Chapter 7: Planning and Governance
Hampshire College Constitution (1998)
Hampshire College Strategic Planning (2000)
Sustainable Campus Plan (2001)
Hampshire College Long Range Plan (2002)
The Hampshire College Constitution, 1998
Note: The text of the 1998 Hampshire College Constitution is available on the archives web site. Click here to access a pdf copy.
"New Constitution Expected To Clarify Lines Of Authority," by Gillian Andrews. The Forward, v.3(5):1,4, Mar. 5, 1998.
Years of debate came to an end last Friday as Hampshire's Board of Trustees approved a new constitution for the college. The constitution is hailed as much clearer and more up-to-date in its description of how authority is shared between administrators and governance bodies such as Community Council and school meetings. The new constitution will take effect July 1 of this year.
"It was an issue of good governance," said Hampshire trustee Diane Bell of the new constitution's passage. Hampshire has operated for many years under its first constitution, a document which did not account for many offices and positions that now exist, includng the dean of student affairs.
Recent re-evaluations of campus governance, including the one undertaken by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges, have made it clear to Hampshire that its lines of jurisdiction need to be far more clearly drawn In order for the institution to stay viable.
Both the faculty and Community Council needed to endorse the constitution in order for it to be ratified. The faculty did so on February 4, having added a clause that gave the faculty the power to elect the dean of faculty. Roughly 35 faculty attended the meeting. Though this is only half of the number eligible to vote, it was an "average turnout," according to faculty trustee Steven Weisler. Community Council endorsed the constitution on February 17 after two weeks of deliberation. Some Community Council members were upset by the sudden appearance of the move to ratify the constitution on Council's agenda, feeling they were unprepared to make such
a substantial move.
Three more notable amendments were passed by Council before endorsement. The first two were proposed by Council member and CCS professor David Kerr. One amendment removed a section which gave the president of the college oversight of Community Council in language that Kerr called "paternalistic" and "discriminatory." The other separated the Norms for Community Living section at the end of the constitution out into a separate Bill of Rights. The third established a job description for the dean of student affairs, much in the same way that the faculty had defined the dean of faculty position.
Once ratified by Council and the faculty, the constitution passed into the hands of a joint meeting of the Educational Policy Committee of the trustees and the Campus Life committee which met last Thursday. Those present at the meeting--Bob Sanborn, e. frances White, trustee Bell, student trustee Barbara Reyes, and Weisler-- refined the constitution for presentation to the trustees.
Concerned students had an opportunity to bring their concerns about the constitution to the trustees at their dinner last Thursday. Council member Benjie Messer brought two concerns. He first asked the trustees to consider that Community Council had not been prepared for the appearance of a ratifiable constitution on their agenda. "I thought...they would think that we'd read over all of it and approved it, and of course we didn't have time to do that," explained Messer. "What we did was make a couple amendments and pass it on." Messer's second concern was that the trustees take into account amendments that had been introduced but not voted upon in the last Community Council meeting. "[Council] still had an amendment or two that we'd presented that we didn't have time to get to," Messer pointed out, "and I hoped we'd have time to change it in the future."
In ratifying the constitution, the trustees eliminated the amendment that made the dean of faculty a faculty-elected position, reinstated the clause that gave the president oversight of Community Council, and returned the Norms of Community Living to its spot at the end of the constitution. However, they left the amendment describing the dean of student affairs essentially intact.
The trustees stipulated in their motion to pass the constitution that they were "adopting the constitution with the understanding that future discussions take place regarding the faculty recommendation that the dean of faculty be elected by the faculty and the Community Council recommendation concerning the dean of student affairs and the Norms of Community Living."
Messer is satisfied that these issues will be addressed. "I think if [discussion] happens that's the best thing that could really happen," Messer said, "because it's good to get [the constitution] passed right away, and it's good to get everything dealt with."
Community Council member Evan Brandes is also pleased with the trustees' response to student-introduced sections. "I think they took us seriously, finally," Brandes said. "They're seeing that we're trying to build a legacy."
The dismissal of the faculty-elected dean of faculty clause has David Kerr unhappy, however. "I'm disappointed in the administrators for not arguing for the faculty-voted dean of faculty," Kerr said, "despite their own personal views. I'm disappointed in the trustees...for not honoring the faculty's wish to have a dean of faculty rather than an administration-selected dean for faculty."
