TO: University Libraries Strategic Planning Steering Committee

FROM: Jennifer Younger

RE: Deans meeting, June 24, 2002

DATE: July 5, 2002

I reported at the Committee’s meeting on the meeting highlights. In the following report on the deans meeting, I have also included comments of my own, beyond what was said at the meeting, in regard to the library planning process.

Nathan introduced the discussion with comments taken from what he has previously written about teaching and research at Notre Dame, particularly about the concept of “signature areas,” and observations on where the academic enterprise was and was not successful in the last campaign. There was clear success in endowing library collections and chairs, but not much as much success in endowing programs. Our challenge is to think creatively about further progress, e.g., what about seeking endowments for entire programs or departments?

Discussion flowed to a central concern. Should ND’s approach be a pursuit of overall excellence in the academic enterprise, or pursuit of outstanding excellence in signature areas? If the latter, is it possible to make the kind of hard choices that would be necessary to seek outstanding excellence in only selected areas? Within the colleges, this also includes consideration of whether to pursue moving all departments from mid-level to the top quartile of department rankings, or of moving some from top to best in the NRC rankings. The individual department ratings are found in the Preliminary Report from the Committee on Research. (Note: this page was already distributed to all library faculty. You can find the complete report on the University site or the library strategic planning site.) Although that data is almost ten years old, it is the most current data available on NRC department rankings. Nathan also mentioned there are new buildings and renovation already “on the plate” for this capital campaign and they will have to take precedence in fund raising priorities. He mentioned new buildings in regard to engineering and law as well as library renovation, not a complete list, just highlights. The specific address for the web site on university strategic planning is http://www.nd.edu/~stratgic/

Another question was “whose strategic plan is this - departments or colleges?” And, how do these fit into Notre Dame as a whole? Nathan pointed to a strategic planning process driven by deans with faculty input, and with the end result endorsed by department faculty. In my thinking about the library process and plan, all of us on the Strategic Planning Steering Committee are involved in identifying strategic directions, aspirations and strategies, based on our ideas as well as the input from others in the library and on campus. And that for the University Libraries, the Strategic Planning Steering Committee will create a strategic plan of directions, aspirations and strategies that will be endorsed and supported by library faculty and staff. This will happen really in three stages: a preliminary plan by August 15,2002; a “final” plan by October 15, 2002, and a continuing plan that changes over time to reflect new and evolving library programs and services as well as department and committee aspirations and strategies. On a practical note, I think a small editorial group of our larger Committee could write our plan (based on our July discussions) and that I will write the report to the University identifying themes, needs and priorities, again informed by our July discussions.

John Jenkins reported on the work of the University Curriculum Review Committee, which is reporting to the Academic Council. The Committee’s work is not really a part of this strategic planning process and is on a different timetable. In 01/02, the Committee decided to focus its work in three areas and divided into three sub-committees to work on proposals arising in these areas. These are: 1) Science/Math/Technology, 2) Enhancing Education in Ethics, and 3) Rationale for University Requirements/Standing Curricular Committee/Undergraduate Research Opportunities. Each has several issues for consideration. Even though not part of strategic planning per se, I will distributed John Jenkin’s written report (two pages) to this group as well as to all library faculty. The Committee had earlier identified general curricular goals for undergraduate education at ND, which included in its emphasis the need for students to gain skills in finding, using and evaluating information as part of their education. Joni Kanzler, Marsha Stevenson (and others) identified specific input they wished to send on behalf of the University Libraries to the Committee. Joni is currently compiling 1) a summary of student observations about library user education and 2) a list of “best practices” where librarians and teaching faculty have collaborated in integrating library user education into the course.

Mark Roche reported that in A&L, more space will be a high priority. He/the college is encouraging undergraduate research. Other themes emerging from the individual department reports (URL already sent to all library faculty at Mark’s request) identify a need for library resources, graduate stipends, and publicity about college programs.

Joe Marino, new science dean, was unable to attend. Patti O’Hara reported that the Law School recently completed its self study and is just beginning to think about this strategic planning process. They have examined strategic plans of the top twenty law schools and universities and observed that with the exceptions of Chicago and New York University, these law schools are focused on overall excellence and academic reputation rather than on specific named strengths. Thus, this might be their recommendation for the Notre Dame Law School, and if so, she raised the question of how this would fit with the approach of the University? For library planning, Roger Jacobs and the Kresge Law Library will work more directly than will we with the Law School.

