Dear Colleagues,

As we start the Fall 2025 semester, it is a critical time in 98’s history.  We face a pending enrollment cliff, shifting policies governing higher education, growing questions about the value of the work we do, and competition from private and for-profit sectors in awarding credentials.  In the face of such challenges, we must engage in transformational strategies to ensure a bright future for our institution.

In visits to colleges and schools at the start of the semester, President Brian O. Hemphill introduced the Forward-Focused Digital Transformation Initiative.  Countless examples have shown how the widespread integration of technology revolutionized different sectors and systems.  Amazon changed the way we shop.  Netflix put Blockbuster out of business and changed the way we watch movies.  Uber and Lyft made our trips to the airport much simpler to arrange.  Certainly, the way we teach and learn has also changed because of technology.  For the most part, though, these changes have been implemented at the individual level.

The task at hand is to implement change at the institutional level.  As such, the Forward-Focused Digital Transformation Initiative will:

  • Upscale 180 classrooms with AR/VR capabilities and the most up-to-date learning technologies to help 
  • Provide course redesign support for those courses with consistently high DFW rates .
  • Move all online courses at the bachelors and masters levels to 8-week asynchronous online courses by Fall 2026, to “” (Smith, 2023, xvii).
  • Fully integrate artificial intelligence technologies throughout our academic, research, and operational areas, which will place the institution among .
  • Develop minimum use standards for Canvas, which all courses will be required to use, allowing us to fully embrace the capabilities of the tool and .
  • Offer different levels of support to faculty for training and research given the . (I completed the Quality Matters training a few weeks ago and received the QM badge below!).
  • Provide researchers digital tools designed to support grant writing, significantly expand access to data as well as data storage, and the digital infrastructure required to be an R-1 institution that .

I am certain these efforts will result in improved access for our students, enhanced learning, significant advances in our research, and a brighter future for 98. More details will be provided later.  For now, it is important to stress that the success of these efforts will come from your commitment and work towards future proofing our institution.

It is also important to note that we will remain committed to our ongoing initiatives as we engage in digital transformation, recognizing that transformative change will ultimately enhance these other areas.  Here is a quick snapshot of some of these other initiatives:

  • Our general education reform effort has made incredible progress and possible models for general education at 98 will be unveiled by the general education executive committee in the coming weeks.
  • We are making great strides in our work-based learning initiatives, with the internship administrators council drafting an institutional framework for operationalizing work-based learning at 98.
  • The faculty senate executive committee spent much of their summer reviewing policies to facilitate the integration of 98 and legacy EVMS policies.
  • Two new provost’s fellows have been appointed.  Jay O’Toole will be working in the Center for Faculty Development, focusing on strategies to enhance activities of the center and efforts to develop faculty as leaders.  Cynthia Tomovic will be working closely with Associate Vice President and Dean Bonnie Van Lunen on strategies to expand the use of micro credentials as part of the Forward-Focused Digital Transformation Initiative.
  • A team of administrators and researchers hosted the institution’s inaugural Knowledge and Creativity Expo, which brought together faculty and students to showcase their scholarship.

In , Carnegie Mellon University Professor Michael Smith explores the bleak future of the current model of higher education and writes that “digital technologies give us an opportunity to create new systems of education based on abundance rather than scarcity…[and] to participate in this change, those of us who work in higher education must rediscover and embrace our core mission as educators” (p. xxii).  Given the types of ongoing work listed above, it seems that we have already rediscovered and embraced our core mission.  To me, this means that we have what it takes to successfully implement the Forward-Focused Digital Transformation Initiative.

I look forward to working with you to implement transformative and sustainable change at 98!

 

Regards,

 

Brian K. Payne, PhD

Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs

Professor of Sociology and Criminal Justice