The College of Arts & Sciences presented a report on its 10-year strategic plan to the Board of Trustees as part of Chancellor Mark Wrighton’s “Plan for Excellence.”

The plan, announced by Wrighton in 2006, is a 10-year strategic initiative involving every school at the University.

Each of the seven schools is formulating a strategic plan with the help of faculty and alumni.

In addition to this program, a separate infrastructure initiative will take place and focus on improving campus spaces like dorms and classrooms.

In Arts & Sciences, which includes an undergraduate program, graduate program and night school, the plan focuses on improving graduate education, undergraduate opportunities, leadership and service and faculty.

Most input from the plan came from the Arts & Sciences National Council, the Academic Planning Committee, the chairs and directors of the University and other members of the faculty.

The national council is mostly composed of alumni that act as advisors to deans.

“The national council has the scope of graduates, and they can really provide a bigger picture view,” said Shelley Milligan, assistant dean of Arts & Sciences.

The academic planning committee is made up of 10 faculty members who work with Jim McLeod, dean of Arts & Sciences, on retreats throughout the year.

For student input, the plan was brought before the Arts & Sciences Undergraduate Council; the president of the Student Council was present at the meetings of the National Council.

Some students feel as though the curriculum is the biggest area of concern for the University.

“If I could change the curriculum, I would try and make the required core curriculum a little more humanities based,” said freshman Allison Block. “I would also rearrange the cluster system because I think it’s tedious. I feel like it’s so constricting like in its rules that it negates its purpose.”

In 1995, a similar overhaul occurred, according to Milligan.

“The last strategic plan was a great success, University wide. On the undergraduate side, this is where we saw a huge explosion in the number of applications to the school and the ability to be more competitive, and the quality of students has skyrocketed,” said Milligan. “We’d like to turn more attention and focus to the graduate program the way we did last time-some things involve building endowment, but also being able to recruit the best students for graduate degrees.”

The implementation of the Plan for Excellence does not include drastic changes to the curriculum but instead focuses on an overall review of the academics in general.

The faculty facet of the plan focuses on bringing the number of tenured faculty from 375 to 425. With this change the University hopes it will make itself more competitive with its peer institutions.

Among peer institutions, Northwestern University has 395 tenured professors and Johns Hopkins University has 269 tenured professors.

In terms of campus life, the University’s main goal is to “create a unified college,” including a more developed liberal arts core.

“I wish I could have had a say in the development of the curriculum,” said freshman Megan Goldsmith. “I would want to participate more in the form of surveys, meetings and other things like that.”

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