Steven Weisler said he thinks the rejection of the faculty-elected deanship will be "very controversial" among the faculty. Yet he does not see the constitution's ratification as the end of the line. "I think the important signal the trustees were sending was despite the fact that it wasn't possible to incorporate that amendment," Weisler said, "...[they] are willing to discuss this issue...without the pressures of time." Weisler said he hopes faculty who find this issue important will participate in further discussion.
Bell protested that the dean election clause "came to [the trustees] very late in the process--" too late to take time to refine the clause to the trustees' satisfaction. "We needed to pass the constitution in order to be in good standing," Bell explained. "The procedures are now there for amendment."
Despite reservations, the mood following the constitution's passage Is one of relief. Speaking to Council members at the meeting where that body endorsed a draft of the constitution, Kerr said, "We have done what many Community Councils have not been able to do. Congratulations." "There's a lot about this Constitution that I don't like," Kerr said. "but I think it's as good as we're gonna get...This has gone through so many hands and heads...(that,) as ragged as it is, it represents the college."
Diane Bell says she sees the clarification of the constitution as giving the college an opportunity to "focus on substantive issues" rather than "murky issues of jurisdiction."
"This is the best of the democratic tradition," Bell says. "We now have a constitution which...has clear lines of authority."
"We're looking forward to the newly constituted Community Council," Bell said, "because this constitution gives them a great deal of opportunity to be part of the governance of a college." This opportunity, she says, is "quite unique."
Barbara Reyes, whose job as student trustee is to act as a liaison between students and the Board, emphasizes that student and Council participation in the continuing discussions about constitutional changes is important. The trustees' acceptance of the constitutional definition of the Dean of Student Affairs' role, Reyes said, is an acknowledgement that "students need to have this [definition]...so they can see the relationship between Community Council and Student Affairs." As written, the definition gives some power over the job to Community Council--more than the current dean of student affairs wanted them to have.
The trustees hope that Council will show the same initiative in seeking out discussion about the terms of the dean of student affairs amendment as they did in passing it, according to Reyes. "This has to be spearheaded by Community Council," Reyes insisted.
Hampshire College Strategic Planning, 2000
Hampshire College's Strategic Planning
[Aug. 30, 2000]
I. Introduction
AdCom met for two and one half days, June 28 through June 30, in order to begin a yearlong, college-wide process to draft a strategic long-range plan for the college. The process will involve faculty, staff, students, alumni/ae, trustees, and key friends of the college, and will adhere to rigorous schedule. The purpose of the plan is to provide the college with a framework for the decision-making and budgeting that will ensure its capacity to fulfill its mission, to clarify what "outcomes" the college expects of itself and its graduates. The analysis necessary to develop the strategic plan will consist of three component parts: input, transformation and output. AdCom's June meeting constituted a first pass at information gathering and the articulation of critical questions and issues... (p.1)
II. Preparing to Plan: Historic Overview/Hampshire Today, AdCom's Perspective
Aaron Berman and Steve Weisler gave an overview of the founding vision of the academic program. Hampshire, said Aaron, was designed in one age, and opened its doors in another. Initially, the college was envisioned to serve an "elite" student body, similar to that of Amherst College, and the program would emphasize "learning how to learn." The education would be cost-effective (20:1 student-faculty ratio), and would not be based on traditional academic departments--the curriculum would be interdisciplinary. The founding vision did not frame what should be taught; however, by the time the college opened in 1970, and the country was deep into the war in Vietnam, the original faculty and students challenged the traditional canon. Steve added the critique that the contemporary program has strayed from the strict interdisciplinary design of the founders' vision, so that interdisciplinary work is an option but not a requirement today.
Mike Ford then spoke about student life, originally envisioned as built around their academic work, which would be collaborative with students and faculty. This was imagined to be a very intense experience, so that individual student rooms were designed to be just that--individual. Social life would revolve around "houses," overseen by faculty masters (the Harvard/Yale model), and therefore be highly decentralized. The ideal of this plan was never realized, and within the first 10 years of the college, much student life activity had been centralized. The architecture designed to realize the founding vision has confounded the present reality of centralized student services and activities and the greatly diminished role of faculty in the extracurricular life of students.
