Arcadia2025 Adaptive Strategy

Arcadia University’s legacy is extraordinary. More than 165 years ago, we began as an institution offering women a liberal arts education. In the decades that followed, we pioneered opportunities in international education, writing across the curriculum, and so much more. Even during turbulent times, the University continued to evolve and advance.

From our founding as Beaver College in 1853 to the present day, Arcadia University continues a remarkable journey as a top-ranked private university in Greater Philadelphia and a national leader in international education. U.S. News & World Report ranks Arcadia nationally among the top universities in study abroad as well as among the top regional universities in the North. The Princeton Review has named Arcadia among the “Best in the Northeast” for five consecutive years, while the University’s Physical Therapy and Physician Assistant programs are nationally ranked in their respective categories by U.S. News & World Report.

Together, we have moved the Arcadia community forward in immeasurable ways. Our community embarked on the foundation for strategy work two years ago with the arrival of the University’s 22nd President, Dr. Ajay Nair. We were intentional as a community to engage in strategy development as an inclusive process, with a thriving model that was adaptive. Given the uncertainty of the times, we reimagined the strategy process and the strategy itself. ARCADIA 2025 is a strategy intended to help us experiment and take initiative, ask questions and create synergies, and move Arcadia ahead in often unknown and unknowable environments.

Today, disruptions in higher education are unprecedented. We must create an agile organization that doesn’t merely withstand external pressure—we must grow from disruption. The adaptive strategy we are developing as a community will help us build the Arcadia University of the future by drawing on the intrinsic qualities that make us unique, while ensuring that every Arcadia student can reach their full potential.

With an understanding of the major disruptions that are occurring in the higher education industry, we built a community of practice to enable and articulate our shared passions and commitments.

We began the paradigm shift in our community by building a shared agenda through our mission, vision, values, and strategic themes through UKnighted town hall meetings and the leadership of the Aspirational Steering Committee. Ultimately, our Adaptive Strategy is guided by our mission, vision, and values.

Arcadia University provides a distinctively global, integrative, and personal learning experience for intellectually curious undergraduate and graduate students in preparation for a life of scholarship, service, and professional contribution.

Arcadia University’s pioneering, global, integrated, liberal arts, and professional learning experience cultivates leaders who are intellectually fearless and uniquely prepared for life and work. Our highly regarded, values-based learning community reflects the world in which we want to live.

Our community work to date has uniquely positioned us to develop several possible scenarios and initiatives, culminating in nearly 100 initiatives organized around strategic themes. These initiatives have been prioritized into an appropriately ambitious, financially affordable, and flexible portfolio of strategic actions by our leadership team.

Through shared governance structures, and with Board oversight, we will execute, monitor, adapt, and redirect our strategy as needed to advance Arcadia. As we encounter unknown challenges, the University is well-positioned to thrive with this new philosophical shift in our strategic thinking and acting. The strategies described herein allow us to be nimble and pivot quickly as the future unfolds.

Rather than a rigid commitment to a strategy that is pinned down to programs and initiatives on a five- or even ten-year horizon, ours will provide constant assessment and evaluation in shorter intervals, where pivoting and shifting our efforts can be much more easily accomplished. Our Adaptive Strategy approach is guided by:

Because Arcadia has been in a highly active state of development for the past two years, this Adaptive Strategy contains tactical details as part of its articulation. Strategic goals remain appropriately ambitious and innovative in nature and present different and new approaches to advancing an area of interest. In total, they represent a longer-term (two-to-four years) directive, are aligned with the Arcadia Vision, and focus on long-term success. Strategic goals require active leadership by the President’s Cabinet for execution, working closely with next-level managers.

Through extensive scenario planning, our Adaptive Strategy represents a balance of actions focused on operational effectiveness, pilots or experiments that can be ramped up or scaled down quickly, and large-scale commitments where there is increasing clarity around a planned scenario in the face of uncertainty. Working collaboratively with the Board of Trustees, the administration will implement a cycle of execution, monitoring, adaptation, and potential redirection that will move Arcadia toward the most advantageous high-impact opportunities.

The Adaptive Strategy’s themes, goals, and objectives include many points of interconnectedness that will help us build more integrative approaches to complex initiatives that, along with their key performance indicators (KPIs), readily embrace goals and objectives found under other themes that will work to achieve desired outcomes. Through extensive and regular assessment and scenario planning in all levels of planning, the University will use cutting-edge software to align, organize, document, report, and monitor our actions. This system will support a data-informed adaptive strategy, program review, accreditation, and managing academic and administrative outcomes.

