By Judith Roberts
Representatives of the University of Louisiana System, including ULS President Rick Gallot, visited Louisiana Tech Tuesday as part of their One System One Mission tour to answer questions and share insights about their newly adopted strategic plan.
The four priorities of the strategic plan include operational efficiency and excellence, student access and success, research and talent development, and external affairs.
Gallot explained part of the need for these priorities was to place emphasis on public trust in higher education.
“We’re forced to really look in the mirror and ask, should students and parents and others feel confident that they should invest their time and resources into getting a college degree?” Gallot said. “There continue to be all these conversations around whether there is value in higher education, and, you’re all here – you know the value of higher education.
“There are a few people out there who still question it, and I think it’s important we not hide from the fact that there are these questions and that we confront them head on.”
Gallot said the ULS had received data from Lightcast, a labor and analytics company, which showed affordability, employability and relevance for ULS schools. Tech was shown to be relatively affordable in comparison to similar schools. Fifty-two percent of Tech students and 65 percent of ULS graduates overall stay in the region after graduation.
Seventy-five percent of ULS TOPS recipients and 52 percent of Tech TOPS recipients stay in the state and region, respectively, after graduation. In regards to economic mobility for PELL recipients, PELL graduates in the ULS earn $60,000 to $82,000, and Tech PELL recipients earn $69,000 to $91,000 after graduation.
In addition to this information, the ULS brought in university presidents, faculty, staff, students, external industry, community partners and more to collaborate in creating the strategic plan.
Rich Vath, Director of Policy and External Affairs at the ULS, then spoke on Priority 1, operational efficiency and excellence, saying the goal for this priority is to look for opportunities to improve the efficient way to deliver services.
“We don’t want to lose sight of the important vendor relationships that each of our institutions have in their local communities,” Vath said. “We want to make sure that, as we explore potential cost-saving opportunities, we’re not suddenly shifting or shipping all of our purchasing to Amazon.
“Instead, we want to make sure that we have a nice balance of investing and supporting businesses in our local communities but also looking forward, when possible, to creating those economies of scale.”
Vath also addressed the last priority of external affairs, which includes sharing the universities’ stories of success.
“Telling those stories in better more frequent, more creative ways, is going to be really essential,” he said. “All of us need to engage more deeply to continue to tell the powerful story, because we know that our institutions are pillars of the communities that they serve.”
Katie Dawson, Associate Vice President for Enrollment, Innovation, and Talent Strategy in the ULS, spoke about engaging college students at any age and stage of life.
“(Student success priority) focuses on those students that we love and want to serve, specifically creating more opportunities for them to engage,” Dawson said. “We want to think around pathways, so not just your traditional students for graduating from high school and moving on to college but thinking about those students who made would be started at a community college and are looking to transfer… This is our effort to bring higher education back to lifelong learning. It’s not a transactional thing.”
Jeannine O’Rourke, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs at the ULS, said she will be meeting with many faculty and staff soon to improve research and to help share that work with others.
“We are working to enhance intellectual property and creation, to increase the number of patents and IPs and licensures and also work with our industry partners to really cultivate and innovate for the future,” O’Rourke said. “Things are moving fast and especially in the area of technology. We want to contribute, not only keep up (but to) ensure that we are enhancing the region that we serve, the state, and of course, the nation.”
Tech President Jim Henderson was able to speak on the many ways Tech is already collaborating with ULS on the strategic plan, including implementing Workday, restorative justice efforts around conduct issues, the Radiance Microchip Manufacturing facility coming to Tech, the university’s new website and much more.
“We have work that’s already associated with this,” Henderson said. “All of these things that we’re doing fit neatly in these baskets that the System has developed as part of their strategic plan. And I think it’s an affirmation of the work being inclusive and getting the voices to the table.”
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