Address given by Katherine Fell, Ph.D., at opening session for faculty and staff
Aug. 17, 2010  

Welcome to the 2010-2011 academic year! Like our students, we are eager for a new start. We’ve bought new pens, cleared the smudges from our computer screens, organized our desks, penciled in 30 minutes of exercise every day and vowed to put behind us any misgivings we may have harbored about our roommates.

As I begin my first year with you, I look forward to our getting to know one another better. 

It may be helpful for you to know some of the principles that guide my thinking about the work I hope we will do together (you will be relieved to find that they are the same principles we discussed during the interview process): Focus on mission and vision, broad-based decision making and attention to individuals within the context of a learning community.

1. Focus on mission and vision.

The University of Findlay is a mission-driven institution. Many of us are here because we believe we are called to this vocation in this time and this place.  

Questions for us to consider regarding our mission to educate our students include

• What do you believe our alumni can do when they graduate that they couldn’t do before they began their education at UF?

• What do you believe our alumni can do when they graduate that they might not be able to do if they had chosen another institution? Perhaps the distinguishing characteristics of our alumni have more to do with who they are than with what they can do?

• What qualities of character do our graduates demonstrate?             

As we articulate a vision for the future, we must answer these questions:

• What should our alumni be able to do when they graduate that they could not do before they began their education with us? 

• What should our graduates be able to do that alumni from other institutions can not? 

• What qualities of character should our alumni display?

• At the end of every day, each of us should ask, “Since my first cup of coffee this morning, how did I help students develop the skills and attributes they need?” 

I believe that the closer correlation we see between our daily work and the goals we have for our students, the happier and more productive we will be. 

We are all educators—professors, administrators and staff.  All of us teach by example every day in ways we may not even know.

As we ask ourselves these questions about our aspirations for our students and graduates, we will answer them about our institution.  In one way or another, you’ve asked these questions many times, and now I must join you in asking them. 

The University-wide mission defines us, and our vision should inspire us. You are indeed equipping students for productive careers and meaningful lives.

Findlay holds a distinctive place between a large research university and a small college.  

I believe we must remain rigorously balanced.  For us, insisting on balance can be a bold declaration that the mysterious intersection -- between the tangible and the intangible and between specialized knowledge and broad understanding -- is the very intersection where careers become callings and life is rich with meaning.  

It is fair to ask what makes a degree from the College of Liberal Arts or Pharmacy or Education or Business or Sciences or Health Professions distinctive. 

We should ask those questions, and we should all be able to answer them for all the colleges:  A chemistry professor for the College of Liberal Arts, an English professor for the College of Business, a pharmacy professor for the College of Education. 

We should also ask and answer in unity: What makes a University of Findlay education distinctive?  

A critical factor in determining the answer to that central question is that we all consider it together, and that brings us to the second principle that I hope will guide our work.  

2. Broad-based participation in decision-making.

Your vice presidents and I have heard many of you say that you value open communication among administration, faculty, staff and students. 

As a first step toward this, we will soon ask each faculty and staff member to complete a Noel-Levitz satisfaction survey.  We hope to discover the common trends in what you perceive as the areas of strength and of need in your work environment and to use the information you provide in setting priorities for the campus.  We will report the results back to you and engage you in discussions about what those results mean and how they should guide us.  

Whenever an institution attempts broad-based decision making, anxieties arise. 

Can you depend on your faculty and staff colleagues to see beyond the strengths of their own departments?  And to be honest about the limitations of their own departments? (You probably have no fear whatsoever that they will be honest about the shortcomings in departments other than their own!)

I believe this community can and will bring to the decision-making table a willingness to let go of territoriality and self-protection for the good of the whole.  I believe that each of you is wise enough to know that others’ strengths need not diminish your own.   

Furthermore, we will make every effort to make our broad-based decisions not by anecdote alone but by careful consideration of evidence.  We will gather, share, and interpret data together.  

You are certainly more likely to participate fully if you are convinced that just as we care about our students as individuals, we care about you as individuals —the third principle that I hope will guide our work together.           

3. Attention to and respect for individuals as members of a campus-wide learning community. 

At Findlay, we will appeal to the best in our students and in one another.   In fact, toward this end, in preparation for  a senior administration retreat last week, each of  the vice presidents and I read Tom Rath’s “Strengths Finder 2.0” and took an online test to discover our individual strengths and to better understand how to work with one another. 

