About CODE

Included here are excerpts from Rice's two core planning documents that are relevant to CODE's planning efforts: Rice: The Next Century (1997) and Implementing Rice: The Next Century (1998). Omissions have been noted with [...]. The complete version of Rice: The Next Century is available at http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~provweb/plan/plan.html, while the full implementation plan is found at http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~provweb/plan/implemplan.html.

Rice: The Next Century

GOAL 1: ENHANCE OUR STUDENTS' EDUCATION THROUGH INITIATIVES THAT SHARPEN THEIR CRITICAL THOUGHT, BROADEN THEIR INTELLECTUAL HORIZONS, AND DEEPEN THEIR KNOWLEDGE.

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Initiative 3. We will involve undergraduates in our research programs wherever possible. These opportunities will be open to all undergraduates and in all academic divisions.

Such learning opportunities enhance the close faculty-student interactions we seek at Rice. They also expose undergraduates to leading-edge research and involve them in the process of experimentation, independent thinking and scholarship, and intellectual inquiry that will serve them well throughout their lives. We believe that these possibilities exist in all fields. We have the research faculty, the graduate students to provide additional support, and the facilities to make the research experience a valuable one for undergraduates. The Fall, 1996, issue of Sallyport depicts numerous outstanding examples of undergraduate research. But much more needs to be done. To begin with, the university should develop an incentive fund for faculty and departments to create undergraduate research opportunities. Individual faculty and departments should be encouraged to apply for these funds on a competitive basis and a faculty committee should be formed to select the best proposals for funding.

Initiative 4. We will encourage collaborative, interdepartmental, inter-divisional and even inter-institutional courses.

In all disciplines, from the humanities to the sciences, recent changes in our approaches to problem solving have blurred the boundaries between traditional disciplines. Many of the issues that scholars want to examine and those that society asks us to address are amenable only to interdisciplinary approaches. To educate our students by means of such approaches will not only expose them to the latest developments in the academy, but will better prepare them for the world beyond. This point was made recently by Phillip A. Griffiths, Director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, with reference to graduate education in the sciences and engineering. But his statement applies to all academic areas and at all levels. Because it touches on matters that go to the heart of this report, it bears quoting:

Current changes in the conduct of science present a challenge for the traditional department structure found in most universities. The organization of science is becoming more flexible, and the boundaries between fields are becoming more permeable. Employers are seeking scientists and engineers who not only are well grounded in their fields but who can also communicate, collaborate, and work across disciplines . . . . New Ph.D.'s must be prepared to meet a variety of challenges in fields as wide-ranging as industrial and technological development, health care, environmental protection, secondary-level education, and urban planning and development. Yet many employers are highly critical of recent graduates' qualifications for nonacademic jobs. They describe students as over-specialized in relation to the variety of tasks they will confront and ill-prepared in areas such as communication and team skills.[4]

Rice should further facilitate the creation of interdisciplinary programs, including areas that enhance the interaction of the three professional schools - architecture, business, and music - with the rest of the university. Our students would benefit enormously from such programs. The appointment process for new faculty can play a central role in fostering inter-disciplinary research. In addition, to encourage interdisciplinary and inter-divisional teaching, the university should create an incentive fund to help faculty teams develop interdisciplinary courses and to help departments and divisions fill the curricular voids created by interdisciplinary collaborations. These funds should be allocated by a faculty committee on a competitive basis. Also, care should be taken to seize opportunities for collaboration in instructional programs involving other institutions including those of the nearby Texas Medical Center, NASA, University of Houston and others.

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GOAL 4: MORE FULLY INTEGRATE UNDERGRADUATE AND GRADUATE EDUCATION AS WELL AS TEACHING AND RESEARCH.

Initiative 17. Rice will establish visiting scholars programs and explore ways to bring distinguished scholars and talented postdoctoral fellows to our campus on short-term appointments.

