Working group for enhanced planning tools formed on campus

In a post-secondary environment where resources are shrinking, it is more important than ever to align the university’s resources with its priorities. A working group has been struck to research and recommend enhanced budget planning tools for UVic decision-makers in academic and service units.

Chaired by Associate Vice-President Academic Planning Katy Mateer, the group’s task is to recommend standardized criteria and an institutional data set that will assist administrators at all levels in aligning resources with priorities in their annual planning processes. The working group’s activities represent phase one of Enhanced Planning:Making Choices, an institutional planning initiative led by Vice-President Academic and Provost Reeta Tremblay. The working group is supported by an advisory committee that includes members of the Senate committees on university budget and planning, plus faculty, student and staff representatives.

“The long-term goal of these planning processes is to ensure UVic can maintain the quality of its programs and services—in education, research and community engagement —in our current financially constrained environment,” says Mateer. “We want to develop a set of enhanced tools that will allow budget decision-makers to assess the quality, cost and contribution of programs and activities in support of the university’s institutional priorities. The criteria and data need to be reliable, valid and evidence-based, so that they can be consistently applied across campus.”

Over the next few months, the working group will be consulting with university administrators and soliciting feedback to help it recommend straightforward, user-friendly and easily accessible criteria and data sets that will assist current planning processes. The group will also review criteria used by other universities.

The working group’s recommendations will be presented to the Integrated Planning Committee, with some of the criteria targeted to be available to start assisting university units beginning in fall 2014.

More info: www.uvic.ca/budgetandpriorities