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UW System hammers out Growth Agenda details

The University of Wisconsin's role in the future of the state economy was discussed at a statewide listening session Tuesday afternoon.

A live teleconference was broadcast simultaneously to 50 different sites throughout Wisconsin, offering each site an opportunity to hear details about the Advantage Wisconsin program and later have questions answered by UW System president Kevin Reilly and UW System Executive Vice President Donald Mash.

The Advantage Wisconsin program is a strategic framework meant to help ensure UW System campuses aid in the future success of Wisconsin’s businesses, communities, residents and students, Reilly said.

"I want to emphasize that this is not an institutional strategic plan, but a systemwide strategic plan designed to do two things: guide the motion of the entire system with all its moving parts in the right direction going forward and provide shared context for decision making at all levels of the university," Reilly said in the teleconference.

Reilly added each UW campus has a specific plan as to how it will benefit the state in the future, which is part of "an umbrella systemwide strategic plan [that] will help us make the whole more than the sum of its parts."

"We believe, of course, that the UW System is a great advantage for Wisconsin, one that the state should leverage more effectively," Reilly said. "The point of our framework building activity is to figure out … how to use the UW to best advantage Wisconsin in the 21st-century knowledge economy."

Reilly thanked Wisconsin’s early leaders for creating a "stellar higher education system that spurred successful communities and strong industries since 1848 when we became a state," adding the Advantage Wisconsin program is a way to leverage the UW’s assets.

The UW System, Mash said, must commit to do several things in order to move Wisconsin successfully into the future, including increasing the number of graduates and educational opportunities for Wisconsin residents, as well as improving access to higher education, retention rates and graduate rates. He added that the UW System must also link its research programs to entrepreneurship and business development.

"Most important, our enriched strategic framework will guide discussions we will have with businesses, community and political leaders about how the UW, in partnership with others, can better advantage Wisconsin," Mash said.

After Reilly and Mash finished addressing viewers and listeners, each site broke into smaller discussions aboutits region-specific roles in Advantage Wisconsin, and later shared feedback with Reilly and Mash.

Many of the questions and comments involved Wisconsin’s youth and how the state can "prepare more of them for success in college and success in life early on," said UW System spokesperson David Giroux.

"I think people today talked about some very important things — and as is often the case with these kinds of listening sessions, the feedback people give needs to be synthesized to really derive the full benefits," Giroux said.

The ideas and feedback from Tuesday’s listening session will be compiled and presented to the Board of Regents at its February meeting.