Strategic Plan

The following details the mission and vision for each of the four pillars that define the College of Architecture, Arts, and Design. These pillars and their resulting strategic priorities were determined through an extensive consultation process that included all constituencies of the college in a variety of formats. The co-chairs for the steering committee were Ariana Wyatt and Lauren Pollard. Members of the steering committee included John Ambrosone, Takiyah Nur Amin, Paola Zellner Bassett, Victoria Boatwright, Terry Clements, Jason Crafton, Ron Daniel, Meaghan Dee, Lauren DiSalvo, Meredith Drum, Zach Duer, Bill Galloway, Dee Hopkins, Shreya Pramodh Manda, Tony Mastracci, Katy Miles, Justin Perkinson, Susan Piedmont-Palladino, Michelle Raines, Brad Whitney, and Leigh Ziegler.

The following strategic plan is structured on four strategic pillars: growth, wonder, inclusion, and connection. These pillars are linked together through many points of connection and work best in collaboration. These pillars and their associated priorities are founded in our land-grant mission. Each pillar is defined by an aspirational vision, goals in support of meeting that vision, and subsequent measures of success and/or progress. 

Expanding on the original land-grant mission, the College of Architecture, Arts, and Design is committed to providing quality experiential learning for all students, creating and disseminating new scholarship and creative activity, and providing greater access to higher education. Quality arts opportunities are fundamental to a comprehensive education. As land-grant institutions have expanded on their primary mission to encompass a comprehensive education, arts experiences are crucial to their continued success.

The establishment of a new College of Architecture, Arts, and Design identified several core values that continue to be inherent in all aspects of learning, research and discovery, and engagement pursued by our faculty, staff, and students. These core values are:

Respect. We maintain a culture of mutual respect for all. We construct and maintain environments of safety, support, and encouragement. We support collegiality, in which the wide spectrum of disciplinary pursuits represented by AAD faculty, students, and staff are equally valued.

Curiosity. We value intellectual curiosity leading to creative exploration, inquiry, and expression within boundaries of mutual respect. We assert our responsibility to share the results of our work with academic peers and local, national, and global communities.

Equity. We affirm inclusivity as a community value and reject all forms of prejudice and discrimination, including those based on age, color, disability, gender, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, political affiliation, race, religion, sexual orientation, and veteran status. We strive tirelessly for an equitable college climate.

Communication. We are transparent in sharing information and our decision-making, and engage in open dialogue among college leadership, faculty, staff, students, and the rest of the AAD academic community.

Engagement. We value participatory decision-making and consequent implementation that engages college leadership, faculty, staff, and students.

Student-focused. We advocate and provide the conditions for student success both inside and outside the classroom, through teaching, advising, and mentoring.

Service. In the spirit of Ut Prosim (That I May Serve), our work demonstrates the importance of serving our schools, college, and university; our professions; and communities at the local, national, and global levels.

Our next steps will be to continue to develop our implementation plan by identifying measurement goals and metrics, and to form communities of practice that will work together to uphold the four strategic pillars. Communities of practice are defined as groups of people who share a common interest who come together to learn and achieve identified goals. In this context, communities of practice will work together to continue the ongoing work identified in this strategic plan. The strategic plan is a living document that grow and change with future challenges and opportunities.

Objective 1: Create a culture that values and respects the contributions of all members (see also the Connection and Inclusion sections).

• Action item: Offer two development opportunities that focus on communication, compassion, and constructive dialogue for faculty and staff.
  • Metrics: Participation numbers and positive change in climate survey results; achieve 75% satisfaction by 2027.
• Action item: Identify and supplement ethics-based course outcomes embedded in the existing AAD curriculum. Ensure first-year experiences in the college include discipline-specific ethics outcomes.
  • Metric: Generate a metric around student learning outcomes specific to ethics.

Objective 1: Provide professional development opportunities for faculty and staff. 