Carolyn Woo stated that programs in the College of Business are multi-disciplinary, and thus the strategic plan is very much a college plan. She identified several issues, including college size, faculty research, the college portfolio and research infrastructure. COB is the wrong size, but they are looking toward minor, not major expansion to reach the right size. College rankings have gone up on faculty research but they cannot sustain their progress without doing something about college size and increased support for faculty research, such as a reduction in teaching load and/or a Ph.D. program. They are asking themselves what the portfolio should be. Should they add a business minor for undergraduates? Should they give up the MBA so as to strengthen their impact in other programs? The ND program is very small - 130 students - In comparison with programs such as Harvard - 1,000 students. The College is aware of both the recognition and revenue generation brought by the MBA program to the University, and that giving up this program would be a hard sell to the University. She also mentioned the critical need for databases and technology support for research in COB and that if recommended, a Ph.D. program would be an interdisciplinary approach in the College.

Frank Incropera distributed a status report for the College of Engineering, of which a copy is being sent to this committee and Carol Szambelan. He is committed to “staying the course” and fully exploiting resources of the new Learning Center. Overall, for research and academic reputation, he identified goals for becoming an international leader in research for strategically targeted areas, increasing external support for research, increasing graduate student population and PhD production, increasing undergraduate participation in research, and obtaining at least a top quartile ranking for the College and all its departments, and a top-20 ranking for two, including Chemical Engineering with a name change to Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. Also, he sees a strong program in information technologies
as essential to the College’s future, and believes there should be an exploration of the merits of combining the Electrical Engineering Department with the Computer Science and Engineering Dept. in the future. He names critical research areas in the department and center areas with four overarching themes: information sciences/technology (IST), environment, materials, and biotechnology. He identifies resource needs for space, endowments for super chairs and faculty, Learning Center staff and equipment, materials characterization facility staff and equipment, as well as infrastructure needs for centers.

Frank Incropera did not identify information resources as among the specific needs, an omission which I believe happens not because the Engineering dean and faculty don’t use or rely on information resources, but for other reasons. One might be that many though not all of the information resource needs are currently being met either through library subscriptions or document delivery. Carol Szambelan can help us on that one. Second, the preference is for access to online information resources and such use is accompanied by the idea that such online information resources are somehow “there, accessible via the Web,” but such resources are not thought of as part of the library collections for which funds are always in short supply. Or, more simply, from the dean’s perspective, that space is seen as the most critical need for furthering engineering education and research at ND, which would not surprise me given the strong statements about the need for academic space from the Committee on Research. That committee included an engineering professor and one from sciences, both of whom spoke to the absolutely urgent need for research space. Frank’s very full report was the end of the college reports and no time was left for questions, so I will talk with Frank more next week about information resources.

At the end of the reports from the deans, Jeff Kantor, Eileen Kolman and I each had a few minutes time. Jeff mentioned six strategic objectives for the Graduate School and Office of Research, including more student stipends, better health insurance and more office space for the graduate programs; building scale into the research enterprise, and a greater emphasis on Notre Dame activities in disseminating scholarship. Jeff has identified in other conversations multiple players in scholarly dissemination, including ND faculty, journals, web publications, the University Press and the University Libraries. I have requested his notes and when received, will distribute them to the Committee. However, please note we already have the preliminary report from the Committee on Research, which Jeff chaired, and which forms the basis for his strategic objectives regarding research at ND. Eileen suggested the entire First Year Studies would be a good program for an endowment. It is central to the undergraduate experience and would provide a significantly greater impact than simply endowing the dean’s position.

I was last in the reporting line, which started with a college dean and then went counter clockwise around the room. I made several points about the nature of our strategic plan. First, that it will be a library-wide plan. That, even though we are consulting broadly across academic units, we expect our plan may well be changed between August and October as we look more fully at the college, center and institute plans. Last, that our plan will also identify areas where library directions and aspirations reflect library-driven programs, services and initiatives. We are both followers and leaders of campus initiatives.

I mentioned that one of our most pressing jobs is analyzing the knowledge and information needs of new or expanding programs, which could be in any discipline or subject, for teaching or research, and what kinds of support, e.g., staff, collections, or space, is needed by the library for support of these academic programs. For us, this includes addressing many complex and connected questions on how best to supply individual academic programs with information and knowledge resources and services. There is a continuum that runs from buying or licensing all information resources needed for any particular subject area, e.g., building a comprehensive collection, or buying or licensing only basic information resources needed for any particular subject area, e.g., developing a collection in support of only basic or curricular information needs, and obtaining specific. information resources on request. We have very good, web-accessible collection development policies in place. These policies sometimes include statements of how other collections and interlibrary loan fit into the overall plan for supporting ND curricular and research programs, that is, for meeting the information needs of students and faculty that are, by policy, not met by onsite library collections and subscriptions to online resources, and it is this latter topic - meeting information needs - that might benefit from further articulation.