On April 30, the Strategic Planning Committee voted to finalize the 2012-17 Strategic Plan.

The vote officially completes the first phase of the strategic planning process, which involved almost two years of Metro State community meetings, conferences and interviews , involving outreach to 1,700 people, to create the document that will drive the institution for the next five years.

This vote follows the Board of Trustees April 5 acceptance of the overall strategic plan. After the board’s vote, the committee took additional comments from the Metro State community on the operational part of the plan, incorporating many of those ideas into the final document.

“We can now remove the word ‘draft’,” said Cathy Lucas, associate to the president for marketing and communications, who along with Faculty Senate President Kamran Sahami chairs the Strategic Planning Committee. “We have a strategic plan!” Metro State President Stephen Jordan will be sending a letter to the campus community with the revised plan.

With the plan complete, the committee turned its attention to implementation phase, which involves educating Metro State’s constituents about how they can help bring the plan to life. Over the summer, a strategic planning subcommittee and Marketing and Communications will develop materials and a presentation about the plan that Strategic Planning Committee members will share with Metro State departments this fall. It will then be incumbent upon individual departments to use the plan as a roadmap in their own planning efforts.

The strategic plan isn’t prescriptive, Sahami said, rather it presents a vision, goals and objectives that will help Metro State move in the same direction. “Instead of 10 ideas, the strategic plan will help you focus on the three or four ideas that will move the institution forward.”