Greater reliance upon visiting or part-time scholars could improve the intellectual life of the campus while minimizing long-term commitments. The presence of such visitors helps sustain the sense of excitement that is conducive to excellence and provides the Rice community, faculty and students alike, with fresh perspectives and viewpoints. To this end we should also establish programs, and the necessary financial and administrative infrastructure, to bring outstanding scholars and postdoctoral fellows to the campus for appointments up to two or three years long. At present the country has an abundance of exceptional talent at both levels, and a rare opportunity exists to bring some of the nation's finest scholars to Houston. The presence of distinguished scholars and postdoctoral fellows whose research interests intersect those of the faculty could enrich the campus significantly.

Initiative 18. We will explore new opportunities for the formation of interdisciplinary centers and institutes.

The difficulties of maintaining a vibrant intellectual community in smaller-sized departments can also be mitigated by the formation of research Institutes and Centers. These bring faculty together across disciplinary boundaries to work on problems of common interest; they enhance the effectiveness of individual talent. Some of our Institutes have built strong reputations by spotting opportunities and acting quickly to take advantage of them. In all fields they create attractive vehicles for fundraising and help alleviate the problems, especially acute in a university of Rice's size, created by cycles of "hot" and "cold" research activity. With their widespread contacts and interdisciplinary projects, Institutes and Centers can also foster the broader education needed by graduate students today, important in preparing them for future shifts in career directions.

GOAL 5: SUBSTANTIALLY STRENGTHEN OUR LIBRARY AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY RESOURCES IN SUPPORT OF EXCELLENCE IN TEACHING AND RESEARCH.

At its intellectual center, every great university has a great library. It is a repository for the basic materials that sustain the institution's educational and scholarly activities. It is also the university's gateway to resources housed around the world. All members of the Rice community depend upon the library for access to the books, articles, on-line data, and images they need for their work. For this reason, an outstanding library is essential to the health of the entire institution. In the past we have not consistently recognized how central the library is to Rice's pursuit of its educational mission, and we have suffered for it. Many think that Fondren Library is not adequate even for undergraduate instruction. One undergraduate recently wrote to our Committee: "Something needs to be done about the library, and soon. There are just not enough resources - not only are we not competitive with the larger research schools, but students' basic needs frequently are not met." Many faculty, particularly in the humanities, cannot perform the most basic of research tasks with the resources available at Rice, including those accessed over the internet.

Initiative 19. We will develop a bold plan to enhance library facilities, collections, and related information services so that the library becomes a truly effective center for learning and scholarship.

As we enter the next century, continued excellence at Rice will depend on committing significant additional resources for expanding the range of what is available through the library. New developments in technology make this a particularly opportune moment to undertake such a program of expansion. Fondren Library can become an innovative and valuable resource center for the entire Rice community, but vision, boldness, planning, and the imaginative use of electronic media are required to make this happen. From the outset it must be recognized that books and other traditional documents will continue to form the core of the collection. Most of these materials will not be available on-line for a long time to come, some never. For certain research programs, the book is the best technology and is likely to remain so. This is the view of the most informed experts on libraries in the country, who are knowledgeable both about the world of books and computer technology. Therefore, if the work of faculty and students is to advance, we will need an expanded collection of such documents in the coming decade. However, because significant expenditures will doubtless be required for this purpose and for the preservation of the current collection, the library's acquisitions policy will need to be guided by the recommendations of the library planning committee and by this strategic plan. The growth of library collections cannot occur in all fields, but must be linked to areas of curricular and research growth in the rest of the university. The library will also have to expand what is available to users by finding new ways to share resources and information with other libraries and institutions. Finally, the library will need to establish protocols for determining what library materials we should purchase and in what form. It will need to create a process that addresses current critical needs like library shelf space, while preserving maximal flexibility for the collection's future organization and availability.

Initiative 20. Rice University will take maximum advantage of information technology to help realize its educational and scholarly aspirations. At the same time it will continually and carefully monitor the costs of investment in information technology against the benefits it brings to its academic programs.

Although books will remain central to the mission of the University for the foreseeable future, it is indisputable that the rapid advance of computing and telecommunications is changing the ways in which knowledge is stored, transferred, processed, produced, and thought about. Some of these changes are likely to have a profound effect on society in general. We also foresee a transformation in our ideas of teaching, learning, research, academic publication, libraries, encyclopedias, and journals. To continue to flourish as a first rate institution, Rice must use the new technologies in ways that help fulfill its primary mission of teaching and research. We need to formulate procedures for assessing the research needs of the faculty, whether they take the form of printed books or computing technology.

