraged about?

Pretty sure you could take that word salad for any university at any time and replace the germane buzzwords and get a similar gobbledygook. 

They are make work programs for people without serious degrees.  

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Quote

The University of Texas at Austin is launching a bold and unprecedented 10-year strategic plan — called Change Starts Here

9 hours ago, deadshank said:

First fix the shitty football program

^^^ Agree. Personally, I prefer Alabama’s one-bullet-point strategic plan, which is: We’re Going To Beat Your Ass.

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2 hours ago, crash_davis said:

many schools have gone away from SAT/ACT tests for admissions. the link below at least frames the idea of why schools are going away from the SAT/ACT. before anyone gets all crazy that by doing so dumbs down UT (which a strong argument can be made that it does), if college admissions were a true meritocracy, across every college campus, there would be even more asians and fewer whites, blacks, hispanics. 

https://www.brookings.edu/research/race-gaps-in-sat-scores-highlight-inequality-and-hinder-upward-mobility/

 

instead of figuring out how to raise test scores for certain demographics they simply eliminate tests. so there are more colors on campus and people feel more comfortable. no wonder we are falling behind globally. 

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2 hours ago, crash_davis said:

many schools have gone away from SAT/ACT tests for admissions. the link below at least frames the idea of why schools are going away from the SAT/ACT. before anyone gets all crazy that by doing so dumbs down UT (which a strong argument can be made that it does), if college admissions were a true meritocracy, across every college campus, there would be even more asians and fewer whites, blacks, hispanics. 

https://www.brookings.edu/research/race-gaps-in-sat-scores-highlight-inequality-and-hinder-upward-mobility/

 

I can get that cultural things may inhibit performance on tests devised to measure things within a dominant culture in a test devised by members of that dominant culture. And, that maybe that dominant culture isn't all it's cracked up to be, or it's corollary, the other cultures have a lot to offer.

But it still somewhat mystifies me that Asians, whose culture is more alien to the dominant American culture in terms of language and just about anything you want to reference or measure (except math), yet they consistently whip the SAT.

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3 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

I can get that cultural things may inhibit performance on tests devised to measure things within a dominant culture in a test devised by members of that dominant culture. And, that maybe that dominant culture isn't all it's cracked up to be, or it's corollary, the other cultures have a lot to offer.

But it still somewhat mystifies me that Asians, whose culture is more alien to the dominant American culture in terms of language and just about anything you want to reference or measure (except math), yet they consistently whip the SAT.

And Asian Americans are the only demographic where suicide is the leading cause of death of their teens and young adults. 

There's no free lunch in this universe. 

https://theconversation.com/asian-american-young-adults-are-the-only-racial-group-with-suicide-as-their-leading-cause-of-death-so-why-is-no-one-talking-about-this-158030

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11 hours ago, Hook1997 said:

*of*. Driving while posting is bad.  Does anyone know what is actually up with the not taking SAT and ACT scores anymore?  Are they just going to be going by class ranking or what are they going to use as a judgment on who gets in and who doesn’t?

Standardized tests are the easiest to game out of everything related to college admissions if you have the money. At least four of the north Texas private schools have classes just for test prep. Most of these kids take Kaplan etc on top of that and have private tutors in addition. 
 

Super driven students (either self or parent motivated) can do just as well with individual prep work. Math is math and the key to the verbal portion is your vocabulary 

 

 

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The university corollary to “beware of any endeavor that requires new clothes” is “beware any strategic plan that comes with a new office of administrators.”

Quote

To ensure success, specific university leaders will be designated to lead each initiative area. They will be guided by a focused and collaborative TransformationSupport Office within the Office of the President.

 

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4 hours ago, Hermanator said:

And Asian Americans are the only demographic where suicide is the leading cause of death of their teens and young adults. 

