The Red Balloon Initiative

Learning Centered is “Where We’re Going” and we need your help to get there. The 2011-2016 Strategic Plan will be developed with a focus that supports JSU becoming a Learning Centered University. Campus-wide discussion groups will help answer these Learning Centered questions:
• What does a Learning Centered University look like?
• What will JSU, as a Learning Centered University, look like in five years?
• What values will influence our decision-making?
• What is our mission?
• How do we have to change to become more Learning Centered?
• How is it different from JSU now?
• What are our strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats to becoming more Learning Centered?
• What are some strategies that will help us reach our vision?

Strategic Plan Goal

These are the goals our University has established.  Which of these do you feel are most important for us to discuss in our meeting on the 12th? We probably should limit ourselves to 3-4 goals.

1. Educate students to be productive, responsible citizens and effective leaders.
2. Advance student learning through academic excellence.
3. Increase student and faculty participation in research and service activities.
4. Create a diverse learning community that facilitates academic and professional excellence.
5. Effectively use technology to support learning, research, information management and evidence-based decision-making.
6. Continuously improve administrative processes and services.
7. Enhance revenue growth and financial planning to ensure adequate fiscal resources for the university

Meeting

Our meeting will be Friday, November 12, from 1:30 until...  We hope to finish in a couple of hours.  We will meet in Steve's conference room (the Honors House on the hill), and there will be food!

The literature

The literature that Dr. Turner suggested as background for our discussion can be found at the following link: www.jsu.edu/redballoon/.  Open the Discussion Group section to see articles about the Learning Centered University.  It is not necessary that you read all of this before our meeting, but it may help us all to understand where our discussion will lead.

Welcome to Our Blog

Here we go!  We have been given the task of looking at our past and our present in order to make suggestions for a better future, for our department, our college, and our university.  This site will list the resources that Dr. Rebecca Turner suggests we might want to read.  The questions our group will discuss on November 12 will also be posted here.  Finally, we will begin to brainstorm ideas and give one another links to other interesting sites so that we will be better prepared for our face-to-face discussion.  Thank you all for being willing to join me on this journey.