The library, said Gai [Carpenter], was to be the center of information, including not only traditional library resources, but also the post office, the switchboard, and computing services. The founders were prescient in their planning for the integration of information and technology, particularly in their assumption that all students would have access to computers in their rooms, although this assumption rested on access to local databases, not the Internet. Some parts, though, of the founding vision have not persisted: students no longer regard the library as the first stop for information, but would like to make greater use of the library as a study area, rather than remaining in their rooms to study. Videotaping has not become a significant force in teaching, as the founders thought in assuming the 20:1 S/F ratio, nor has the original administrative structure--to address this latter issue, "school librarians" were invented.
The founding vision of the physical environment, said Larry [Archey], was to create a "little city" of residential units surrounding the academic core of the campus. This "little city" would be pedestrian friendly, would contain no high structures, and be landscaped to preserve its rural charm. Buildings would be efficient, built to serve multiple purposes and multiple disciplines. The founders did not plan for the long-term growth of the college. Master plans undertaken in the early '80s and early '90s both concluded that quality and maintenance both required upgrading. This conclusion is even more true today.
Reviewing financial premises, Johan [Brongers] discussed the founders' goal of providing a first-rate liberal arts education at a minimum cost per students, charging tuition comparable to other high quality liberal arts colleges. They also assumed that tuition revenues alone would fund the college, and that there would be little, if any, fund raising. Scholarship funds would be available to those very few students requiring them, but financial aid was not envisioned as a significant portion of the budget. Cost efficiencies would be achieved through a 20:1 student-faculty ratio, a young, non-tenured faculty, strong ties to the other colleges, multiple use facilities, and no costly team sports. With the exception of continued participation in the Five Colleges and lack of an expensive athletic program, virtually none of the founders' ideas have persisted: tuition is at the very top of the national list; nearly 25 percent of the budget is dedicated to financial aid; the faculty is aging in place, and the student-faculty ratio goes back and forth between 11:1 and 12:1. To these financial concerns, there are deferred maintenance costs, over-reliance on tuition revenue growth, and pressures to maintain competitive salaries and scholarships.
The founders envisioned admitting students from the intellectual/academic "elite": they would be men and women; there would [be] representatives from all economic strata; there would be a racial mix. Students would arrive at Hampshire with solid preparation for rigorous academic work and capable of an exceptionally high degree of independent work. Hampshire today, says Karen [Parker], more or less lives up to this ideal, although the student body is more diverse in every way than the founders' imagined, and the college is committed to making it even more diverse, a goal with programmatic and fiscal implications. Competition in the market place has changed dramatically since 1970, and admissions today faces new challenges, among them the emphasis on "consumerism," a pool of students with widely divergent preparations for academic work, an image shaped by alums and the past rather than current reality.
Maddie Marquez, Roy Bunce, Elaine Thomas, Nancy Kelly, and Gregory Prince reported on topics not covered in the founding documents. Maddie talked about diversity, a stated goal of the college. She pointed out that "diversity" means many things--diversity of opinion, beliefs, and values, as well as racial, ethnic, and economic diversity--but that what drives parents seeking to educate their children are two concerns, a "brand-name" education and the assurance of a post-college "good job." She noted that Hampshire today tends to elevate the individual at the (sometimes) expense of the group or community.
Roy said that building endowment, contrary to the founding vision, was one of the keys to the continued health of the college. He emphasized that right now was an important moment for the college--the first wave of alums is turning 50, a time when people begin to think about significant charitable gifts; he also pointed out that within the next decade there would be a generational transfer of wealth the likes of which the country has never seen. He concluded by noting that donors give to successful enterprises, not needy ones.
Elaine gave an overview of external perceptions about higher education and Hampshire's media profile...The college's media challenges are residual stereotypes from its largely imagined hippie past, the modest communications budget, and the general lack of public understanding about higher education. Its advantages are its image as an innovative, risk-taking institution and the stories its alumni can tell.
Greg and Nancy talked about the current environment in which higher education operates, focusing on the intensely competitive market for students and noting that the competition is not simply among traditional competitors (college to college) but also among colleges and universities, colleges and proprietary institutions, colleges and distance learning...
III. Discussion: Where are we now?
After the plenary presentations, AdCom divided into small groups to talk in greater detail about Hampshire's successes and challenges. Common themes persisted throughout the three groups' discussions. Those themes can be organized around mission and program and student life.
