The Oberlin Review
<< Front page Commentary March 4, 2005

Optimism guides strategic plan

At the time this issue went to press, Oberlin was still awaiting a vote from the General Faculty on the College’s strategic plan. However, it is probably a fairly safe prediction that the motion will pass overwhelmingly at today’s faculty meeting.

There is no cause for alarm in this development. The strategic plan is a collection of primarily sound and self-explanatory goals for Oberlin’s future. It also contains little in the way of specific suggestions about how the plan ought to be implemented. This paper remains cautiously optimistic about the provisions of the plan but increasingly concerned about how much of an effect it will actually have on administrative decisions in the future.

If current trends hold, it is likely that many decisions made by the College in the coming years will fall outside the scope of the plan or even contradict it entirely. This is an unfortunate but unavoidable result of the College’s budget difficulties.

Likewise, as politics professor Ron Kahn pointed out at Wednesday’s faculty meeting, “It is possible that once we start implementing this plan we may find that some things in it aren’t good ideas, in which case we won’t do them.”

Thus it is nearly impossible to judge this plan prior to its implementation. It is now the task of students, faculty and administrators to ensure that the noble intentions of this document are carried out.
 
 

   


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