Op-Ed
Purdue plan includes specific metrics and goals
Thank you to the Journal and Courier for its continued interest in Purdue University's new six-year strategic plan that will impact our students, faculty, and staff along with state, national, and global communities.The Journal and Courier clearly understands the importance of strategic planning and how this process has transformed Purdue during the past eight years.
However, a recent (11-31-08) editorial focusing on Purdue's strategic plan metrics underscored a misunderstanding of what we are trying to accomplish and how we are measuring success.
Our plan is broad-based and emerges from the grassroots of the university. It includes a bold vision and goals, along with strategies to accomplish the goals. Our plan also includes metrics.
At a Board of Trustees meeting in September, Purdue President France Córdova discussed nearly 60 of these metrics, and there are many more.
A metric is not a goal. It is a standard of measurement. Think of it as a ruler. Metrics enable us to evaluate success at periodic intervals and at the conclusion of our plan. They also enable us to measure our progress each step of the way. This helps us adjust strategies and resource allocations in a rapidly changing world. This makes the plan a living document.
We also have created a "dashboard," a set of selected metrics that reflect the salient vital signs of Purdue as we measure progress with our new strategic plan. It identifies very specific metrics showing comparisons with our peers whenever possible. They will be updated as new data become available.
Our metrics compare progress at Purdue not only to other Big Ten public universities, but also to aspirational peers such as the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Texas at Austin, Georgia Tech and Texas A&M.
As Purdue moves forward, though, other universities are advancing as well. This means we cannot set static goals. The bar is constantly moving upward. For some goals, we will strive to position ourselves at the mean or better in relationship to our benchmark universities. In cases in which we already are at that level, we will stretch to reach the next level.
The plan also has specific strategies. For example, to promote excellence in learning experiences and outcomes, our specific strategies include increasing recruitment of excellent students, improving retention and graduation rates, enhancing experiential learning opportunities, and working with faculty toward implementation of a core curriculum.
To support this, we will raise $304 million for scholarships. This Access and Success campaign will not only bring the best students in Indiana and the nation to Purdue, but also will assist students from lower- and middle-income families.
We also will be able to measure our progress toward this goal using metrics that compare Purdue to peer and aspirational universities in key areas such as SAT and ACT scores of entering freshmen, undergraduate retention and graduation rates, selectivity, and the number of students taking part in internships. For each of these, the goal is relative to our position compared to our benchmark universities.
Another focus of the plan is discovery with delivery, which means advancing the frontiers of knowledge and developing our research into products that can improve the economy and quality of life.
Strategies include building on Purdue's current strengths such as Discovery Park; identifying strategic research areas for new investment; and increasing strategic alliances, including our partnership with Indiana University.
Metrics include growth of the university's research program and success in technology commercialization not only relative to what we have accomplished in the past, but also in comparison to how our peer institutions are advancing.
We are already stepping up our partnership with IU through the Indiana Innovation Alliance. This joint proposal to the General Assembly will improve the state's economy and its public health by fostering new research, bolstering companies in biology and health-related industries, and increasing the number of health-care professionals being trained in our state.
Our plan runs through 2014. We look forward to executing with excellence to achieve the goals of this strategic plan. These metrics are posted on Purdue's Web site that describes the strategic plan at https://www.purdue.edu/strategic_plan/
Rabindra N. Mukerjea, Executive Director, Strategic Planning and Assessment, Purdue University
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