Rath explains why he and his colleagues of Gallup scientists began their work in strength psychology: “We were tired of living in a world that revolved around fixing our weaknesses.  Society’s relentless focus on people’s shortcomings had turned into a global obsession.  What’s more, we had discovered that people have several times more potential for growth when they invest energy in developing their strengths instead of correcting their deficiencies” (Rath i.).  

Other examples of looking for the best in one another and collaborating to build community abound.  I visited with Dr. John Malacos just last week about his project: “The Power of Positive: Celebrating Human Goodness.”  In his role as the Richard E. Wilkin Chair of the College of Liberal Arts, Dr. Malacos will lead an effort that will encompass many campus members as well as leaders from Winebrenner Theological Seminary, the United Way, the Ohio State University Extension, the public library and area schools.    

Another  example of respect for individuals and campus-wide community building  is the work Dr. Michael Edelbrock, in his role as the chair of the College of Sciences, will conduct this year in the advancement of interdisciplinary undergraduate research and scholarship.  He plans to meet with colleagues across all colleges to define research and scholarship and promote opportunities to work inside and outside the classroom on research projects. In his view, a challenge we face as an institution is to define the degree to which we value undergraduate research, and the impact it has on the growth of our students.  

In our attention to individuals as members of a campus-wide community, even when we cannot reach consensus, we will respect one another.  We will exemplify civil discourse at its best in discussions with our students and with one another.    

With these principles guiding us — focus on mission and vision, broad-based decision making and attention to individuals as members of a campus-wide learning community — we will set priorities  for the next few years.

We are at the midpoint of the timeline of the current strategic plan, an appropriate point at which to evaluate our progress and adjust our thinking where necessary.  My prediction is that our success in recruiting and retaining students and in fundraising will occur in direct proportion to the authenticity of our strategic plan and the clear purpose each of us senses in our day-to-day work in behalf of our students.

Measuring the success of our plan will be critical.  The Higher Learning Commission and the 10 professional accrediting agencies with which we work force us to assess and report.  I submit that we could have a culture so attuned to the five steps of planning, doing, assessing, reporting and improving that accreditors who visit our campus would be left with little to do but stop by Fort Findlay for a doughnut and some coffee on their way out of town.

• You have made tremendous progress in each category of the current strategic plan: 

• Quality Learning, Scholarship and Performance
  
• Service-focused Administration and Support Functions
  
• Growth of Enrollment, Programming and Affordability
  
• Enhanced Financial Performance and Capital Resources
• Expanded Outreach, Engagement and Service  
  

In the next few months, we will fully assess the progress we’ve made goal-by-goal, and we will revise and renew our strategic plan. 

This afternoon, during our faculty-staff information session, we will begin a series of conversations about the next five years.  I have asked each vice president to summarize progress in his area for the first five years of the strategic plan.   Some of the priorities as they are currently stated may remain, and others may change.

I am fully convinced that a university that has celebrated as many accomplishments as The University of Findlay can plan a future filled with promise. 

Take a moment to consider three exciting announcements that  U.S. News and World Report will make later today or early tomorrow about our very own University. 

• Findlay is again ranked in the top tier of U.S. News & World Report’s “America’s Best Colleges” in the Midwest.  As you already know, Findlay has been named a Best Midwestern College by the Princeton Review for the past five consecutive years.  

• UF dropped from the “most debt” list in the US News Rankings.  

• We have been named to the “A+ Schools for B Students” listing,  positive evidence that supports  our contention that we help students to grow through  hands-on experience and faculty mentoring.  

Official rankings are wonderful.  They enhance our name recognition among prospective students and donors, and they help validate our work. 

As gratifying as these accolades are, we are perhaps even more grateful for the positive comments we hear from the people who know us best: our students, our alumni, and our community friends. 

What do you hear people say about Findlay that we should celebrate? 

Those comments speak to your strengths, and your strengths are many. 

Conclusion:  May this be a year of  learning for our students and for us.  May we make good use of the lessons of our past victories and challenges. May our students and we write, edit, and rewrite the story of this new year until our words, sentences, and paragraphs unfold in clear and distinct prose and reach toward poetry.  

Thank you.