CLIMBING NEW PEAKS

Objective 1: Improve academic quality through increased support for faculty excellence in teaching and scholarship and heightened attention to program accreditations.

• Encourage, evaluate, and reward excellence in teaching.

• Monitor all current and potential academic accreditations and their status.

• Increase faculty professional development resources in support of high-quality teaching and ongoing scholarly work.

• Launch the Center for Faculty Innovation.

Objective 2: Strengthen our academic infrastructure to support and measurably improve student success in persistence, retention, and degree completion.

• Promote effective faculty mentoring and stronger student-faculty relationships.

• Blend adjunct and term faculty members into the academic fabric of the University and recognize them for their vital work.

• Fill vacant professional advisor positions and train them with input from their respective academic units and from athletics.

• Equip faculty members with the confidence to address issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion in their programs and the skills to do this well.

• Pursue additional grants to support student persistence, retention, or degree completion.

Objective 3: Enhance the University's economic, social, and environmental impact in western South Dakota and beyond through meaningful investments in academic program review, revision, and development.

• Pursue several new or substantively modified graduate, major, minor, or certificate programs.

• Align our curricula with current and emerging workforce needs in western South Dakota.

• Increase student opportunities through greater engagement with regional businesses, community groups, government agencies, and individual citizens.

• Develop the Opportunity Center into a visible and flourishing asset for our students.

• Broaden the use of experiential learning or other high-impact practices across our courses.

• Grow the number of educational opportunities for students through service learning, community projects, international studies, Honors work, and student academic and professional organizations.

• Publicize distinctive examples of highly engaging faculty members and successful student outcomes through our marketing and recruiting efforts.

• Increase faculty scholarship through peer-to-peer mentoring and stronger engagement with the Office of Sponsored Programs.

• Improve faculty contributions to the student-recruitment process.