Learning, one of the core values of our university, takes place in classrooms, laboratories and libraries. It also occurs in residence halls, student organizations, intramural teams, support groups, volunteer experiences and service work. The Division of Student Affairs offers these opportunities and many more, striving every day to develop culture of excellence that supports individual students and staff in learning and personal and professional development. Today, we are releasing our second annual Impact Report which illustrates the ways our four “Elements of Excellence” (Partner, Participate, Progress and Purpose) guide the work of our Division.
Take a look at this compilation showcasing some of the many ways our Division has developed a collective habit of excellence and done superior work during the 2014-2015 academic year. The report highlights some of the people, the facts and the faces behind the programs, services and facilities across our nine departments.
To reiterate some of what I said at our Division-wide meetings a few weeks ago, our Strategic Plan has multiple goals with outcomes and action steps in support of those goals. Defining a culture of excellence was one of the many action steps we committed to in our Strategic Plan.
However, it is important to remember that those four Elements of Excellence are our attempt to define the ways in which we are working on the other action steps. The Elements of Excellence are designed to guide us so that the work we do on each action step, toward each strategic goal is of a uniformly high quality.
We are challenging ourselves to be excellent in each thing we do. The Elements of Excellence don’t replace the Strategic Plan, they define the ways we work toward its completion AND they set standards we endeavor to reach.
I think you will agree that this year’s Impact Report shows that we are making great strides. We are living our mission, reaching for our vision and working on our Strategic Plan. We are doing it all within our culture of excellence.
I am proud to be able to share this Impact Report with you. I am proud to be able to share this Impact Report with colleagues across campus and across the country. I hope you will be just as proud to see and share your work – and that of your colleagues.
Keep up the great work!
Gage
P.S. I would love to hear from you if you have had (or scheduled) lunch to be in conversation with your partner from the Division-wide meeting or anyone else. If you have talked with someone and asked them the five questions we used at the Division-wide meeting, I’d really like to hear how it went. Please feel free to email me at vpsa@austin.utexas.edu. Keep listening everyone!