Provost's Message to the Campus
Summary
September 25, 2009
Full Description
To: W&M Community
From: Michael R. Halleran,Provost
Re: A Conversation about W&M as a Liberal Arts University in the 21st Century
The College of William & Mary is a liberal arts university, combining with distinction the historic strengths of the liberal arts tradition and the intense focus of a contemporary research university. This past year’s strategic planning process reaffirmed this core identity and laid out ambitious goals predicated on our excellence in this arena. Appropriately, the first item on this year’s agenda is to engage in a broad campus conversation about what it means for W&M to be a liberal arts university in the 21st century.
This conversation will invite wide participation—of faculty, students, staff, Board of Visitors members, alumni and other members of the W&M community. It will also be purposeful: our goal is to develop a compelling vision of W&M as a liberal arts university in the 21st century that will in part guide future discussions about fundamental curricular issues. Formats for this conversation will include small groups, open forums and town hall-style events, and we will invite to campus national leaders to join in and enrich our conversation.
The College comprises faculties and schools of arts and sciences, business, education, law and marine science, with undergraduate, professional, and master’s and doctoral degrees in selected fields. Each school and program has individual strengths and a distinct identity, but throughout our conversations we should be thinking about the totality of the university. To borrow the old adage, how do we imagine our whole as greater than the sum its parts? Or, to use a less common phrase, how do we turn our attributes into our advantages? While there are many dimensions to this large topic, the following issues should be included in a successful campus conversation:
1) What do we mean by liberal arts in the 21st century? Looking forward, how do we define this term: by fields of study, breadth of learning, modes of inquiry and/or other characteristics?
2) What role does scholarship—a term meant to encompass creative production in all the fields represented by the College—play in the liberal arts university and the education we provide our students? What is the desired balance and interaction between scholarship and teaching?
3) W&M offers degrees in graduate and professional programs, with about one fourth of its students in these programs. How do they interact with the undergraduate programs in our vision of a liberal arts university?
4) Integration is becoming a defining characteristic of discovery and learning; we see this in the increasingly global nature of our curriculum, interdisciplinary courses and programs, cross-school initiatives, collaborative research groups, service learning, study abroad, undergraduate research, etc. How does a liberal arts university in the 21st century embrace this principle of integration, building on strong disciplines and traditional structures, to create the most robust education?
5) The 2008-09 strategic plan‘s visions statement declares that our students arrive wanting to change the world and leave with the tools to do so. How do we ensure that this ideal is realized?
The above issues are not meant to be restrictive; our liberal arts conversation will take up other topics beyond these. This is not intended as a theoretical exercise: we should focus on the particular implications of W&M being a liberal arts university as we move forward, and at all times the fundamental values of academic excellence and opportunity should inform our discussion,
This conversation will culminate in a white paper for consideration by the faculty in April 2010 to guide future discussions and reexamination of curricula. Just as important as this white paper are the strength and breadth of the conversation leading up to it. And it is this conversation that I ask all of you to join with me this year. A steering committee, including members of the Planning Steering Committee (PSC), will give shape to this year-long process, and I invite all of you to participate in this important dialogue about the essence of our distinctive College. Details on specific events will follow throughout the year.
