Dear Colleagues,

The Restructure Taskforce met on July 14th. We discussed comparator/competitor institutions used to inform the number and types of primary academic units in the Taskforce’s eventual restructure recommendation. This was followed by a discussion on the metrics/rubrics/lenses to be used for evaluation of draft restructure models. Taskforce members recognized various elements important to strategy that WOU might utilize, such as the role of serving Hispanic students, ensuring program synergy and collaboration, and reassessing TT and NTT faculty per unit, to name a few. 

The steering committee prepared four draft restructure models, organizing academic units based on group discussions from the previous meetings. Individual Taskforce members selected one of the four models based on their perceived strengths and small work groups were formed. Each group reviewed and revised the draft models and briefly presented those to the taskforce as a whole.  

We established an agenda for our next meeting (on July 27th), when we will begin to evaluate the models by the agreed upon metrics. Thus, evaluation of any draft model moving forward will be done using quantitative and qualitative raw data to check actual distribution of resources and synergies for each lasting model. 

The Communication Subcommittee also reported on the content of the survey responses from the WOU community to date.

Please take a moment to share your questions, concerns, and/or suggestions with the Taskforce. We welcome and value your input, which will be most helpful in the next few weeks as we endeavor to narrow the range of possible structures to a short list that can be examined in light of our institutional goals, academic programs, staffing and resources. We’re grateful for your input on this important endeavor.