All agreed that self-initiated, negotiated education is alive and well at Hampshire, although there were many observations about what could be improved, including enhanced assessment at every level so that students will have clearer markers along the way to know that they are making progress, especially in their first year, and will have a very clear understanding of the outcomes of their Hampshire, education. Other ways in which this theme surfaced was through the observation that the college needed clearer definitions of outcomes and greater consistency between and among schools of course design and expectation. The theme of more and better assessment, particularly at the institutional level, persisted throughout the meeting, and it also manifested itself in at least one group with the view that the faculty review process does not include external evaluation.
Groups also made similar kinds of observations about student life, noting a persistent sense of isolation, due perhaps to an absence of group projects and the failure to replace the house model with another that would ensure social intercourse. Hampshire needs to be a "meeting place" for students, one group observed.
Continued group discussions looked more closely at the environment, with special attention to where Hampshire still fits current needs and where it should be seeking a closer fit. Again, there were themes common to all groups. Our core strengths remain delivering an education that emphasizes learning how to learn and lifelong learning, and that the experience of a Hampshire education is truly transforming for students. Such an education well prepares students for life and work in a global economy. Many challenges, though, stand between the full realization of this strength and the college today.
Perhaps the most pressing concern is attrition, and the college must address this concern in multiple ways, from addressing deferred maintenance and upgrading facilities to rethinking student life, including sports and formal athletic programs, to looking hard at the academic program to see where it lags behind in meeting student needs. None of this can happen, or if it does happen, sustain the college without a solid financial plan. Jerry Bohdanowicz observed that the founders did everything right except for one thing--they did not develop a business plan and test economic models for the college. In a sense, the strategic planning process will now take this overlooked step.
IV. Next Steps: Where do we go from here?
AdCom agreed that there was demonstrable urgency to complete and execute a strategic plan that took into account Hampshire's history, its current strengths and challenges, and, perhaps most importantly, the current and future environment for higher education. Such a plan, then, would recognize that
? Hampshire needs to develop and maintain a competitive resource base
? Hampshire needs to understand and answer increased competition from an increasing number of sources
? Hampshire needs to do a better job of assessing itself, articulating its strengths and moving decisively to correct weaknesses
? Hampshire needs to be clear about its priorities... (p.1-5)
V. Advancing The Process: Examining Fundamental Questions within A Strategic Planning Framework
As mentioned in the introductory section, a strategic plan governing Hampshire College's forward decision-making and budgeting may be arrived at by examining the fundamental questions and issues that were raised in the course of the AdCom retreat... (p.6)
VI. Capstone: What the Hampshire College Strategic Plan will address.
The strategic plan that we envision will concretely define a finite set of high priority strategies needed to assure the continuing, long term viability of the college. Consistent with the stated mission of the college the strategic plan will serve as a road map for setting concrete actions which, in turn, find their reflection in the college's annual budgets. The strategies defined in the plan will build upon the college's historic strengths as well as a realistic assessment of our current weaknesses, and they will take into account the competitive pressures and evolving expectations of the distinguishing education that we provide... (p.9-10)
Hampshire College Sustainable Campus Plan, 2001
Hampshire College Sustainable Campus Plan
Draft, September 2001
[PowerPoint Presentation]
Community based planning process...
Vision
--Advance the college's distinctive educational program by modeling how the campus and community can be a laboratory for experimentation and demonstration of sustainable development principles;
--Strengthen the college as an educational enterprise that is itself sustainable, qualitatively and financially.
Impetus
--College is at a developmental watershed;
--Opportunity to keep Hampshire at forefront of educational innovation;
--Necessity to address immediate space, maintenance, construction, operational issues;
--Backdrop of significant development activity in Amherst paired with changing human condition globally;
--Potential for College to meet long-term financial health through various sustainable development initiatives.
Underlying Premise
--Sustainability of the College will require a multi-disciplinary approach and coordinated action that promotes education, ecology, equity, and economy.
--This pursuit will strengthen Hampshire's sense of community and commitment to social responsibility.
--Fortified, the College will sustain its ability to make a difference locally, nationally, globally.
