Department of Biological Sciences Strategic plan 2010-2014

The Department of Biological Sciences aims to become a destination for world-class scholars and a flagship for the life sciences on this campus and across our state. We envision increasing opportunities for our departmental mission to impact society: the grand challenges of human health, energy supply and conservation of our environment can be tackled with solutions rooted in biological research.

Our previous strategic plan focused on hiring priorities to position the Department for outstanding research. This hiring plan has been successful, changing the demographics of Biological Sciences with an infusion of young and energetic talent. We aim to capitalize on this success with a new strategic plan that is congruous with the goals of the University’s New Synergies plan, and the College’s Insight, Innovation, Impact plan. It is at the Department level that “the rubber hits the road” in creating synergistic research teams, superb learning environments, and successful engagement initiatives on campus. To this end, our strategic plan is constructed as a roadmap – we describe our goals, strategies and metrics, with suggested routes and the first steps that we have taken or will take to advance toward our goals.

All departmental constituencies – faculty, staff, undergraduate, graduate and post-docs – contributed to defining our goals and strategies. An analysis of metrics will be shared annually with our Alumni Advisory Committee, the College of Science and with the faculty. A newly constituted executive team will determine mid-course corrections as needed. (View: Department of Biological Sciences Strategic Plan 2010-2014)