At the same time, it is critical that the expenditure of funds for information systems be determined by our academic needs and goals and not by the technology itself. We know from experience that it is easy to spend a great deal of money on computer technology and information systems without being able to measure the benefits of the outcome. While we recognize that experimentation with new technologies is essential to discovering their most effective use, we caution against extensive investments without first developing careful measures of the benefits of such investments for teaching and scholarship. To underline the importance of this guideline, we recommend that the faculty play a major role in the process of determining technological initiatives.

Information technology can enhance all of the University's fundamental activities in the pursuit, production, and dissemination of knowledge. Intelligently deployed, it can help Rice to overcome some of the constraints imposed by size, since it facilitates sharing of costly resources with other institutions and makes certain kinds of research more efficient. The University needs to strengthen its computing infrastructure with enough servers, sufficient network band width, and flexible systems connections to allow faculty and students to communicate effectively with one another and with the outside world. All faculty and students at the University must have access to the Internet.

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Initiative 21. We will ensure that expenditures for computing needs become part of the regular budgetary process, with sufficient funds committed not just for the purchase but for the maintenance and replacement of equipment and information technology.

In the last decade, Rice has purchased large quantities of computers and information technology. These purchases have and continue to be made on the capital budget, as if computer purchases were one-time events. We need to move these expenditures to the operating budget and develop a process for amortizing them on a realistic schedule that takes into account equipment obsolescence within a five-year period. Because computing needs have not been treated as part of the operating budget, it has been difficult to plan for them in academic areas. The ad hoc nature of the process has placed impediments on long-term planning and wise decision making.

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Initiative 22. The President will create a standing committee, called the Committee on University Information Resource Development, whose members, appointed by the President, will deal with long-term planning for both the library and for computing on campus.

The Computer Planning Board's 1990 Five-year Strategic Plan for Information Services and Computing Facilities developed long-range goals that are still relevant for Rice University. That board no longer exists, but another committee, the Library Planning Committee, is now at work with a similar focus on long-range planning. Given that both committees were charged to deal with long-term issues in areas of overlapping interest, and given the close interdependence of the library and computer technology, it will be most effective to create a single committee to assess the University's progress in these areas and advise on long-term goals and strategies. A single board, charged with strategic planning for both the library and computing, will underscore the fact that we need to be concerned with how to identify, acquire, access, and maintain information that is essential for research and teaching, regardless of the form that the information takes. In this context, it is clear that the Fondren library is at once the repository and circulation center for books, monographs and periodicals and at the same time the vital research information hub of the campus.

Unlike the standing committees on computing and the library, this committee will focus on long-term issues rather than on immediate concerns and matters of implementation. It will also serve to enhance the faculty's communication with the staffs that manage the Library's and the University's information systems so that a judicious balance can be struck between the dual needs for additional paper documents and digitized information. As part of this function, it will help to convey that while we must take advantage of emerging technologies, the disruption to users of older technologies should be kept to a minimum and those users should be consulted in the planning process.

Drawing on existing strengths and some unique resources, Rice can aim to be a leader in adapting new technologies to research and teaching, but equally to service and community outreach. It is important to encourage and support experiments in educational computing like the Galileo Project, the NSCI 230 course, and various electronic studio ideas currently underway.

The University should also employ new technology to upgrade its administrative functions and its own institutional research data. Obsolete computer technology and information systems in these areas can be an impediment to the academic functions of the university. The inefficiencies they create can leave fewer resources for teaching and research.

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Initiative 23. We will continue to develop the Center for Technology in Teaching and Learning as a cooperative venture of the Fondren Library and the Division of Information Technology. We will ensure that faculty are informed about what it can do to support them. We will also improve classroom and research facilities where needed so that faculty can use the new technological tools for teaching and research.

There is great value in the current proposals for a Center for Technology in Teaching and Learning in the Fondren Library. The Center can succeed, however, only if a significant number of faculty become involved. We need to make faculty aware of the present capabilities of information technology and to help prepare them for likely new developments. This will require intimate cooperation between the Center and Information Services. In developing and implementing advanced applications for teaching, research and communications, the Center can help to define an appropriate and challenging role for information technology at Rice.