Hampshire's Unique Strengths
--Educational philosophy
--Sustainable commitment
--Participatory governance
--National leadership
--Sustainable vs. balanced budgets
--Academic program in sustainability
--Alumni values and activity
--800-acre campus
--Economic development opportunities
--Existing planning
Hampshire's Challenges
--Reconciling individualism with community values
--Balancing participatory planning vs. decision timetables
--Competition from those with greater resources
--Scarce resources
--Competing pressures for land resources
--Aging facilities without sustainable qualities
--Rural location
--Competing social causes...
10 Principles
--Core goal is Hampshire's long-term sustainability as an institution.
--College must first sustain economic, intellectual, and creative fulfillment of its staff and faculty.
--College must next pursue educational and social goals through a sustainable physical environment.
--In all, Hampshire must strive to make a difference nationally.
--Hampshire must encourage entrepreneurship, invention and innovation, even at the risk of failure.
--Economic benefits are not enough; College must offer an enriching intellectual and physical environment.
--Balance is key: practical/artistic, physical/spiritual, individualism/community, Hampshire/greater good.
--Physical sustainability priorities are resource management, land use, maintenance ease and efficiency.
--If possible, physical improvements should include demonstration or interactive educational displays.
--Innovative programs and facilities must be endowed or flexibly designed to be modified or discontinued...
5 Planning Dimensions
--Educate: Use the campus as a laboratory
--Protect: Preserve the rural environment
--Conserve: Reduce energy and other resource use
--Renew: Strengthen Hampshire's sense of community
--Evolve: Strengthen the Farm Center through expanded academic and auxiliary programs
Strategies
--Land Stewardship: Land use plan, farm center enterprises, community memberships, productive forest
--Core & Community Cohesion: New arrival and information commons, infill buildings around green, new paths and sculpture
--Energy & Resource Management: Central biomass heating, demonstration energy reduction, increased recycling & composting
--Community Partnerships: Atkins Corner, conference facility, cultural village, faculty co-housing...
Tools
--Ongoing Environmental Audit
--Construction Guidelines (site, new construction, renovation)
--Sustainable Charters (Talloires, Ceres, UN Earth Charter)
--Demonstration Projects
--Team Selection Criteria
--Programming Guidelines...
Fundamental Questions
--What will most put Hampshire at the forefront of "sustainability"?
--What are the most significant benefits to be gained?
--What elements are missing or underdeveloped in this draft plan?
--What is the appropriate allocation of resources for the expected benefits?
"Sustainable Campus Plan: Hampshire's Revolutionary Ideas for a College Campus," by Donald Jackson. The Forward, Nov. 14, 2001, p.1.
Our campus is one of fairly experimental or radical values and exploration. This exploration leads to many daring ideas including the Sustainable Campus Plan. This undertaking is unique among higher education, in that future Hampshire design will be organized around an ethos of sustainability (in the ecological sense). The physical structure of Hampshire will come to embody some of the values it espouses: communal cohesion, "village" level self-sufficiency, vociferous environmentalism.
At the first meeting for the plan, Professor John Fabel and Director of Physical Plant Larry Archey gave a skillful and informative presentation to interested students. They spelled out the goals, motivations, and possible innovations entailed in the Plan (SCP). This was by no means the first meeting involving students, however. They have exhibited a strong concern throughout for community planning; there has been much student and staff/faculty participation as well as recommendations by the residents living near Hampshire.
Hampshire is well suited to pursuing an ecological design. Both its drawbacks and strengths support the initiative. Hampshire's limited space, resources, and repair needs are organized within the SCP along lines dictated by its interdisciplinary academic philosophy, its relatively participatory governance structures, its existing academic programs geared toward sustainability, and its 800 acres. The plan has the potential to become a great demonstration and "laboratory" for sustainable practices and designs, complete with interactive educational displays to describe the parts of the plan to visitors. It should also improve Hampshire's financial situation, by both drawing students and grants and decreasing our dependence upon outside resources.
Much effort has gone, and still goes, into planning the Atkins Corner Development. Hampshire owns land between Atkins and Applewood. The EPA has given Hampshire a grant to plan "green" development for the area, modeled according to ecologically sound principles. Some ideas being tossed around include mixed use buildings with small businesses on the first floor and affordable housing on the second (perhaps with preference given to interested Hampshire staff). Other promising proposals include the following: expansion of the Farm Center, both in programs and acreage; spring CSA; a forestry stewardship program; central biomass heating for the campus core; increased recycling; new and better paths (using non-conventional materials and arranged more reasonably); developing co-housing units on other land; moving Physical Plant closer to campus; strengthening the campus core; and constructing a "living machine" which will clear sewage naturally from Greenwich and Enfield.
