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Goals for Excellence

Promoting the arts, other priorities will 'make a difference' for campus employees

The strategic plan will provide more cultural opportunities for the Duke community. Pictured the Duke jazz ensemble rehearses with director John Brown, left, and visiting artist saxaphonist Lou Donaldson.

Kim Burrucker isn't a runner, but she'll lace up her sneakers for a 13.1-mile race to support Duke Law School graduates pursuing careers in public service.

"I ran my last mile 30 years ago -- or so I'd thought," said Burrucker, 47, the law school's director of public interest and pro bono programs since 2002.

Burrucker is running in the Thunder Road Marathon in Charlotte on Dec. 9 to raise money for the law school's Loan Repayment Assistance Program (LRAP). The program provides financial support to graduates who accept jobs with public interest organizations.

"By choice, my hours are long," Burrucker said. "We have a lot of pro bono projects. I have to be selective when deciding which ones to oversee and which ones to become directly involved in. I enjoy helping the students and our community."

That a program, person or university can make a difference on campus and in the world is at the heart of Duke University's new strategic plan, "Making a Difference."

The Strategic Plan At A Glance

• Invests $1.3 billion over five to eight years in student needs, faculty, programming and facilities.

• States Duke University priorities, goals and themes for enhancing Duke's excellence while strengthening distinctive qualities.

• Focuses on enhancing education of students and extending Duke's contributions to society.

• Includes key expenditures of $248 million for academic programming; $350 million for Central Campus transformation and $551 million for facilities modernization.

The plan, approved by the Board of Trustees in September, builds on Duke's special strengths to chart a bold path, emphasizing the diversity of the Duke community and its ties to Durham and the world. It places high priority on strategies connecting knowledge to real-world challenges such as global health care, social justice and protecting the environment.

"We are fortunate at Duke to be part of a great university, with a unique opportunity to make a difference both at home and around the world," President Richard H. Brodhead said.

"Making a Difference" guides the university's priorities for the next five to eight years, investing $1.3 billion in student needs, faculty, programming and facilities. Of this, $350 million is slated for a revitalized Central Campus to include new programming and residential housing. An additional $551 million will modernize campus facilities and $248 million will be invested in academic programs.

"This is a very ambitious plan," Provost Peter Lange said. "It aspires to make Duke a really distinctive place that fosters new opportunities to shape positive societal change."

Lange, along with President Brodhead and Vice Provost for Academic Affairs John D. Simon, led the two-year, campus-wide effort to develop "Making a Difference." The plan outlines strategies to achieve goals grounded in Duke's core themes: interdisciplinarity, knowledge in the service of society, diversity, internationalization, affordability and access and the enduring importance of the humanities and interpretative social sciences.

 

A Positive Workplace

 

Duke is Durham's largest employer, and, according to the plan, Duke wants to continue to be among the most respected. The plan reaffirms Duke's close connections with Durham, home for slightly more than half of Duke's employees. It seeks to build upon the success of the Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership's collaborative programs with 12 neighborhoods and eight public schools near campus.

The plan notes Duke's responsibility to ensure that "working at Duke should be a positive experience, with employees treated fairly and encouraged to develop to the best of their abilities and talents."

"We are deliberate in our efforts to continue to make Duke a great place to work," said Executive Vice President Tallman Trask III, a close collaborator in the development of the strategic plan.

Trask said that about half of the university's annual expense is on its people -- $1.7 billion of $3.2 billion in 2005.

"Making a Difference" includes a new Faculty Enhancement Initiative to recruit diverse people committed to innovative forms of learning and teaching, and to connecting knowledge to real world issues.

"Most of the people who work at Duke want something compelling in their work and in their working environment, and this plan provides that," Lange said. "It's exciting to play a role in making a great university better, and we're counting on the contributions of every member of the Duke community to help us do that."

What does the strategic plan mean for you?

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Provost Peter Lange, left, piectured with vice provost John Simon, will lead an employee town hall on the strategic plan at noon, Thursday, Nov. 16, in the Griffith Film Theater, Bryan Center.

Lead and Innovate

 

Employees such as Reference Librarian Joline Ezzell will play a part in helping Duke successfully implement part of the plan.

Duke wants to lead and innovate in creating, managing and delivering scholarly resources for teaching and research. This will require Duke's libraries and information technology services to provide convenient and efficient access to information and support for innovation. The plan includes developing a new Central Campus library that supports the study of visual culture.

Ezzell joined Duke as a serials specialist in 1968, just before Perkins Library opened its doors. She worked out of what is now the Breedlove Room. Over the years, she has helped scores of faculty and students navigate library resources that have transformed from hand-marked card catalogues and thick research volumes to comprehensive electronic databases searchable at the click of a mouse.

For at least two hours a day, Ezzell answers questions at the reference desk in Perkins.

"There are so many more resources that I have to understand and be familiar with to help our students find what they need," Ezzell said. "But I really enjoy the challenge -- especially since I get to learn alongside faculty and students about all of the interesting research they are doing, but I never have to write a paper."

Among the strategic plan's priorities is investment in emerging technologies that improves collaborative learning and creates new opportunities to connect knowledge in the service of society.

Jess Mitchell is a special projects manager for the Duke Digital Initiative (DDI), a program supported by the Center for Instructional Technology and the Office of Institutional Technology (OIT) which built on its success two years ago in distributing iPods to first-year students as a way to spur classroom innovations.

Mitchell moves between schools and departments across campus, working behind the scenes with information technologists to ensure new technology initiatives are fully operational before they are turned over to their owners for more widespread implementation. Duke is involved in programs piloting the use of iPods and iTunesU to stimulate creative use of digital technology in class and campus life.

"It's exciting to be among the handful of universities in the world working closely with companies like Apple to develop emerging technologies," Mitchell said.

The Duke Digitial Initiative is about increasing options for more interactive teaching and learning, she said.

It also generates multiple opportunities for collaboration within departments and across disciplines at Duke and across the state, country and around the world, Mitchell said.

 

Modernizing Campus

 

The new strategic plan also calls for investments in the landscape of all three campuses through modernization and building projects, including the revitalization of Central Campus.

"It is clearly a priority for us," Trask said. "Revitalizing Central Campus is the most ambitious and most expensive project we'll pursue under the new plan."

The plan describes a new Central Campus that will integrate university activities and provide a signature for the arts and academics, along with residential space and a library for the study of visual culture. The university hopes to break ground on Central's revitalization within the year.

John Brown, assistant professor of the practice of music and director of the Duke Jazz Program, said he is encouraged that Duke has recognized the need for modernized and new arts buildings. Brown conducts the Duke Jazz Ensemble and the Duke Jazz Festival, coaches jazz combos and teaches academic courses.

"Our investment in new arts facilities will attract world-class performers to Duke as it strengthens our ties on and off campus," he said. "We want people in the Durham and area communities to want to come to Duke to experience the arts, and new facilities will help make that happen."

Jack Burgess, assistant director of maintenance services in Duke's Facilities Management Department (FMD), will play an important role in the revitalization of Central Campus.

Burgess, who joined Duke in 1974 and moved to FMD in 1989, leads a team of slightly more than 100 staff responsible for maintaining all of the university's buildings. He said he feels fortunate to be at Duke during this exciting time.

"The environment is consistently challenging, fast paced and growing," he said. "I have had a number of different assignments and responsibilities over the years. This has offered a chance to continually be challenged and learn new things."