• Action item: Implement college-level professional development funding opportunities for faculty (two rounds of funding to start in 2024).
  • Metric: Establish a baseline by 2025.
• Action item: Create college-level professional development funds to support staff and A/P faculty.
  • Metric: In year one, establish a baseline assessment of available funds in each school to determine who can access funds, how to access funds and make requests, etc.
  • Metric: Number of events funded.
  • Metric: Positive change in climate survey results (achieve 75% satisfaction by 2027).
• Action item: Embed emerging technologies into existing curricula. 
  • Metric: Best practices and metric to be established by school and program curriculum committees.   
• Action item: Ensure that Equipment Trust Fund funds are used to maintain a four-year life cycle for equipment in each school and provide student workers for lab support.
  • Metric: In year one, identify gaps in equipment at the school level and work to establish a timeline for upgrade/replacement.
• Action item: Bring in professionals and industry partners to help identify new and emerging technologies. 
  • Metrics: Potential milestones include sessions with students, collaborations with faculty, and possible gifts in kind.
• Action item: Ensure peer-to-peer mentoring opportunities and onboarding are available for faculty, staff, A/P faculty, and students.
  • Metric: Establish a metric around the various types of mentorship so that faculty, staff, and A/P faculty can accurately record their service through their reporting systems. Additional qualitative metrics acquired through surveys, exit interviews, etc. will be utilized to measure quality of mentorship and additional needs.
• Action item: Improve communication to ensure that students know about the mentoring opportunities available.
  • Metric: Number of students engaging in mentorship programs.

Objective 2: Develop and provide demonstrations and training for emerging technologies for faculty, staff, and students in the environment of rapidly changing markets and industry.  

• Action item: Embed emerging technologies into existing curricula. 
  • Metric: Best practices and metric to be established by school and program curriculum committees.   
• Action item: Ensure that Equipment Trust Fund funds are used to maintain a four-year life cycle for equipment in each school and provide student workers for lab support.
  • Metric: In year one, identify gaps in equipment at the school level and work to establish a timeline for upgrade/replacement.
• Action item: Bring in professionals and industry partners to help identify new and emerging technologies. 
  • Metrics: Potential milestones include sessions with students, collaborations with faculty, and possible gifts in kind.

Objective 3:  Strengthen and solidify mentoring systems to ensure faculty, staff, and A/P faculty have adequate opportunities for peer-to-peer mentorship.

• Action item: Ensure peer-to-peer mentoring opportunities and onboarding are available for faculty, staff, A/P faculty, and students.
  • Metric: Establish a metric around the various types of mentorship so that faculty, staff, and A/P faculty can accurately record their service through their reporting systems. Additional qualitative metrics acquired through surveys, exit interviews, etc. will be utilized to measure quality of mentorship and additional needs.
• Action item: Improve communication to ensure that students know about the mentoring opportunities available.
  • Metric: Number of students engaging in mentorship programs.

Objective 1: Increase opportunities and access to new experiences for all students. 

• Action item: Fundraise to support college undergraduate and graduate experiential learning opportunities such as study abroad/study within experiences, internships, research, and community outreach events and collaborations.
  • Metric: Increase funding by 25% annually over the next five years (approximately $250,000 in scholarship endowments).
• Action item: Identify funding sources, both internal and external, to support and resource faculty who implement and evaluate Bridge Experiences in their courses. Grow the number of positions dedicated towards improving the student experience.
  • Metric: Increase student participation in Bridge Experiences. Increase number of AAD students participating in Bridge Experiences to 50% by 2026 (after first establishing a baseline).
  • Metric: Positive increase in qualitative feedback from faculty, advisors, and students

Objective 1: Complete regular assessments to ensure the curricula is meeting the needs of ever-changing professions.  

• Action item: Each program should utilize the Academic and Certificate Program. Assessment Report to identify their own metrics for each learning outcome and connect them to their professional field.
  • Metrics: Measure the of achievement of outcomes per program-identified metrics.

Objective 2: Partner with industry professionals to develop corporate-funded projects that will provide collaborative learning experiences for students and are tied to the curricula.

• Action item: Increase number and diversity of funded partnerships. 
  • Metric: Increase number of funding partnerships by 10% per year for the next five years (after first establishing a baseline).

Objective 1: Provide internship and bridge opportunities that connect students to their profession.