Finally, a true innovation for Hampshire which inspires us with hope: a well-designed system for smooth participation in the process and program... Students will both elect student representatives for the SCP Committee and can enter with any project or good idea at the ground level...
Hampshire has made many questionable policy decisions in the past, ranging from academics to positions on unions. However, this program cannot but improve the college structure and community as a whole, or rather as a connected system governed by ecological principles. This effort is truly daring and inspired among all the schemes present in academia today.
Hampshire College Long Range Plan, 2002
Hampshire College Long-Range Plan: Sustaining the growth of excellence: an assessment of the human, program, and physical resource needs of the College. October 2002.
Executive Summary
The 2002 long-range plan defines what Hampshire must do to sustain its distinctive approach to liberal arts education; to insure its educational effectiveness, especially in its power to transform, is second to none; and to enhance Hampshire's capacity as an institution, beyond the accomplishments of its graduates, to make a difference locally, nationally, and internationally by modeling the behavior it expects of its students...
The plan assumes that elements of Hampshire's education, while well proven over time, place unique strains on the institution and its resources. The freedom to frame new questions, the discipline to negotiate a contract with a faculty committee, the ambition to meet the ideal that "to know is not enough," and the pursuit of new ideas unhindered by the fragmentation of departments and the rigidity of academic disciplines are critical elements that make a Hampshire education so transforming for students. Sustaining this dynamic model, however, requires an unusual capacity for flexible and timely responses to the new ideas and pedagogical approaches that constantly flow from negotiated, contract-based education. Responding to these strains represents the focus of the strategic plan and determines its major priorities...
I. DEFINING OUTCOMES AND EXPECTATIONS
Education succeeds when faculty set appropriate, well-articulated expectations, which in turn depend on clear definitions of the outcomes they seek. Outcomes and expectations in turn shape the applicant pool.
Goals:
1. Establish steady state enrollment of 1200 by 2005.
2. Increase racial, ethnic and "field-of-interest" diversity of student body.
3. Safeguard the affordability of a Hampshire education.
4. Strengthen the marketing of the college.
Strategic Priorities:
1. Use outcomes and expectations to generate appropriate applicants.
2. Expand strategies for identifying applicants.
3. Create feeder programs through outreach education programs for teachers.
4. Make optimal use of web-based resources for admissions.
5. Expand financial aid resources to support strategic priorities.
6. Expand endowed financial aid resources.
7. Hold tuition increases and discount rates to appropriate levels.
II. TRANSFORMATION
The real measure of what Hampshire accomplishes educationally must be the value added for each student, the level of positive transformation that takes place for each student given her or his needs and aspirations.
A. Academic Program Goals:
1. Strengthen the resource base for the academic program.
2. Improve the technical and learning infrastructute for academic program.
3. Enhance and augment the distinguishing characteristics of Hampshire's pedagogy.
4. Explore continued collaboration with Five College partners.
Strategic Priorities:
1. Enhance faculty compensation to competitive benchmarks.
2. Improve faculty-student ratio to 1:10.
3. Restructure first-year program.
4. Expand inter-disciplinary academic programs.
5. Expand program resources for schools, library and IT.
6. Expand study abroad and international exchanges.
7. Fund Division II and III research and related internships.
8. Support faculty development.
9. Foster expansion of service learning and community-based education across the curriculum.
10. Work with Five College colleagues to develop select cross-institutional programs.
B. The Residential Program Goals:
1. Develop and increase the capacity of members of the community to live together well.
2. Promote an inclination to engage with and serve the Hampshire community and its broader communities.
3. Develop the value of openness to the rich variety of people, connections, and experiences possible in a community of individuals with diverse backgrounds, identities, and values among its members.
Strategic Priorities:
1. Hold regular public forums to discuss major campus, national and international issues.
2. Develop programs and activities that foster positive connections among students.
3. Enhance social life.
4. Design and implement a college-wide conflict resolution program.
5. Develop programs to strengthen the integration of students' academic and social lives.
6. Enhance athletic programs and activities to provide a fuller range of options and opportunities for team and individual sports.
