As Northwest proceeds through the planning stage of its next strategic plan, Excellence: The Northwest Way, it is hosting SWOT analysis sessions.
A SWOT analysis is the process of determining the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of a scenario, according to the U.S. Economic Development Administration. There are 20 sessions scheduled, each planned for a specific group on campus. The first sessions were Feb. 9, and they will continue each day until Feb. 13. The members of Northwest’s strategic planning insight group are facilitating each session.
All students were invited to the Feb. 10 session. Student Senate Executive President Anna Tucker and Northwest Wellness Services Assistant Vice President of Health and Wellbeing Christy Tapps facilitated this session. Tucker said the purpose of these sessions is to hear the voices of students and any other individuals who participate.
“The strategic plan of our school matters a lot because it’s what the life of a student is going to look like, and so I think it’s amazing that our school is giving the opportunity for students to have a voice,” Tucker said.
Chief of Staff Jacob Wood also attended. He said the job of the attendees of these sessions is to identify and give feedback based on what they see as the most important topics to be discussed in the making of the strategic plan.
Four strategic pillars will be focused on in the creation of Excellence: The Northwest Way — enrollment growth and sustainability, the collegiate experience, people and operations. In these sessions, attendees have the opportunity to share their opinions and ideas regarding these four pillars through the process of creating a SWOT analysis.
In Northwest’s case, participants are doing this process for each of the four pillars.
Tapps said conducting a SWOT analysis will help Northwest leadership evaluate all aspects of the institution.
“(It will look at) what could be improved on, opportunities, and just to get different groups’ voices heard on how to help leadership make those decisions on how to develop the strategic plan and what should be focused on for the next four years,” Tapps said.
Through this analytical process, the students in attendance chose a few of the ideas brought up that they felt were important to emphasize.
An opportunity the attendees liked within the people pillar was the idea for the University to open a drugstore on campus. The attendees agreed this would help those students who do not have a car on campus.
Northwest freshman Jaycee Fangmeyer said another opportunity she thinks the University should implement is a nursing degree.
“We have a lot of amazing students that come here for two years and want to stay, but then we lose them because obviously they can’t finish their degree here,” Fangmeyer said.
On a positive side, freshman Micaela Frankum said there are a lot of different organizations available to students and it is easy to get involved.
Tapps said after the sessions are over, all of the feedback will be brought to the Northwest leadership team.
“Where it kind of goes from here is…each one of these is going to be kept and tallied by Jacob (Wood) and the insight group, and then that will be given to the Northwest leadership team to help guide them as they create that strategic plan,” Tapps said.
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