Associated Student Government (ASG) is planning for Miami University's future by creating a document detailing the organization's long-term goals.
Student Body President Jonathan McNabb revealed a "Four-Year Strategic Vision" at Tuesday's student senate meeting.
"It's really about setting goals in general," McNabb said. "It's making the statement 'We have serious goals.'"
McNabb said ASG complies a list of goals at the beginning of every year, but this year was different since ASG put forth an actual document with goals for the upcoming four years.
"We're using this (document) to guide us," McNabb said. "This really is a starting point in my mind."
McNabb said having ASG create a four-year plan is something relatively new. Since most student concerns are not fixed overnight, it was important to McNabb and Adam Harris, student body vice president, to create a long-term list of goals.
"I think it's definitely a good idea to start off the year with some guidelines," said Adam Clampitt-Dietrich, president of student senate.
The "Four-Year Strategic Vision" is four pages long and broken into four sections - enhance the student experience, engaged student learning, maximize fiscal resources and ensure representative excellence.
According to the "Four-Year Strategic Vision" document, it was created "to give student governance at Miami solid direction and to let the university community better understand the perspective of students."
ASG will establish public yearly plans each year to carry out the long-term goals established in the "Four-Year Strategic Vision."
The "One-Year Implementation Plan" for the 2009-10 academic year lists several goals and is more than a page long. One goal listed was to address chronic transportation problems, such as implementing a bus to Wal-Mart or transportation for international students during school breaks. Another goal listed is to educate students on recent changes to the integrity policy in the student handbook.
The "Four-Year Strategic Vision" document was worded broadly to allow flexibility, McNabb said.
"It's very hard to say in four years what we need to implement," McNabb said. "We want it to be a living document."
Students in ASG will hold each other accountable for carrying out these goals, McNabb said.
"It's going to be a lot of collaboration between senate, cabinet and administration," Clampitt-Dietrich said.
McNabb said this informal document will be posted on the ASG Web site once it's finalized and e-mailed to every student in an upcoming ASG monthly newsletter.
"We want students to hold us accountable," he said.
