Wayne State University

AIM HIGHER

Eugene Applebaum - College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences

Strategic Plan

Building a Culture of Collaboration 2005-2010

(Revised  9/2007)

Strategic Direction 1: Social Responsibility
Strategic Direction 2: Holistic Education
Strategic Direction 3: Integrative Scholarship
Strategic Direction 4: Impact on External Environments

Strategic Direction 5: An Internal Culture of Excellence


Strategic Direction 1: Social Responsibility
Preamble
The college seeks to resolve health disparities and accepts responsibility for the production of knowledge to reduce these disparities. The college's social responsibility permeates its efforts to educate, undertake scholarship, and translate knowledge into projects/products/tools/services that promote the health of citizens of Detroit, southeast Michigan, and Michigan. The college's responsibilities require it to broaden the meaning and nature of professional preparation, scholarship, and research ensuring diversity in the creation, use, and translation of knowledge relevant to the resolution of health disparities.

The Eugene Applebaum College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences will be distinguished by its interdisciplinary learning, research, service, and clinical practices. It will generally be recognized for its high quality of graduates prepared to serve the health care needs of culturally diverse populations throughout southeast Michigan, Michigan, and the nation in general. Special attention will be given to the health disparities of southeast Michgian.

The college will be on the edge of innovation academically, in scholarly pursuits, and via practice/service delivery. The college will be open to potential collaborators and to establishing partnerships that enhance the college. The college will more fully build on its array of programs and part of its branding will be its interdisciplinary approach to learning, scholarly activity, service, and practice. College engagement in southeast Michigan will make important contributions and augment the value and visibility of the college. Our graduates will be prepared for the changing worlds of their respective disciplines and serve as positive ambassadors for the Eugene Applebaum College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences.

Our alumni, our Board of Visitors, and Development success will enable us to fulfill our social responsibility. The college will have a well- established alumni group that actively supports the college via programs and financial support. Each program in the college will have an active affiliate alumni group. These groups will support one or more student activities/projects. The programs in the college will add value for our alumni by offering continuing education programs on-site, off-site, or electronically. Our annual alumni event will provide recognition to alumni classes and be near to becoming a fundraising event for scholarship and special programs. Alumni will routinely participate in University and college events. Alumni will be invited and encouraged to engage and support student learning experiences and pave the way for possible mentor relationships

The Board of Visitors (BOV) will be well established and at full capacity. The BOV will have twenty to twenty-five members. Each member of the BOV will have donated to the college, solicited a significant gift for the college, provided access to key persons to enhance the college, or supported the college in achieving its strategic plan. The BOV will be comprised of persons representing the disciplines in the college, constituencies served by our graduates, employers of our graduates, and community leaders. The BOV will have a well-established structure for fundraising, nominations, and an executive group.

Development activities will enable the college to achieve higher levels of success, climb to a higher level of visibility, and better contribute to the urban mission. The Mortuary Science and Preparing for Tomorrow campaigns will be completed. The college will have successfully achieved its Wayne First Capital Campaign goals, which focuses on endowments, scholarships, and programs to improve health in southeast Michigan.

At least one endowed chair, two student fellowships, and one or more community programs will have received support through development efforts.  The community program will contribute to our uniqueness and firmly engage faculty and students in helping to make the community in which we reside healthier. The college will house or collaborate in a primary manner in one Center of Excellence focused on research and/or practice. Three endowed scholarships will be established in the college

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Strategic Direction 2: Holistic Education
Preamble
Fostering student preparation and readiness for a challenging and dynamic health environment is a principal core of its curriculum and the learning experience. Holistic education requires students to learn how to enact collaboration among multiple disciplines through cooperative practice with high demands for professional autonomy, accountability, and creative problem-solving. Supporting a common framework of health practice while at the same time fostering discipline-specific competence is an aim of holistic education. Building curricular bridges across disciplines and between scientific and practice-oriented aims becomes a hallmark of the learning experience. Community-course interactions through service learning, civic engagement, and volunteer engagement in contexts where health disparities persist will help students understand the role of the health professional and scientist in contemporary society.


The learning experience will be characterized as interdisciplinary, collaborative, and one in which several active learning strategies are routinely used. Faculty will make maximal use of the technologies available to them. We will have at least two interdisciplinary courses in which three or more disciplines in the college will collaborate. These courses will not only allow for the consideration of topics from multiple perspectives, but will promote our graduates to engage in collaborative practice patterns. The Human Patient Simulator Complex will be used for interdisciplinary learning activities by three or more programs. Pediatric and portable mannequins will be added to the complex. The college will offer two or more courses online that will be incorporated into three or more curricula. Also, at least three programs will offer distance learning courses to off sites and may involve collaboration with other universities. The college will have a wireless environment to support technology to become a lap-top/PDA college. Cultural competence and core professional behavioral competencies will be integrated into all curricula in the college.