• Action item: Generate and implement a plan to ensure that more students are connected to these opportunities. 
  • Metric: Increase number of AAD students participating in internship and bridge opportunities to 50% by 2026 (after first establishing a baseline).

Objective 1: Foster increased alumni engagement.

• Action item: Meet or exceed the college’s annual participation goal as set by central advancement. 
  • Metric: Meet annual alumni participation goal.
• Action item: Increase participation of advisory board members on Giving Day.
  • Metric: Increase alumni board participation on Giving Day to 100%.  
• Action item: Solidify and support school and program advisory boards. 
  • Metric: Alumni director will meet with each board twice a year. 
  • Metric: Maintain or increase number of events to which board members are invited. 

Objective 1: Develop new graduate offerings. 

• Action item: Develop professional doctorate (low residency programs housed at the Washington-Alexandra Architecture Center) and master’s (full residency) degrees in design. 
  • Metrics: Will include enrollment and yearly growth metrics (after first establishing baselines).
• Action item: Develop new low residency programs and graduate certificate programs; form a committee to identify possible degree programs and graduate certificate programs by 2025. 
  • Metrics: Will include enrollment for and growth metrics for each program (after first establishing baselines).

Objective 2: Improve recruitment and retention in current graduate programs. 

• Action items: Work with the director of diversity, equity, and inclusion and graduate program chairs to discover retention issues and develop a plan to improve. Build an inclusive community that fosters a sense of belonging and inclusion. Support the creation of a graduate student association. 
  • Metric: Identify current retention rate and create a metric for improvement.
  • Metric: Identify current graduation rate and create a metric for improvement.
  • Metric: Determine a metric for student participation in a graduate student association.
  • Metric: Increase graduate enrollment by 10% per year for the next five years. 

Objective 1: Obtain college support to ensure programs meet their enrollment goals.

• Action item: Schools work with director of recruitment to improve communication with prospective students to increase undergraduate applications and enrollment.
  • Metric: Create an enrollment metric (melt rate should be below X by 2027).
• Action item: Schools work with director of recruitment to improve communication with prospective students to increase undergraduate yield.
  • Metric: Establish baseline undergraduate yield by program and then determine if a steady state or yield growth is appropriate by program.

Objective 2: Clarify college/university policies regarding offering new online courses that can accommodate large enrollment numbers.  

• Action item: Work with University governance to provide clarity on online course policies (2024-25) and generate best practices and policies for implementation (2025-26).
  • Metric: Will include establishing student learning outcomes through guidance from the Pathways Strategies working group.

Objective 3: Increase opportunities for undergrade access to AAD Pathways courses (see also the Wonder section).

• Action items: Assess Pathways offerings across schools to determine where gaps of access to AAD classes are and create new courses or leverage existing courses to increase access. Clarify college/university policies regarding offering online courses that can accommodate large enrollment numbers. 
  • Metric: Pathways Strategies working group to assess Pathways offerings and outcomes and provide guidance on possible new courses or course improvements.
  • Metric: Identify how many non-AAD students are taking Pathways courses and use that information to generate a metric. Collect qualitative data on why students engage with AAD pathways courses.

Objective 1: Effectively communicate the impact of creative scholarship.

• Action items: Continue to develop a qualitative evaluation framework that works with the budget model and lead in defining “impact” in the arts and design (creative scholarship metrics). Use our metrics to lead the national conversation on metrics in the arts through participation in national organizations like A2ru and the College Music Society.
  • Metric: Create, implement, and reassess PIBB related creative scholarship metric. First implementation expected in 2025. Revision and second implementation in 2026.
• Action item: Revise and/or update promotion expectations and guidelines for relevant non-tenure track faculty categories across the college.
  • Metric: Will obtain faculty survey results to measure clarity of promotion guidelines.
• Action item: Revise promotion and tenure guidelines to include a continuum of engaged scholarship framework.
  • Metric: Generate a framework for inclusion into Promotion and Tenure Guidelines. Generate a metric for growth after establishing a baseline.

Objective 2: Promote the scholarship and creative activity of our faculty and students on campus and beyond.