There's no free lunch in this universe. 

https://theconversation.com/asian-american-young-adults-are-the-only-racial-group-with-suicide-as-their-leading-cause-of-death-so-why-is-no-one-talking-about-this-158030

Probably because they do less drugs so that eliminates the number one cause.  

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7 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

I can get that cultural things may inhibit performance on tests devised to measure things within a dominant culture in a test devised by members of that dominant culture. And, that maybe that dominant culture isn't all it's cracked up to be, or it's corollary, the other cultures have a lot to offer.

But it still somewhat mystifies me that Asians, whose culture is more alien to the dominant American culture in terms of language and just about anything you want to reference or measure (except math), yet they consistently whip the SAT.

They study more.  And people want to punish them for working hard.  Getting rid of standardized tests is basically de facto discrimination against Asians.  Can’t have too many of them.  

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On 5/3/2022 at 1:29 PM, crash_davis said:

To ensure success, specific university leaders will be designated to lead each initiative area. They will be guided by a focused and collaborative Transformation Support Office within the Office of the President.

When do they start taking applications for Vice President - Transformation Support?

Edited by NeverMarryAStripper
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On 5/3/2022 at 2:29 PM, crash_davis said:

Wonder how the new the proposed Liberty Institute will function in this new strategic plan.

 

https://news.utexas.edu/2022/05/03/ut-will-be-worlds-most-impactful-public-research-university-through-new-strategic-plan/

AUSTIN, Texas — The University of Texas at Austin is launching a bold and unprecedented 10-year strategic plan — called Change Starts Here — to become the world’s highest-impact public research university.

“Now is the time for our university to turn ‘What starts here changes the world’ from a statement into a call to action, as we set a bold but wholly achievable aspiration,” said President Jay Hartzell, who initiated the strategic planning process shortly after becoming UT’s 30th president in 2020, recognizing the pace of change and the opportunities that presents.

Change Starts Here was developed during the past year with thousands of students, staffers, faculty members and alumni providing input through more than 275 group sessions, focus groups and interviews, and 1,500 survey responses. It calls on all UT community members to work collectively and leverage the university’s size and scale to implement more than 40 initiatives — all built on five core pillars that will increase UT’s impact across our campus community, as well as our city, state, nation and world.

As part of the strategic plan, UT is also developing a three-year diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) action plan to foster belonging and create an even stronger community. You Belong Here: UT’s Plan for an Equitable and Inclusive Campus will be released this fall.

“This Plan for an Equitable and Inclusive Campus builds upon the university’s strengths in diversity, equity and inclusion yet encourages us to reach even higher,” said LaToya Smith, vice president for diversity and community engagement. “It reflects an honest assessment of where we are and a commitment to attracting world-class talent from all backgrounds to a campus where everyone feels they belong.”

UT was chartered by the Texas Constitution of 1876 to be a “university of the first class.” Today, it has 52,000 students, 20,000 faculty and staff members, and more than a half-million living alumni. And it is already one of the top universities in the world, ranked consistently among the top 10 public universities in the nation and recently as the 31st university globally.

Change Starts Here is built around five strategic pillars that provide specific direction for an even more impactful future. They are:

People

  • Serve more students and learners.
  • Cover more of their financial need.
  • Aggressively pursue outstanding, high-potential students, faculty and staff.
  • Achieve the objectives of a new, three-year DEI plan.
  • Engage UT graduates for life.

Place

  • Embrace and enrich the spirit of Austin and Texas.
  • Strengthen UT’s leadership in health, entrepreneurship and innovation, talent development, scholarship, and the arts.
  • Simplify and promote new avenues for partners to collaborate with the university.
  • Take advantage of and reimagine elements of UT’s campus.

Experiences

  • Deliver exceptional, transformative experiences for students, staff, faculty and alumni.
  • Offer a vibrant residential campus environment.
  • Provide holistic support to all students, staff and faculty.
  • Create more small communities and shared campuswide experiences.
  • Deliver operational excellence at every touchpoint.

