STRATEGIC PLANNING NEWSLETTER #2

November 10, 1994

Dear fellow faculty and staff:

     On behalf of the Strategic Planning Committee, I would like
to bring you up to date on our activities during the fall.  

     The primary news is that at its meeting last Friday (Nov. 4)
the Board of Visitors voted to adopt the Strategic Planning
Committee's revision of the Institutional Mission Statement.  
I have included at the end of this newsletter a copy of the
revised Mission Statement, but I would like to mention as well
the reasons for the changes that were made and the procedure that
was followed in adopting the revisions.

     Let me emphasize first that the mission of The Citadel has
not changed.  The revisions in the Mission Statement are intended
to make the statement more precise and to comply with
recommendations made in the past year by CHE and SACS. 
Paragraphs 2 and 3, for instance, answer CHE's mandate that the
mission statement of each state-assisted college and university
must reflect the primary service areas and any planned enrollment
caps for its undergraduate programs as well as a commitment to
serving South Carolina students.  According to CHE, the mission
statement should also describe the nature of the degree programs
offered by the College. 

     The changes in paragraph 1 and the addition of paragraph 2
are in response to the recommendation made by SACS that The
Citadel's mission statement must clarify the relationship between
the Corps of Cadets and the College of Graduate and Professional
Studies.  The last paragraph answers SACS's demand that the
statement also describe the roles of Research and Public Service
for the College in general and the faculty in particular.  Both
of these matters were found by the SACS Reaffirmation Team to be
less than clearly defined in our documentation and less than well
understood by the members of the faculty and staff they
interviewed.  It is the hope of the Strategic Planning Committee
that this revision of the Mission Statement will clarify both
issues.
     
      The other major change you will notice is that goals in the
previous Mission Statement that seemed vague or difficult to
assess were either eliminated or made more precise.  

     The Strategic Planning Steering Committee, chaired by me and
comprised of General Poole, Deans Metts, Reilly, Gordon, and
Gaskins, Vice-President Lyons, and Professors Askins, Ezell,
Carter, Ozment, Moreland, and Nichols, worked on this document
throughout the summer.  Its completed draft was then submitted to
General Watts.  After suggesting several minor changes, which the
Steering Committee agreed with, he accepted it and the new draft
was forwarded to the Academic Affairs Committee of the Board of
Visitors, which voted unanimously to recommend its adoption to
the full Board.  

     I mention all this to emphasize the involvement of the
faculty, through the Strategic Planning Committee, in every step
of the revision and acceptance of this Mission Statement.  I hope
you will agree that it is an improved version.

     Finally, I would like to remind the faculty that the faculty
meeting on December 8 will be focusing on Strategic Planning.  At
that meeting I will describe in detail the activities this fall
of the particular Task Forces and our intentions for the Winter
Term.  Time will also be reserved to answer any questions you
might have about the Strategic Planning process.  If you have
other suggestions for the agenda of that meeting, please let me
know. 
     
     Thank you.