C. Physical Environment Goals:
1. Create the Knowledge Commons, a multi-purpose facility that will be the hub of campus life for study, research, and leisure.
2. Enhance key academic and social facilities.
3. Add new space for housing and selected academic and social purposes.
4. Achieve the objectives of the Sustainable Master Plan.
Strategic Priorities:
1. Implement sustainability principles in all physical plant projects.
2. Build the Knowledge Commons in two phases.
3. Enhance and upgrade student social and residential spaces.
4. Refurbish facilities in two phases.
5. Expand Video/Film facilities as part of Liebling Center.
6. Renovate the FPH lobby.
7. Make improvements to the Farm Center.
8. Support the sculpture park.
9. Reduce deferred maintenance.
10. Assure ongoing regulatory/code compliance.
III ASSESSING OUTCOMES
Strengthening the core requires assessing what is taking place as students progress through the program and in subsequent years in order to determine whether and how much value is added.
Goals:
1. Create a culture of assessment throughout the college.
2. Create an infrastructure to manage assessment.
3. Develop appropriate assessment measures and tools.
4. Support the Cycles Survey of Five Colleges.
Strategic Priorities:
1. Plan for and implement assessment of first year as pilot for all efforts.
2. Write strategic plan for assessment for entire institution.
3. Generate resources to support implementation of plan.
4. Incorporate Five College data into assessment activities.
These goals and objectives can be achieved only if the campus also achieves and maintains financial sustainability. To that end, the strategic plan addresses Hampshire's financial needs through a budgeting model and strategies for generating revenue.
IV AN INTEGRATED FINANCIAL PLAN
The college has developed a financial modeling system that focuses on sustainable financial growth, not simply balanced budgets. The financial analysis conducted as part of long-range planning identified the resources needed to introduce and sustain required initiatives. The model makes clear that tuition alone cannot sustain a strengthened core and that Hampshire must build endowment. At the same time, it also makes clear that endowment alone cannot make up the difference between tuition and the needs of a strengthened core. Hampshire must develop a third entrepreneurial revenue stream within its principles of sustainability.
A. The Campaign to Endow Hampshire's Future
The strategic priorities have been translated into key goals for the Campaign to Endow Hampshire's Future:
1. Support the quality of faculty and staff through the strengthening of compensation...
2. Provide discretionary program resources that allow flexible and timely response to innovative proposals to make possible the rigorous testing of new ideas...
3. Support the quality of community life by enhancing the college's ability to enhance the capacity of all its members to live together well...
4. Create an adequate physical infrastructure to support and reflect the innovation that characterizes a negotiated contract-based education...
B. New Revenue Sources
As a complement to the Campaign to Endow Hampshire's Future, Hampshire must add new "entrepreneurial" sources of revenue.
Goals:
1. Create a third revenue stream to support the academic core.
2. Ensure that revenue-bearing programs complement the college's mission.
3. Enhance the cost effectiveness and revenue potential of all auxiliary programs.
4. Unlock the contributory potential of land and building clusters at the campus periphery.
5. Leverage the contributions to advance sustainability principles and initiatives.
6. Strengthen cost-efficiencies derived from Five College cooperation.
Strategic Priorities:
1. Obtain structural cost reductions in various auxiliary programs.
2. Develop farm center as a model of sustainable development.
3. Obtain income from leased space/services to partnerships or savings from sharing of resources with them.
4. Evolve Red Barn cluster as center for events and partnerships.
5. Develop income potential of two pieces of land: SE corner of Bay Road/Rte 116 Intersection and Hadley land adjacent to Physical Plant.
6. Commercially develop the Atkins Corner Land.
The ultimate purpose of the strategic plan, of course, is to enable Hampshire to continue its innovations in education, sustainability, and social justice in order to shape the future, not simply respond to it. The expanded plan that follows speaks in greater detail about the campus's efforts to realize its ambitions...(p.3-5)
These efforts also are complemented by Hampshire's effort to create a sustainable educational community. In 1999 Hampshire began a detailed and methodical study of facilities, land, and land management. While that study had a limited purview, it called attention to the broad and compelling concept of "sustainability," which now guides long-range planning. Incorporating sustainability into long-range planning means implementing practices in order to maintain the health of the institution well into the future in human, academic, physical, economic, and spiritual terms. (p.6)