• Action item: Provide opportunities for faculty and students to share their research and creative activity in spaces beyond Blacksburg through internal and external funding.
  • Metric: Number of college events to celebrate common themes in student and faculty research and creative activity.
  • Metric: Generate more opportunities at other Virginia Tech campuses; create a least one annual domestic travel opportunity in each school to support student travel and connections for those who cannot travel abroad. 
  • Metric: Number of external institutions and venues reached through scholarship and creative activity.  
  • Metric: Number of applicants and participants selected to the Creatives in Residence Program.
• Action item: Communicate our stories frequently and effectively.
  • Metrics: Establish a baseline of four mentions in Virginia Tech News per semester (2025-26); increase to five mentions per semester (2026-27). Launch the Cision daily news alert and benchmark external media mentions (2024-25) and then establish metric for growth.

Objective 3: Be a leader in promoting wonder as a driver for creativity, curiosity, inquiry, and imagination.

• Action item: Strengthen connections with professionals and industries for deeper and broader research and problem-based collaboration opportunities. Wonder is necessary to solve problems, and our college has students and faculty ready to collaborate on solutions.
  • Metric:  Generate a growth metric (after first establishing a baseline).
  • Metric: Increase funded research and sponsored projects by 10% per year for the next five years. (Funding is currently around $500,000 annually. Increase would start at $50,000 per year.)
• Action item: Provide sufficient financial management and support for individual research and creative activity. 
  • Metric: Increase the internal funding options and level of funding, proportionally to the overhead returns. 
• Action item: Ensure that internal research and creative activity funding meets promotion and evaluative expectations.   
  • Metric: Survey results measuring support for research and creative activity to achieve over 50% favorability by 2026.

Objective 1: Increase opportunities for undergraduate access to AAD Pathways courses (see also the Growth section).

• Action item: Assess Pathways offerings across schools to determine where gaps of access to AAD classes are and create new courses or leverage existing courses to increase access. Clarify college/university policies regarding offering online courses that can accommodate large enrollment numbers. 
  • Metric: Pathways Strategies working group to assess Pathways offerings and outcomes and provide guidance on possible new courses or course improvements.  
  • Metric: Identify how many non-AAD students are taking Pathways courses and use that information to generate a metric.

Objective 2: Increase arts experiences for and with the community. 

• Action item: Measure current number of experiences and participants to get a sense of scope and develop a strategy for increasing. 
  • Metric: Use the Arts Vibrancy Index to establish a baseline after identifying an aspirational peer in this category.

Objective 3: Use arts, design, and academic research to create a more equitable society. 

• Action items: Increase emphasis on scholarship and creative activity in areas that foster equity like universal/inclusive design, sustainability, emerging technologies, and arts access. Provide internal seed funding and support for these areas of research.
  • Metric: Establish a baseline funding amount (include internal Education and General and travel funding) and then develop a metric for growth. 

Inclusion is the intentional act to include difference and create environments where any individual or group is welcomed, respected, supported, valued, and given the opportunity to fully participate. Inclusion fosters a sense of belonging through centering, valuing, and amplifying the voices and perspectives of all individuals, and includes eliminating practices and behaviors that marginalize groups of people or individuals.

Objective 1: Build a culture of respect for faculty, staff and students with Virginia Tech Principles of Community at the forefront.

• Action item: Ensure that processes are unified and transparent across the college. 
• Action item: Post policies and procedures on Inside AAD.
• Action item: Ensure equity in evaluative measures of programs and people so that they are easy to understand, equitable, and informative.
  • Metrics (for all above): Achieve 75% satisfaction in qualitative survey results.

Objective 2: Build our capacity to work as a team in a manner that is clear, predictable, and streamlined.

• Action item: Provide annual group trainings aimed at faculty, staff, and graduate teaching assistants in communication and collaboration.
  • Metrics: Achieve 100% compliance with respect, equity, and anti-discrimination training by 2025; achieve 50% engagement with group training activities by 2026.
• Action item: Ensure unity in shared process to achieve outcomes across the college. 
• Action item: Build a strong mentoring program (see the Growth section).
  • Metrics: Establish a baseline minimum number of mentorship hours so that faculty can track through their Faculty Activity Reports; combine with additional qualitative metrics acquired through surveys, exit interviews, etc. 

