Dye speaks about future planning

GF members informed about planning process for next fall

At Tuesday's General Faculty (GF) meeting, President Nancy Dye spoke at length about the College's plans to embark on a process that will result in the development of a strategic document which will inform future planning. The document, when finalized in early spring next year, will be distributed to the entire campus.

Dye said the document will be a priority statement, but "should not be ironing out every single wrinkle for the next 10 to 15 years."

"I've never seen plans as prescriptive blue prints that must be followed," Dye said.

Dye said the planning process, which will begin next September, will be future oriented, "not past or problem oriented." She said discussion about the direction of planning and the College's future will take place in small groups composed of trustees, faculty, students and staff. The small groups process, Dye said, will be "very grassroots." Elaine Kuttner, the College's planning consultant, will facilitate small group discussion.

"The conversation will not involve deans, senior administrators or me," Dye said. She said it is important for many different campus constituencies to be involved in discussion. "Custodians know an enormous amount," Dye explained.

Next year, an advisory team composed of administrators, students, possibly a couple trustees and other campus constituencies will oversee the planning process and identify the set of issues the planning process will address. The advisory team will "kick into gear" after first semester, Dye said, and develop the strategic questions to be focused on, issues that will be described in the document produced next year.

Dye said issues that interest her are those that are relevant to the relationship between the Conservatory and College and those that address how and why a residential community is set up.

She also said she wants to see future-oriented questions that address what students are going to need to take from an Oberlin education to live in a society that is both more diverse and global than in the past discussed. She said it is important to discuss whether Oberlin is basing its curriculum on disciplinary structures that are adequate. "If [they are not adequate] how might we think about changing them?" Dye asked.

Student life, Dye said, is also an important issue. She said Oberlin does not have many common spaces where all campus constituencies can come together. "How," Dye asked, "do we go about creating a community that celebrates difference and diversity, but also manages to have some commonality to it?"

"I'm very interested in Oberlin's mission," Dye said. "It seems to me that Oberlin has much to build on.

Kuttner met with students this semester to discuss the planning process. She also presented a strategic draft outlining a schedule of events for next year. The draft schedules future-oriented articles to be made available to everyone on campus, a "Future Symposium" where two or more individuals present different perspectives on Oberlin's future and the campus-wide discussion groups.

Kuttner called her draft an evolving draft and explained, "It literally is still evolving ... It evolves even more by what I hear."