GOAL 6: INCREASE OUR INVOLVEMENT AND PRESENCE IN LOCAL, NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITIES IN WAYS THAT BOTH CONTRIBUTE TO THE COMMON GOOD AND INCREASE THE RECOGNITION OF THE UNIVERSITY.

Initiative 26. We will enhance support for programs of community education at all age levels, employing a range of traditional and innovative formats, including electronic technologies and the expanded potential of KTRU.

Better use of electronic technologies is important if we are to fulfill our potential for educating those who are neither regular students nor enrolled in Continuing Studies courses. There should be experiments with offering courses from Rice over the Internet, with providing data to the public, and electronic exchanges with faculty in their subject fields. Alumni who now feel disconnected from the University could be brought into closer and more active relationship with their Alma Mater in this way. Taking life-long learning seriously means stimulating a commitment to it among our current students, alumni, and the broader public.

Rice has, as noted above, been involved in many efforts to provide knowledge and leadership in pre-collegiate education, K-12. Most notable are the collaborative initiatives with HISD that went into planning and starting The Rice School / La Escuela Rice. These are difficult and time-consuming endeavors, but they are of great importance as communities wrestle with the many problems of public education. Rice must accept its part of this responsibility, and those especially interested in these problems and local opportunities for confronting them would benefit if we maintained a central catalog of such projects.

The Strategic Planning Committee's interest in expanded interaction with the community and the University's interest in life-long learning led to enthusiastic discussions concerning the greatly enlarged broadcast capacity of KTRU. We believe it is appropriate to begin using this valuable resource in a variety of new ways that would supplement its current programming. The station provides an invaluable means for making the University's educational presence felt throughout this region, with a large population now within the range of its expanded and enhanced signal. All sorts of opportunities suggest themselves: the broadcasting of language courses; news and commentary; outstanding Rice lectures; interviews with scholars, scientists, artists and leaders who are visiting the University or the city; the broadcasting of concerts from The Shepherd School, radio drama... - the list goes on and excites the imagination. We recommend that a group of students, faculty, and staff be formed by the President to explore these possibilities. There is much to be learned from those universities that have had successful programs for a long time, such as WHA at the University of Wisconsin. An expanded KTRU could be a fine training ground for many students with disparate interests while providing a public voice for the University that could attract and enrich a large listening public.

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Initiative 27. We will foster mutually beneficial partnerships with other institutions and organizations, and with industry.

Partnerships are a valuable means of exploring possibilities that would otherwise be beyond our reach. They can be formed with other institutions, public and private, with industry, with governments, and in some cases with individuals. Possibilities for partnerships and joint ventures with the institutions of the Texas Medical Center, NASA, and the University of Houston are especially promising. Through a sharing of resources, funds and knowledge, partnerships can open new research arenas to us, particularly in cross-disciplinary fields. Many research issues can now be addressed only on a global scale. Even large institutions can approach these questions only in cooperation with others. In many of these joint efforts important issues arise, such as intellectual property rights or the need for strong but flexible technology transfer programs for ideas and inventions that may have significant societal implications. We need to be at the forefront of the national and international discussions of these questions.

Such partnerships often involve international travel, emphasizing again the importance of foreign language skill and knowledge of other cultures. There is probably no better way to convince students of that importance than to place them in situations that require these skills and knowledge, in conjunction with projects and persons inherently interesting to them. Study abroad and student exchange programs have been discussed already in this report. We simply wish here to underline them again as essential to broadening our horizons at Rice, achieving throughout the University a greater sense of our regional and international context, and our expanded capacity for broad, stimulating interaction and leadership beyond the hedges.

Implementation Plan

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A. Enhance the Quality and Value of Education and Scholarship at Rice.

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4. Strengthen our library.