The four Themes and associated strategic goals capture a series of objectives and initiatives that are threaded throughout the Adaptive Strategy and cut across all of our colleges, departments, and divisions. With support and direction from the Office of Strategic Initiatives and the Office of Institutional Research and Effectiveness, departments will further align their strategy with the University’s strategic direction and provide annual reports to ensure accountability. The University will produce a comprehensive annual report to document progress.

Once the strategic direction was approved in February by the Board, we have continued our work with the Board and community to align an adaptive multi-year business plan, further develop risk profiles for initiatives, solidify KPIs, continue work on a Campus Master Plan, and develop a collaborative system with the Board to monitor and respond to uncertainties. The strategic direction and associated goals, objectives, and initiatives in this document were prioritized because they will enable or directly contribute to student success and increased revenue. The Provost and Chief Financial Officer will work through our new budget governance process, and with the Finance and Infrastructure Committee of the Board, to align our strategic direction with the proposed fiscal year 2021 operating and capital budgets and a five-year business plan. We will seek approval in May for the fiscal year 2021 capital and operating budgets as well as a five-year business plan which supports the strategic direction, with the understanding that the adaptive nature of the strategy calls for periodic reviews that may result in redirection of strategy and associated resources.

Theme Team leaders and identified initiative owners will undertake a process that articulates the specific metrics (e.g., number of persons, percent of matriculants) as well as target dates for completion. These specific data points will then be entered into a dynamic online strategic management system that will be actively managed and monitored by staff and administration. In addition, the initiative-level KPIs will inform a smaller set of plan-level KPIs that will more efficiently enable us to measure success. Status reports will be regularly generated from the strategic management system and provided to key stakeholders and Board committees for review.

Our Adaptive Strategy implementation process will include performing risk analyses of potential threats and shifts coming from both external and internal contexts. With direct involvement by members of the Board of Trustees and with community support, our leadership team will work to monitor and consider key uncertainties (e.g., business model risks, reputational risks, operating model risks, enrollment supply risks, compliance risks) and related signposts (e.g., KPIs) that will ensure our adaptability and antifragility as an organization.

Arcadia University’s long-standing traditions of innovation, inclusion, and global engagement establish a unique evolutionary opportunity for the next decade: to redefine academic excellence as Arcadia’s success in meeting students where they are, building transformational academic and professional experiences, and measuring attainment in terms of social impact and self-fulfillment.

Deepen the Undergraduate Experience through Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) and Global Lenses

Arcadia will solidify and expand on its national leadership in global engagement and interconnect it with a leading higher education model for justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion.

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Launch New Undergraduate and Graduate Programs across Pedagogies and Modalities

Leveraging market demands and opportunities for social impact, Arcadia will expand and diversify its programming, paying particular attention to the synergies among its four academic epicenters: liberal arts, health sciences, global business, and education.

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Increase Undergraduate Enrollment and Diversity through New Recruitment and Enrollment Strategies

Arcadia will develop comprehensive, innovative, and contemporary strategies that will redefine how students are recruited and enrolled at the University.

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Increase Graduate Enrollment through a Strategy Focused on Program Mix and Recruitment

Leveraging its unique mix of programmatic and professional strengths, Arcadia will develop and execute a graduate program strategy that delivers compelling professional growth, extends Arcadia’s brand, amplifies its social impact, and generates new revenue.

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Implement Whole-life Advising and Planning 

Implement an advising framework designed to support our students as they pursue academic and life goals at Arcadia and beyond.

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Expand our Commitment to Teaching, Learning, Mentoring, and Research

Grounded in the belief that the entire Arcadia community should be committed to transforming lives, and recognizing the opportunities for pedagogical innovation across all disciplines, we will create a physical and virtual entity that builds capacity within and across units, roles, and programs to deliver on Arcadia’s mission, vision, and values.

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Leverage Philadelphia’s Career Landscape to Provide Engaging Opportunities for Student Learning and Development

Building strong relationships in and through businesses, organizations, and institutions in the Philadelphia region, we will provide robust opportunities for students to learn and grow through practical experiences and internships.

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Enrich Global Ventures and Initiatives

Expand, deepen, and enhance shared academic, experiential, co-curricular global initiatives supporting student engagement and learning, faculty collaboration and research, and innovative institutional partnerships.

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Promote all aspects of student achievement through engaging curricular and co-curricular programs and services that empower personal and professional success.

Design a Student Success Strategy for Underrepresented and Underserved Students 

Develop equitable and inclusive programs that are designed to support students from underrepresented and/or underserved backgrounds.

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Create a Career Ecosystem

Enhance career education and preparedness of undergraduate students by creating a career ecosystem, woven throughout curricular and co-curricular experiences throughout students’ time at Arcadia.