Objective 3: Build a more inclusive learning environment for all students.

• Action item: Work to provide a support system for faculty and staff to meet needs of students with Services for Students with Disabilities accommodations, including ensuring faculty have access to existing support systems and understand additional needs.
  • Metric: Establish a baseline for "time to degree." Build a metric for increase of success for degree completion within six years.

Equity is the active process of identifying and eliminating or reducing the structural barriers related to race, class, disability, and gender and other identities that limit access or prevent full participation in our institutions. It requires understanding the root cause(s) of disparities, identifying the barriers, and redressing, particularly, the exclusion of historically underrepresented groups within our society. Equity works to ensure justice, access, opportunity, and advancement for individuals within the policies, practices, procedures, processes, and distribution of resources by institutions or systems. Access is having the unfettered ability to take full advantage of the resources and opportunities available.

Objective 1: Uphold inclusive pedagogy. 

• Action item: Provide support for students to participate in study abroad/ within experiences (see also Growth section).
  • Metric: Meet or exceed development goal to support study abroad/within experiences; increase funding for these experiences by approximately 25% per year. 
• Action item: Provide opportunities for students to participate in bridge and internship experiences (see also Growth section).
  • Metric: Increase number of student participants to 50% by 2026. 
  • Metric: Increase number of underserved student participants by 50% by 2027 (after first establishing baseline).
  • Metric: Increase number of underrepresented student participants by 50% by 2027 (after first establishing baseline).

Objective 2: Provide the tools, equipment, and space necessary for student success.

•  Action item: Eliminate equipment barriers for students.
• Action item: Explore partnerships to expand materials access for students.
• Action item: Explore better collaboration and opportunities for students to access labs. 
  • Metric (for all above): Measurement of materials access through quantitative and qualitative metric generation.

Objective 3: Upgrade technology access in computer labs.

•  Action item: Designate a portion of each school’s Equipment Trust Funds for annual IT upgrades.

Objective 4: Purchase and maintain a library of equipment for emergency student use.

• Action item: Identify resources (financial and personnel) to be able to provide emergency student support.
  • Metric: Establish a repository of equipment and procedures to support students by 2026.

Objective 5: Ensure that the college strategic plan is a living document that is referenced regularly and aligns with the university strategic plan.

•  Action item: Assess and update the plan every three years.

Objective 6: Provide clarity of purpose for the school committees and promote collaborative decision making.  

• Action item: Ensure that college committee structures have representation and service is valued.
• Action item: Create a culture to support the unique roles of staff and of faculty.
• Action item: Support equitable recruitment, retention, and promotion practices for faculty and staff.
  • Metric: Increase in satisfaction through qualitative survey results.

Objective 7: Support the Virginia Tech Advantage in order to ensure that all students have access to transformational learning opportunities, regardless of their financial circumstances. 

• Action item: Continue building philanthropic support for student scholarships (see also Growth section).
  • Metric: Meet or exceed philanthropic goals for scholarship support (approximately 25% increase per year or $250,000).

Objective 8: Support efforts to promote universal/inclusive design (see also Wonder section). 

• Action item: Increase emphasis on scholarship and creative activity in areas such as universal/inclusive design, sustainability, emerging technologies, and arts access. Provide internal seed funding and support for these areas of research.
  • Metric: Establish a baseline funding amount (include internal education & growth and travel funding) and then develop a metric for growth.

Diversity is the various backgrounds, lived experiences, values, and worldviews that stem from differences in culture and circumstance. This includes race, ethnicity, gender and gender expression, age, religion, language, (dis)ability, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, geographic region, and more. Some of these identities may be marginalized in the broader society. As our society has grown more diverse, our understanding of how these varied identities face barriers to success also increased. Each of these identities, often in combination with others, requires a complex understanding of the institutional and societal context and distinctive responses to encourage success.

Objective 1: Understand and address challenges for traditionally underrepresented populations. 

• Action item: Use institutional data on nontraditional (transfer, veteran, second career, students with families, etc.) students to understand barriers and work towards developing a plan to reduce or eliminate barriers.
  • Metric: Increased number of nontraditional students enrolled in AAD programs.
  • Metric: Understand the retention rates and create a metric to track.