The recent Report of the Library Planning Committee outlines a much-enhanced role for the library as a central resource for Rice, the region, and the nation, using traditional and emerging technologies. To serve this broader mission, we have already committed $1 million from our current operating budget over the next five years to upgrade the undergraduate collection, and we are planning substantial enhancements of the library's programs and facilities. The most significant of these enhancements will be program and collection development amounting to an estimated $21.5 million over the next six years and a major expansion of the library facility between the fiscal years 2000 and 2003, estimated at $35.9 million. We must also undertake further renovation of the existing facility, which will cost an estimated $1.9 million. A new library for the Shepherd School will not only enhance our offerings in music, but will also liberate scarce space in the main library facility at a cost of approximately $3.6 million. We must continue to provide within the library easy access to information resources for all of our students and to be responsive to their evolving technological needs for performing class work and in conducting research. Responsibility for these initiatives rests with the vice provost and university librarian, in consultation with the president, the provost, the deans, the vice president for information technology, and the vice president for advancement.

5. Enhance learning through information technology.

The technologies of chalk, pencils, and books have strongly influenced the ways universities acquire and share knowledge. Now information technology promises to change profoundly the ways in which our faculty teach and students learn. For Rice, the strategic import of information technology lies in the enrichment of the intensely individualized, personal, and often private style of learning we value so highly. But to gain the most from these powerful new tools, we must develop new ways of integrating students, teachers, and technology, while at the same time making most efficacious use of traditional information resources. If we can do this, we can:

Prepare our students for life in the Information Age by facilitating a shift from teaching to learning throughout our academic programs;
Create an electronic Rice community extending to all Rice alumni, that becomes the primary environment for life-long learning among graduates of Rice;
Extend and enrich the Rice community through electronic linkages to other organizations and institutions; and
Develop new ways of using technology to help members of the expanded Rice community acquire, share, and manage knowledge.

By vigorously pursuing these aims, we will support the core purpose of the university--the promotion of a singular style of learning and investigation. And the technology we develop for knowledge management will support our research activities and enhance our administrative processes.

To support the strategic plan of the university, we will balance a set of interlocking investments in people, technology, and traditional library resources. Much of our current success with technology stems from the integration of staff from Information Technology and the Fondren Library on divisional teams that support the academic and administrative programs of the university. To keep pace with advancing technology, we need to strengthen continuously the technical staff of these teams. And we need to add people highly trained in academic disciplines to help faculty integrate electronic and conventional resources in new learning environments. The augmented support teams will help us retain faculty in their unique role as creators of the "magic of the classroom." Our current effort to transform language teaching with technology shows the power of this collaboration.

The advance of information technology poses complex investment choices for Rice. A devotion to an overarching strategic goal--the support of a singular style of learning and investigation--will make these choices easier and sharply reduce the problems of managing our information technology portfolio in the years ahead. In FY 1998, Rice is spending $1.4 million through the capital budget for electronic classrooms and campus infrastructure improvements. We intend to raise $7 million to fund this activity for fiscal years 2000 through 2004. The vice president for information technology is responsible for the administration of technology on campus, with guidance from faculty, the deans, the provost, and the president.

C. Expand and Strengthen our Interactions "Beyond the Hedges."

4. Expand the use of technology in creating a "virtual Rice," an expanded network of Rice faculty, students, alumni and friends to encourage life-long relationships among the wider Rice community

Given the tremendous rate of growth in the volume and scope of services available on the world-wide web, each year witnesses a doubling or trebling in the number of people who use this powerful tool for business, recreation, and general communication. The explosion in network communication is irreversible, and Rice is moving aggressively to take advantage of it. "Virtual Rice" already exists. Our alumni especially our recent alumni are already conversant in the use of the web for work and for keeping in touch with their families, their friends, and their professional associates. As educated members of society, they are far more likely than most to welcome a link to their university community, to the friends whom they met here and to their faculty and advisors who have helped shape their lives. Today, we matriculate students to Rice not simply for a four-year experience. We admit them for a life of learning. With the growth and wise use of the electronic network, we are well positioned to be able to keep this growing cadre of graduates in close touch with their alma mater. "Virtual Rice" is as yet an untapped network of tremendous potential. Our task is to ensure that it grows in ways that are consistent with our institutional mission of quality education while providing the fullest possible access to the resources of the university to all members of the Rice community for a lifetime.

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