The below message was sent to faculty, staff, and students on September 16, 2025.
Dear Â鶹ÊÓƵ Community,
The semester is in motion and the energy across campus is palpable. We started on an amazing note hearing from our students and faculty at Convocation. More than a handful of people – faculty, staff and students – have commented on how deep in the semester they feel already and how excited they are for the months to come.
At the town hall last Thursday, we marked an important milestone in our work together to build Â鶹ÊÓƵ’s next chapter. Following a year of conversations, consultation, surveys, and learning together – bolstered by valuable studies and focus group work that preceded my arrival at the College – we have arrived at a draft of Â鶹ÊÓƵ’s next strategic plan.
As we mark the 140th anniversary of the College’s first class this fall, we look forward to those who will join us in ten years, 2035, when we will celebrate the 150th anniversary. Those young people are starting fourth grade this fall. Â鶹ÊÓƵ’s next strategic plan – the next chapter – imagines what we can do together over the next ten years. At its core is the opportunity to envision the liberal arts of the future and to anticipate the knowledge and capacities that our graduates – both undergraduates and graduate students- will need to lead successful, engaged, and fulfilling lives. I cannot imagine a better community with which to tackle that challenge than ours.
You will see that the plan is organized around four areas of focus:
Foundational to our work in all of these areas is a comprehensive and expansive commitment to environmental sustainability, including accelerating the College’s work toward carbon neutrality by 2035.
The strategic plan will proceed in close alignment with – and be informed by – the comprehensive planning project launching this fall. That initiative will anticipate and guide our building and renovation needs for the coming decade.
I encourage you to think of the strategic plan as a directional framework, the specifics of which we will build together through experimentation and testing. I spoke last week about the opportunity to clarify our distinctiveness – what we might colloquially call our hook – to strengthen our place in the highly competitive higher education landscape. Up to $100,000 in pilot funding will be awarded this academic year to community members to design and pilot innovative ideas in support of the four focus areas and the question of what makes Â鶹ÊÓƵ distinct. There is an information session on Thursday, September 25 at 3 p.m. in Old Library 224 for further conversations.
In my inaugural address almost a year ago, I spoke of the College’s rich legacy, powerful global community, and bright future. At a moment when higher education’s value and models are increasingly challenged it is more important than ever that we invest in Â鶹ÊÓƵ’s distinctive strengths. We are called to steward the remarkable resources we have been given by the past and loaned by the future, so that those who come after us are empowered to do the same.
We will continue our conversations about the College’s next chapter in three Current Topics in Higher Education, several workshops and visits from DLR, our campus physical plan partners, and initiatives in process. Your feedback is also welcome in an email directly to me or through , which will close on Friday, October 10. I will provide an update at the start of the spring semester.
Thank you for a joyous beginning to the year and for your generous reflection and insights that have brought us to this point in the planning process.
With thanks,
Wendy Cadge
President and Professor of Sociology
Â鶹ÊÓƵ
101 N. Merion Ave., Â鶹ÊÓƵ, PA 19010
Pronouns: she/her
brynmawr.edu
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