Strategic Goal #1: Academic Excellence

Academic excellence, the cornerstone of the university’s mission, begins with the faculty.  Eastern Kentucky University seeks to build on its strong foundations as a school of opportunity by enhancing opportunities for professional development and by strategically developing and growing programs to meet the needs of our students.  We are committed to achieving academic excellence by promoting innovative pedagogy and by investing in our faculty and our academic programs.

We will achieve academic excellence through recruiting, retaining, and supporting innovative faculty and through continuous assessment and strengthening of academic programs.

We will enhance our dynamic, diverse academic environment and ensure outstanding student learning outcomes by focusing on:  promoting innovative teaching and learning practices; engaging students with an increasing emphasis on active and service learning and research opportunities; supporting faculty growth and excellence; and strategically strengthening academic program expansion and development while emphasizing program excellence.

Strategic Initiatives

Invest in Our Faculty (1.1)

Strategies

• Enhance faculty professional development opportunities with a focus on developing skills and engaging students through high-impact learning strategies, including metacognition skills, teaching techniques, curriculum design, and providing customer-focused service to all. (1.1.1)
• Update promotion and tenure policies to reflect increased importance of engaging students, innovative teaching, advising, scholarship of teaching and learning, and support of our Region. (1.1.2)
• Increase opportunities for faculty scholarship, research and creative endeavors, and faculty-student collaborations. (1.1.3)
• Build academic leadership capacity among faculty. (1.1.4)
• Recruit and retain faculty who are highly qualified in their discipline and demonstrate excellence in teaching. (1.1.5)
• Design and implement a comprehensive recruitment and retention plan for diverse faculty. (1.1.6)

Promote Innovative Instruction and Programming (1.2)

Strategies

• Embed and support high-impact teaching strategies and best practices for student engagement to promote learning and increase retention. (1.2.1)
• Focus on involving students in decision-making, research, and creative activities with faculty, scholarship, service learning, international education, co-op, and internships. (1.2.2)
• Provide students the opportunity and support to participate in and receive recognition for research, creative, and academic endeavors. (1.2.3)
• Increase the quality and capacity of pedagogical and technological support. (1.2.4)

Strengthen Academic Programs (1.3)

Strategies

• Ensure relevance of all academic programs through ongoing curriculum development and program review. (1.3.1)
• Financially invest in and promote nationally recognized programs that attract students to EKU. (1.3.2)
• Identify, pursue, and promote opportunities for new high-quality, distinct, and compelling programs with capacity to grow enrollments. (1.3.3)
• Support and invest in opportunities for high-achieving students University-wide. (1.3.4)
• Increase capacity in existing programs identified as having high demand. (1.3.5)
• Invest in state-of-the-art, cutting-edge technology across all programs. (1.3.6)