Connecting Students and Faculty through Technology, Collaboration and Globalization at Wake Forest University
Wake Forest University is close to concluding the implementation of a novel strategic plan ("Plan for the Class of 2000," 1995) that has received considerable national attention. The May 5, 1995, Chronicle of Higher Education, for example, featured the fact that Wake Forest is providing to all faculty and entering freshmen IBM laptop computers.
Wake Forest, a private institution located in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, has a total fall 1998 enrollment of 6,147 students in undergraduate, graduate, law, and medical programs. The undergraduate schools have a prominent liberal arts mission, and their enrollment of 3,868 students represents 63% of the University student population.
Major Outcomes of the Strategic Plan
Major outcomes of the strategic plan include:
The technology and first-year seminar initiatives have been fully implemented for three
first-year classes (1996-98); the hiring of new faculty and awarding of new scholarships
and fellowships have been partially implemented. As of fall 1998, 30 additional new
tenure-track faculty members were hired, 96 new scholarships ($2,000 each) were awarded to
students studying abroad, and 36 new fellowships ($2,000 each) were awarded to students
for collaborative research with faculty. Financial plans are in place to reach the
numerical goals previously cited.
Planning Process
A university-wide program planning committee was formed and began work in the fall of 1992 and completed its task in the fall of 1994. The committee, chaired by the University provost, consisted of elected faculty, administrators, and students; all schools were represented on the committee. The committee's activities included surveying seniors about their education-related satisfaction levels and faculty about their needs, holding a faculty retreat, and conducting 82 open hearings with department chairs and program directors about their needs and priorities. Members of the committee visited and observed two outstanding private universities that have missions and academic programs comparable to Wake Forest. The committee also coordinated an environmental scanning process to identify influential trends, including the magnitude of information explosion and the impact of multiculturalism, at educational institutions. Additionally, the committee sanctioned comparative studies of other institutions in numerous areas, including enrollment, student/faculty ratio, tuition, and faculty salaries.
Implementation Strategies
The administration felt that the technology component was the most attractive feature and thus would help "sell" the entire strategic plan to the Board of Trustees. The faculty initially resisted the technology feature but unilaterally approved the addition of faculty to reduce the student/faculty ratio. The administration and the program planning committee convinced the faculty to accept all recommendations of the plan, including the establishment of standing committees on "information technology" and "first-year seminar." These committees oversaw the implementation of the technology and first-year seminar recommendations.
The program planning committee conducted a pricing study of the implementation costs of the strategic plan. The total cost was estimated to be annually $8,301,700. After realizing that there were no funds or forthcoming campaign to pay for the plan, the committee had to be creative in providing a plan for funding. A pricing study of the 33 "most competitive" private colleges (as identified in the 1994 Barron's Profiles of American Colleges) indicated that Wake Forest was next-to-last in tuition costs. Thus, University administrators felt that they could raise tuition $3,000 per year, effective with the freshman class entering in 1996, and still be competitive in the admissions market. The trustees approved the tuition increase, thereby allowing the University to implement the entire strategic plan. Additionally, Wake Forest used unrestricted endowment earnings to pay for extra costs related to the computing program.
Assessment of the Strategic Plan's Outcomes
An evaluation committee consisting of faculty and administrators is assessing the strategic plan's outcomes. The evaluation committee members serve as liaisons to different committees and administrative offices throughout the University. They provide the groups with results of surveys and other data.
The evaluation committee monitors twenty-seven key measures of quality in the following areas:
Examples of key measures being monitored are: freshmen retention rates, student/faculty ratio, percent of graduates receiving degree credits abroad, graduation rates, alumni giving rates, and academic reputation as measured in U.S. News & World Report.
The evaluation committee uses the following primary instruments to measure the effectiveness of the strategic plan:
Surveys of this nature have proven to be of value in assessing educational programs. Wake Forest's CSEQ results were cited and analyzed in a global assessment context (Banta and Kuh, 1998). The CSEQ, administered to freshmen, sophomores, and juniors, is designed to determine how students spend their time. The HEDS Senior Survey determines seniors' satisfaction levels in numerous academic and other areas, which can then be evaluated next to comparative data from peer institutions. The In-house Faculty Survey, developed by the Evaluation Committee, specifically assesses the outcomes of the strategic plan from the faculty perspective.
Ubiquitous Computing
The most distinctive outcome of the strategic plan is that, as of fall 1996, all faculty and entering freshmen receive IBM laptop computers. They receive an upgrade every two years, and the seniors keep the computers upon graduation. Also, the entire campus has been completely wired, and 17 additional computing professionals have been hired to provide faculty support.
