Engaged with the World:
A Strategic Plan for Wesleyan University, 2005-2010

I. OVERVIEW

In 1831, Willbur Fisk wrote that education serves two purposes, "the good of the individual educated and the good of the world." This enduring vision of a Wesleyan education has guided us for over a century and a half. It inspired our 1997 commitment to A Wesleyan Education for the 21st Century and the Strategy for Wesleyan that we adopted the following year.  And it inspires our new plan: Engaged with the World.

At Wesleyan we prepare our students to face a rapidly changing world with confidence and the sense of responsibility to want to make the world a better place. Our students gain that confidence from a strong education in the liberal arts and sciences - an education that engenders the ability to engage in critical thinking, to communicate effectively, to find creative solutions to problems, to develop the imagination to see the world as others see it, and to make ethical judgments that come from deep within one's character.

The goals we set for ourselves in 1998 have been largely accomplished or surpassed. We have expanded into new areas of knowledge and pedagogy and increased the size of the faculty. We have better prepared students and a more diverse community. We have improved student financial aid, increased alumni and parents' support, and enhanced fundraising. We have also developed strong infrastructures to support scholarly and pedagogical innovations, improved capacities for institutional research, and improved communications. We have completed the Wesleyan Campaign, substantially exceeding our original targets.

To make these gains, Wesleyan has exercised strong financial discipline and has deployed its assets well, including its financial leverage. Wesleyan has one of the lowest ratios of administrative costs to educational expenses among our peers.  The challenge going forward is to reinforce our focus on academic excellence and to exploit our momentum to deal with important remaining challenges:

o    Academic Excellence. Continue to provide a first-rate liberal arts and science education that will give our students the capabilities to be leaders in a diverse global society. Organize resources so that scholarship and pedagogy continue to strengthen each other. Make further curricular advances through improved use of resources, the addition of new faculty, and enhanced advising.

o    Campus Community. Promote a campus culture in which academic rigor is valued and where diversity is not just acknowledged but engaged in the lives of students, faculty and staff, and incorporated into the curriculum. Create spaces and opportunities for activities that enrich the out-of-classroom social and intellectual experiences of students.

o    Financial Aid. Continue need-blind admissions to make Wesleyan affordable to students whose academic excellence would enrich the campus community but who cannot afford to attend without assistance.

o    Reputation. Continue to build Wesleyan's reputation for academic excellence. With the aid of outside reviews and other measures of excellence, we can continue to identify differentiating strengths, such as previously unexploited strength in the sciences.

o    Communication. Through continued improvements in our communications we intend to convey to the world the excellence of our faculty and students, the outstanding quality of Wesleyan's academic programs, and the intellectual vibrancy of our residential learning community.

o    Engage Alumni, Parents, and Friends. To build broad-based support, we will continue to involve alumni, parents, and friends in discussions of strategic issues and to find new and meaningful ways to engage them in significant aspects of Wesleyan's life.

o    Funding. With the momentum of the Wesleyan Campaign and improved portfolio performance, Wesleyan has more resources available. Our endowment per student, however, is substantially less than our competitors'. We must manage our resources with both boldness and prudence and sustain high levels of fundraising into the future.

Wesleyan is wealthy in the talents of its faculty and students and in the accomplishments and generosity of its alumni. Among U.S. universities, it is financially strong and well managed. But our long-term competitive interest as a first-class academic institution clearly and emphatically depends on increasing our per-capita endowment. One of our highest priorities will be to support a growing proportion of essential and predictable costs (faculty salaries, financial aid) through the endowment. Over the long term, this will increase our budgetary flexibility and reduce our dependence on tuition. We must take every opportunity to increase the endowment through new gifts, careful stewardship, and successful investments.

The pages that follow discuss these themes in detail and list the ranked initiatives, their costs, and their funding sources.