Objective 2: Address historical power structures in the context of shared governance.  

• Action item: Continue to work to understand different needs with attention to barriers to access and retention in AAD. 
• Action item: Provide proper financial management for research. 

Justice occurs when all individuals can live a full and dignified life, and all communities can thrive. Justice is the outcome of dismantling barriers to resources and opportunities for people who live in marginalized communities.

Objective 1: Build empathy, compassion, and forgiveness. 

• Action item: Ensure restorative justice processes are embedded in AAD community and committee practices.
  • Metric: Visibility of these practices in policies.

Objective 2: Lift up social justice issues through creative activity, scholarship, and inclusive design practices.

• Action item: Promote scholarship and creative activities that wrangle with social justice issues.
  • Metric: Increased number of social justice centered scholarship and creative activities, after establishing a baseline.

Belonging is the extent to which people know and feel that they are valued, respected, included, and celebrated for their individual and unique contributions and identities.

Objective 1: Create a community of belonging.

•  Action item: Cultivate communities of practice for important topics and efforts.
  • Metric: Participation in communities and generated action items.
• Action item: Encourage practices for communication and engagement.
  • Metric: Participation in workshops and trainings.

Objective 2: Link activities and initiatives to the Virginia Tech Principles of Community.

• Action item: Include signage for the Virginia Tech Principles of Community in classroom spaces, reference them at meetings and gatherings, and introduce into classroom discussions.
  • Metric: Measurement of the above.

Objective 1: Create a culture that values and respects the contributions of all members.

• Action item: Offer two development opportunities that focus on communication, compassion, and constructive dialogue for faculty and staff.
  • Metrics: Participation numbers and positive change in climate survey results; achieve 75% satisfaction by 2027.
  • Metrics: Achieve 100% participation in Respect, Equity, and Anti-Discrimination training by 2025; achieve 50% engagement with group training activities by 2026.

Objective 1: Find space for gatherings, pinups, displays, exhibits, and performances. 

• Action item: Use space assessment as a baseline to develop a strategy to address space needs.
  • Metric: Creation of a short-term, mid-term, and long-term plan to address space needs.  
• Action item: Generate a plan to work toward a new building for the College of Architecture, Arts, and Design.
  • Metric: Identify a strategy for achieving this new building. 

Objective 2: Find necessary lab space, storage facilities, and spaces for research and creative activities.

• Action item: Use space assessment as a baseline to develop a strategy to address space needs.
  • Metric: Creation of a short-term, mid-term, and long-term plan to address space needs.  
• Action item: Create and implement a strategic plan to address the most pressing recommendations for space needs based on the assessment.
  • Metric: Work with the AAD Dean’s Advisory Board to develop plans to address the most pressing space needs, as well as plans for short-, medium-, and long-term needs and aspirations.  

Objective 1: Support projects and research that reach underserved populations locally and globally.

• Action item and metric: Increase research and creative scholarship with a community-focused component.
  • Metric: Establish a baseline and increase by 10% annually over the next five years.
• Action item: Incorporate this impact into promotion and assessment metrics.
  • Metric: Measure the number of states, countries, and communities directly impacted; generate metric for increase.
  • Metric: Create a metric for impact in local and global communities

Objective 2: Connect to the larger campus community. 

• Action item: Expand offerings at the Washington-Alexandria Architecture Center (WAAC) to all AAD programs.
  • Metric: Establish a baseline and metric for growth. 

Objective 3: Capitalize on the location of the WAAC to have a broader reach. 

• Action item: Generate and support a growing number of opportunities; metric TBD. 

Objective 4: Create and conduct research with accessibility and sustainability in mind.

•  Action item: Support projects and research that are accessible and sustainable.
  • Metric: Increase the number of funded projects and resulting publications/exhibitions/performances. 
• Action item: Link the impact of each project with the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
  • Metric: Contribute to the university’s efforts to achieve a top Global 100 ranking in University Impact Rankings (Times Higher Education) by X date through linking projects.
  • Metric: Generate a yearly report impact to demonstrate growth in projects that link to SDGs for the college.