The "Wake Forest Computer-Enhanced Learning Initiative" (1998) was founded in 1997. The Initiative, referred to as CELI, is faculty-based and has as its mission the development of effective uses of computers in instruction. Directed by a faculty member given a reduced teaching load, CELI sponsors campus seminars on using technology in instruction and provides a number of other services as well.
The implementation of ubiquitous computing is pioneering; fewer than 20 liberal arts colleges in the United States have such a program. Thus, efforts have been made to assess its impact. The CSEQ, In-house Faculty Survey, In-house Student Computer Survey, and In-house Faculty Computer Survey were administered to students and faculty before and after the strategic plan was implemented. Wake Forest has measured changes in computer usage by analyzing results of these surveys. CSEQ results show that significantly higher scores from students under the strategic plan took place in the following areas: use of computers, courses using computers, and use of computer in doing research. Faculty Survey results indicate significant increases for faculty under the plan in the following computer-use areas: teaching effectiveness, individual instruction, communication, presentation, modeling/simulation, and information gathering. Both faculty and students have shown increasingly positive attitudes toward computer use and improvement in computer-use skills, as is further evidenced by survey results.
Results of the Strategic Plan
The retention rate of first-year students who entered in 1996 (the first year of the strategic plan) was greater than that of those entering in the previous three years. Also, the 94.3% retention rate of the 1997 freshman class was even higher than the 1996 freshman class retention rate of 93.4%. The mean grade point average of first-year students at the end of the first year was higher in 1996 (2.81) and 1997 (2.83) than in the immediate years prior to the implementation of the strategic plan. While retention and mean grade point average of freshmen have increased since the plan began, the academic quality of the entering freshman class has remained essentially unchanged (in terms of entering students' mean SAT scores and academic rankings in their high school graduating classes). Thus, the positive changes cannot be attributed to the enrollment of better students, since new freshmen in 1996 and 1997 were not any stronger academically than the students who enrolled in the immediate years prior to the implementation of the strategic plan.
The student/faculty ratio was 13:1 when the plan was developed in 1995 and is presently 11:1. The CSEQ results indicate a significantly higher score for students' positive relations with faculty and student participation in class discussions; the Faculty Survey results indicate a significantly higher score for intellectual climate among students. The number of undergraduate students studying abroad in the fall of 1998 increased 65 percent over the number studying abroad in the fall of 1997; thus the awarding of 96 new scholarships for international study has dramatically increased the globalization of student experiences. Data on 1998-99 student/faculty research collaboration is not yet available, but the awarding of 36 new scholarships in July 1998 for such collaboration should have an impact on the quality of research as well.
Summary
Wake Forest University has successfully implemented a major strategic plan that includes ubiquitous computing, first-year seminars, new faculty, new scholarships for students studying abroad, and new fellowships for students participating in collaborative research with faculty. Overall assessment of the substantial outcomes of the strategic plan, based upon analysis of key measures of quality, indicates that the plan has been effective to this date. Certainly administrators and faculty were pleased with the progress of the plan as they approached the fall 1998 semester (Cox, 1998). However, continual assessment is necessary since the first class to enroll under the strategic plan will not graduate until the year 2000. At that time, many measures, including graduation rates and senior survey results, will be compared to previous classes and other groups; a true evaluation of the complete effectiveness of the strategic plan will then be available.
References
Banta, T. W., & Kuh, G. D. (March/April 1998). A missing link in assessment. Change 30 (2), 40-46.
Barron's Profiles of American Colleges. (1994). "College Admissions Selector." Publication city and publisher? p. 215.
Cox, Kevin. (1998). Fall semester marks new stage in undergraduate plan. News Service, Wake Forest University [On-line]. Available on the World Wide Web: http://www.wfu.edu/wfunews/releases/081498p.htm.
DeLoughry, T. J. (May 5, 1995). Mandatory computers. The Chronicle of Higher Education, pp. A37, A39.
Fact Book. (March 1998). Office of Institutional Research, Wake Forest University. Available on the World Wide Web: http://www.wfu.edu/Administrative-offices/Institutional-Research/FactBook1.html.
"Faculty Survey." (1998). Office of Institutional Research, Wake Forest University. Available on the World Wide Web: http://www.wfu.edu/Administrative-offices/Institutional-Research/Faculty-Survey/1998Results.PDF.
"Plan for the Class of 2000." (January 1995). Office of the Provost, Wake Forest University. Available on the World Wide Web: http://www.wfu.edu/Academic-departments/Program-Planning-Committee/Plan-for-the-Class-of-2000.txt.
"Wake Forest Computer-Enhanced Learning Initiative." [On-line]. Available on the World Wide Web: http://www.wfu.edu/CELI/.