Education

  • Drive educational transformation through new degrees, interdisciplinary education, innovation in pedagogy, and increased linkage between learning and research.
  • Enhance support for academic success for students at all levels.
  • Strategically expand lifelong learning and Continuing Professional Education offerings.

Research

  • Lead the world in research at scale in three broad areas of importance to Texas and the world, while also finding new ways to teach more students about these critical areas.
  • Propel the leading edge of Technology and Society research.
  • Lead the nation in Energy and Environment research.
  • Drive research in Health and Well-Being that transforms quality of care and life.

The strategic planning process was chaired by three faculty members with decades of experience as professors and administrators: Professors Lauren Ancel Meyers from the College of Natural Sciences, Bobby Chesney from the School of Law and Richard Flores from the College of Liberal Arts, who also serves as a deputy to the president. It was overseen by an Advisory Committee comprising leaders from across the university.

To ensure success, specific university leaders will be designated to lead each initiative area. They will be guided by a focused and collaborative Transformation Support Office within the Office of the President.

The strategic plan and resulting impact will also be enabled through UT’s ongoing capital campaign, called What Starts Here, which has a similarly audacious goal that is tied for the largest ever for a public university in the U.S.

“UT is the education, research and health care engine of the most dynamic city in the most thriving state. Now, we have the chance to do even more to change lives, power social mobility, and solve great challenges by creating impact at a scale that few other universities can match,” Hartzell said. “We must audaciously elevate our ambitions while reinforcing our core commitment to UT’s mission and values.”

277EDE8A-2BEB-4677-9558-2F4B4872A34D.jpeg.80ab1c73ebe32d53f4bc85a9a11cd3c1.jpeg

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On 5/3/2022 at 1:29 PM, crash_davis said:

Wonder how the new the proposed Liberty Institute will function in this new strategic plan.

 

https://news.utexas.edu/2022/05/03/ut-will-be-worlds-most-impactful-public-research-university-through-new-strategic-plan/

AUSTIN, Texas — The University of Texas at Austin is launching a bold and unprecedented 10-year strategic plan — called Change Starts Here — to become the world’s highest-impact public research university.

blah blah fucking blah...

 

5HO.gif

 

13 hours ago, freyguy said:

a strategy that long ain't a strategy.  It's just jerking off.

See above.

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  • 5 weeks later...
On 5/3/2022 at 1:29 PM, crash_davis said:

Wonder how the new the proposed Liberty Institute will function in this new strategic plan.

Probably not at all if I had to guess based on the Tribune's reporting

Texas Tribune: Professors behind conservative-backed “Liberty Institute” say UT has strayed from plan

Quote

University of Texas at Austin finance professor Richard Lowery was emailing with a colleague in London last November when he was asked if it was true that the so-called “Liberty Institute failed to launch.”

Six months prior, UT-Austin had received $6 million in the state budget to launch a new think tank “dedicated to the study and teaching of individual liberty, limited government, private enterprise and free markets,” known as the Liberty Institute.

The project had hit some roadblocks after The Texas Tribune reported that the university was working with conservative donors and politicians to launch the center, sparking concerns among some students and faculty that the Legislature was “politicizing” the university.

Lowery replied that the failure-to-launch rumor was “100% accurate.”

“We’re in the Weekend-at-Bernie’s phase of the Liberty Institute life cycle,” he wrote, referring to the 1989 movie about two coworkers pretending their murdered boss is still alive to continue their weekend vacation.

...

“The President of UT, in coordination with one of his chief deputies, Richard Flores, chose to completely default on the plan agreed to for bringing needed intellectual diversity to campus and to push back against the persistent attacks on free inquiry and academic freedom at UT-Austin,” Lowery said in an emailed statement.

TLDR - liberty institute the thinktank is DOA, but they're still trying to push through Hartzell's handpicked "self-described 'pro-life evangelical'" to be its executive director and ignoring typical scholarly review of hires

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