Final Quality Enhancement Plan Submitted to SACSCOC

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Our final draft of our Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP) has been submitted to SACSCOC as part of our ten-year reaccreditation cycle.  The full draft is available to community members in Box: https://stedwards.box.com/s/062r4d5xb5f5ykvsg6ljs0gp551vb25t

The executive summary is below:

St. Edward’s University’s Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP), Vocation: Discovering One’s Purpose in a Changing World, will provide our first time traditional undergraduate students with a four-year, integrated plan for vocational discovery. Our goal is to emphasize and enrich the Holy Cross tradition of vocation by inviting students to answer:

  1. what contribution do I want to make;
  2. how am I preparing to make this contribution;
  3. in what context(s) can I make this contribution(s);
  4. how do I integrate my liberal arts experience with complex problems faced by the world today?

At the heart of our mission is the cultivation of the mind in concert with the heart as well as the Holy Cross practice of preparing useful citizens for society. The intertwining of these concepts forms a core component of our identity—a component embodied in vocational discovery. Our definition of vocation embraces the Latin roots of the term VOCARE (to call) and VOX (voice) meaning calling. As part of our mission to help students “understand themselves, clarify their personal values and recognize their responsibility to the world community” we are committed to cultivating their callings and life purpose(s). In addition, we recognize that our students are facing an ever-changing world due to accelerating technological, economic and cultural shifts. Our mission is “to instill the critical skills that flex, bend and weather life’s tests.”

Our QEP was chosen through a campus-wide selection and development process that engaged students, faculty, staff, and administration in a variety of ways including presentations, surveys, workshops, institutes, and forums. We drew on institutional research and assessment data that revealed St. Edward’s students place a high value on life goals, career planning, and expect that a degree from St. Edward’s will present opportunities for successful and meaningful careers.

To achieve our campus-wide plan, during their time at SEU, students will engage in intentional, explicit opportunities for vocational discovery. The foundation of this process of vocational discovery will consist of two components: (1) advising and mentoring, and (2) reflection. Current processes and structures will be highlighted and leveraged while new opportunities will be developed. Faculty and staff will continue a tradition of vocational discovery in order to model and guide students in the process.

From their arrival to campus, beginning with student orientation, students will begin to integrate aspects of advising and mentoring with vocational discovery. Students will become familiar with campus support services and create a 4-year degree plan. Through activities led by Student Life, Student Academic Support Services, the Career and Professional Development office, and Campus Ministry, in addition to academics and related support services, students will develop a more holistic understanding of their university experiences, be encouraged to engage in co-curricular involvement and identify and meet with mentors. By the time students are ready to graduate, they will engage in, and reflect upon, a culminating experience in which they will apply their skills and values in a controlled context.

Implementation and Assessment of the QEP will be led by the QEP Co-directors and the implementation team. This integrated team, consisting of faculty and staff, will be charged with not only implementation but ongoing assessment and innovation within the QEP.

Because our Holy Cross mission has deep tradition of vocational discovery, the administration fully supports our QEP, and is committed to providing necessary resources. Over the course of the next five years, we are certain that Vocation: Discovering One’s Purpose in a Changing World will positively impact our campus community and prepare our students for meaningful and purposeful lives.

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About Rebecca Davis

Rebecca Frost Davis Director of Instructional and Emerging Technology Rebecca Frost Davis joined St. Edward’s in July 2013 as Director of Instructional and Emerging Technology, where she provides leadership in the development of institutional vision with respect to the use of technology in pursuit of the university’s educational mission and collaborates with offices across campus to create and execute strategies to realize that vision. Instructional Technology helps faculty transform and adapt new digital methods in teaching and research to advance the essential learning outcomes of liberal education. Previously, Dr. Davis served as program officer for the humanities at the National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education (NITLE), where she also served as associate director of programs. Prior to her tenure at NITLE, she was the assistant director for instructional technology at the Associated Colleges of the South Technology Center and an assistant professor of classical studies at Rhodes College, Denison University, and Sewanee: The University of the South. She holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in classical studies from the University of Pennsylvania, and a B.A. (summa cum laude) in classical studies and Russian from Vanderbilt University. Dr. Davis is also a fellow with the National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education (NITLE). As a NITLE Fellow, Dr. Davis will develop a literature review relevant to intercampus teaching, which will cover contextual issues such as team-teaching, teaching through videoconferencing, and collaboration; a survey of intercampus teaching at NITLE member institutions; and several case studies of intercampus teaching at liberal arts colleges, including interviews with faculty, students, support staff, and administrators. This work will be summarized in a final report or white paper to be published by NITLE. At Rebecca Frost Davis: Liberal Education in a Networked World, (http://rebeccafrostdavis.wordpress.com/) Dr. Davis blogs about the changes wrought by new digital methods on scholarship, networking, and communication and how they are impacting the classroom. In her research, she explores the motivations and mechanisms for creating, integrating, and sustaining digital humanities within and across the undergraduate curriculum.

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