A Tale of Two Tasks Forces at IU Kokomo

In light of Liz's insightful comments to the last post (on Facebook), I'll offer a better description of what the faculty is doing to pull its weight. Liz proposed forming a task force, and that's what has happened.

There are two task forces that are basically answering the same questions. The first was formed in the School of Arts and Sciences (SOAS) under the leadership of Dr. Sue Giesecke, the dean of this school. A group of about 30 of us faculty members have been meeting throughout the academic year to find creative ways to take our school to the next level. We've been studying the basic themes of the popular business book, Good to Great, and exploring ways to create a higher degree of excellence at IU Kokomo. Tiffany's negative experience in the campus bookstore should be a rare oddity, but it probably isn't at present. :) Although we have met a couple of times as a larger group, most recently on December 8, most of our work has been carried out in five smaller brainstorming groups. There is great potential to get things done with the SOAS, which is the largest of the schools on our campus, and by extension, there is potential to influence the rest of the university as well. At the end of the last meeting, Dr. Giesecke asked for volunteers to join a leadership team that will take the SOAS to the next level. Yours truly was one of the two who has accepted the call, and I'll be working with Sue and any others who volunteer to do what we can to take some major steps toward making our school great. So, that's the first task force.

The second task force was called by Chancellor Ruth Person and was a more direct response to the budget shortfall that hit us this year when enrollment took a hit. I'm also a member of this task force, and I've been assigned to work on a committee that is brainstorming ways to promote our institution to its key publics. This committee is more short term in nature. Our final reports are due Feb. 15, and after that, I guess we'll exist no more. This task force is oriented toward developing broader goals and leaving the details to someone else. For example, ideas to promote IU Kokomo via facebook, or student blogs, or K-GOV channel 2 have been dismissed as being too specific. This group does not promote a "rubber meets the road" discussion, but seeks to strategize at a broader level.

In the end, it will be interesting to see which group does the best job of bringing about the type of organizational change that results in IU Kokomo having more students and offering a better educational product. On the one hand, the chancellor's group includes all of the key administrators who hold the legitimate power to get things done. On the other hand, the SOAS committee is composed entirely of tenured or tenure-track faculty members who have the most contact with our students. Perhaps the SOAS group should focus more on retaining the students we have through offering the best educational product possible while the chancellor's group should focus more on recruiting students to IU Kokomo from withing the 11 county area that is our market.

Personally, I expect to have far greater influence through the grass-roots orientation of the SOAS group which aggressively seeks my input and involvement than I'll have in the other group, which is far more top-down in focus. I'll keep you posted.

One last thought--shouldn't there be some students involved in this process, at least in terms of offering input? Seems obvious to me.

Your man on the inside,

Raul