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Create a Collaborative Model for Student Experience

Enlist the campus community in creating an institutional climate supportive of student success by integrating student-focused systems and service.

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Develop a Practice that Informs, Facilitates, and Improves the Well-being of Students

Create a uniquely Arcadia framework based on best practices for inclusive excellence, student success, achievement, belonging, and well-being.

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Design a Robust New-Student Experience from Acceptance to the First Day of the Second Year

Through thoughtful attention to our students’ experience during their first year at Arcadia, including first-year, transfer and graduate students, design a comprehensive plan for this timeframe that includes targeted programs and communication plans which facilitate curricular and co-curricular activities, reflection, and learning.

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Provide High-quality, Meaningful Opportunities For Parents and Family Members to Engage with the Arcadia Community

Integrate critical elements of successful, sustainable, and scalable programs that seek to inform and connect families to the Arcadia community in impactful ways.

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Develop a Residential Engagement Strategy

Build a robust residential program that increases participation rate, enriches student learning, and fosters a spirit of engagement and community among students, staff, and faculty.

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Reimagine Arcadia’s Graduate Environment

Create a sense of belonging and enhance engagement for graduate students within and beyond their program.

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Forge partnerships and alliances, affirm the talents of diverse populations, engage in difficult dialogue, and question our own practices through the lenses of justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion.

Expand Vibrant Partnerships Across the Region

Create local partnerships and alliances with mutually beneficial goals both to strengthen Arcadia’s commitment to the community and to elevate students’ learning experiences through a meaningful application.

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Meet the Financial Needs of Diverse Applicants and Affinity Groups

Through meaningful awarding of financial aid, help students find clear pathways toward success related to their diverse interests and affinities.

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Expand Specialized Admission Programs

Arcadia will give more students opportunities to see a clear home for themselves as they make their college choices.

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Promote Dialogue and Safeguard Open Expression

Promote engaged discourse through clear frameworks for open expression and a renewed emphasis on dialogue and debate.

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Expand Community-engaged Teaching and Learning in Local and International Settings

Provide applied learning opportunities for students to practice community engagement and produce meaningful outputs beyond the traditional classroom.

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Position Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) at the Center of All of the Institution’s Work

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Expand Environmentally Sustainable Practices

Create new programs to measure and address campus carbon footprint, and organize education around the most relevant and current topics.

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Arcadia’s strength is its people. Investing in our campus, culture, and community unites us in purpose and empowers our community to contribute and lead our institution into the next decade. We will develop a culture of engagement, intentionally entering into supportive relationships with students to create a sense of belonging and development as work-ready and life-ready adults. 

Develop a Plan for Digital Transformation

A multi-phased digital transformation effort that will fuel innovation, enhance learning, maximize institutional resources, and improve business processes and stakeholder experiences at Arcadia University. The transformation will create the framework and infrastructure by which technology and data can be leveraged as key institutional assets.

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Achieve Shared Governance Excellence

Enhance organizational effectiveness, intentionally balancing participation in planning and decision-making among
various campus constituents.

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Support University Advancement Engagement Initiatives

Increase awareness about the power of communal giving and impact philanthropy through radical generosity.

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Develop a Multi-Year University Budget Model

Develop a funding plan utilizing operational surpluses, redeployments, partnerships, new initiatives, philanthropy, investment, and debt to redeploy, cultivate, and grow the resources available to power strategic initiatives.

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Launch an Institutional Branding Initiative

Create a brand platform that is authentic to Arcadia, based on market research.

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Centralize a University Marketing Strategy

Unify and centralize the University’s market dynamics, demographics, and competitive benchmarking.

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Establish a High-Performance Culture

Attract, motivate, develop, and retain highly talented and diverse faculty and staff to deliver exceptional results.

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Develop a Campus Master Plan

Assess and leverage ways in which the priorities of the adaptive strategy may be best supported through physical structures and campus layout.

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After the strategic direction was approved by the Board of Trustees in February 2020, the University has continued its work with community members to align a business plan, further develop risk profiles for initiatives, solidify KPIs, and develop a collaborative and routine system with the Board to monitor and respond to uncertainties, which may result in further redirection of our strategy.

We are confident that Arcadia’s future growth and prosperity will be well-guided by this adaptive approach. Undoubtedly, our efforts will lead to Arcadia’s next transformation. Even as we pay homage to the ingenuity and fearlessness that are our hallmarks, through our engagement with you, we have learned that today’s world demands more. Our Adaptive Strategy will keep us mission-focused while helping us remain nimble in a quickly evolving environment.

With such momentum and urgency, it is hard not to dream about the future. The community engagement activities in the past year-and-a-half are producing a spectacular dream—one that we are confident we can achieve.