Two doctoral program proposals will be completed.  We anticipate a PhD in Pharmacy, and a PhD degree in Rehabilitation Sciences. Each of these degrees will be a one-of-a- kind program in Michigan. They will help to prepare faculty for the Pharmacy Practice department, Physical Therapy program, Occupational Therapy program, and Physician Assistant Studies program. The PhD degree in Rehabilitation Sciences will involve faculty from several programs in the college and faculty from other universities. It will be of interest to a variety of health professionals. The college will have an additional two to three graduate certificate programs to address areas of specialization in one or more of our programs. The Anatomical Pathologists' Assistant program will be transitioned from a baccalaureate degree program to a master’s degree. The college will have a generic BS in Health Sciences (BSHS)  that will admit students as freshmen and feed several programs of study in the college. The establishment of this curriculum will provide a model for the premier BSHS curriculum in Michigan, demonstrating strong rigor, service learning, and health care communications.  The Radiation Therapy Technologist, the Radiologic Technologist, and Radiologist Assistant programs will be well established. The college will have three or more combination degree programs, such as PharmD/PhD, PharmD/MPH/MBA, PAS/MPH, DPT/MPH/MBA, and MOT/MPH. All students in clinically oriented programs will engage in service learning or community outreach activities. Other programs in the college may require these activities as well. These opportunities will be interdisciplinary and tailored to the health care needs of the people in southeast Michigan, Michigan, and the nation in general. The college will be on the leading edge in preparing our students for a technologically advanced and diverse work setting. We expect to achieve the goal of 1,000 or more students in the college.

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Strategic Direction 3: Integrative Scholarship
Preamble
The college values a broad view of scholarship legitimizing mainstream and alternative methods of inquiry. Inquiry into service delivery, professional socialization and development, pedagogical methods are important venues of scholarship. Increasingly community-based action/participatory research will reflect the college’s partnerships with health care recipients, those people and communities who experience health disparities, and service providers in communities/contexts where health disparities are dominant. Scholars/researchers/investigators are immersed in a culture of research excellence that enables their effective execution of their research programs and projects. Action settings that integrate service, learning, and scholarship expand the curriculum and foster multiple competencies of practitioners and scientists simultaneously.


The college’s scholarship presence will expand significantly within the University and in comparison to benchmark programs. External funding will increase by a minimum of two fold and we will be approaching a three-fold increase college-wide. Our Pharmacy program (Pharmacy Practice/Pharmaceutical Sciences) will be ranked in the top 25% of programs according to NIH funding. One-half  of all research-prepared faculty will have some level of external funding. Fifty percent of the college faculty will hold professional doctorates or PhD degrees.  Faculty researched-prepared will be engaged in scholarship and have evidence of some form of dissemination of this work. Interdisciplinary scholarly activity will be common among faculty in the college and with faculty from other colleges, schools, and universities. Increasingly, faculty will engage in transformational research to better bridge basic sciences research and clinical practice. The college will have one endowed chair that will enable the establishment of one Center of Research Excellence or collaboration with a Center of Research Excellence. The college will serve as a resource center and be in the process of becoming a health care economic resource for one discipline in the college. The Annual Research Day will attract faculty from across the campus. The college will partner with external organizations, such as businesses, community based organizations, and government agencies to establish scholarly opportunities.

The Pharmaceutical Sciences Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) will continue and one or more additional departments will also offer undergraduate research experiences. The research infrastructure will continue to improve with the addition of graduate assistants for active faculty researchers as needed. The college will have eight to ten additional student fellowships to support student research and special learning opportunities.

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Strategic Direction 4: Impact on External Environments
Preamble
Effective and reflective practitioners and scientists who understand their duty, undertake social responsibility, and who perform with excellence is a fundamental dimension of the college’s impact. Successful diffusion of scientific knowledge and models of practice that improve health care and well-being are measurable outcomes of the college’s program of diffusion/translation. The college’s program of translatory research augments/strengthens community support. Diffusion and translatory research is undertaken in partnership with communities, service systems, and organizations based in the City of Detroit, Southeast Michigan, and the State of Michigan.


The college will have begun to promote and test new interdisciplinary models of health care delivery. These models will combine a variety of health care professionals in non-traditional settings that exemplify interdisciplinary care. The college will promote accessibility to screening and prevention/wellness programs for high-risk and medically underserved groups, in and out of the workplace, in southeast Michigan. Efforts will be made to address the health disparities that are prevalent in southeast Michigan through offering culturally and linguistically appropriate programs.  The college will triangulate teaching/learning, research, and practice/service. The triad of activity by faculty will become a part of each student’s educational experience.

Entrepreneurial activities are limited in many ways by state and University policies, but the college can adopt some entrepreneurial practices. The Human Patient Simulator Complex (HPSC) will have a sufficient number of external users to cover the disposable goods costs of the complex. The HPSC will provide a source of training for homeland security and emergency preparedness. It will be viewed as a community resource and connect the college with other units on campus and other universities in Michigan. Research technologies and intellectual property could result in the formation of small businesses. We will have a sufficient number of distance learning partners to help cover the college infrastructure costs for distance learning. A college practice plan will be established and faculty will benefit from participation in the plan. Differential tuition will be used for distance learning and other programs in the college to enable expansion of programs and provide infrastructure support. Entrepreneurial activities will become part of a routine funding source for the college.

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Strategic Direction 5: An Internal Culture of Excellence
Preamble
Continuous quality improvement permeates all the principal systems of the college. The culture builds an effective approach of celebration and support for all of its members including students, faculty, administrators, and support staff. The culture supports social responsibility at all levels of the college. The culture facilitates discipline-specific and cross discipline interactions to produce innovations in curriculum, learning, and the integration of research and pedagogy. The culture supports diversity in scholarship and its funding, dissemination, and translation.


The college will have a fully implemented, comprehensive assessment plan that is exercised at programmatic, departmental, and college levels. The college assessment tools will be unique and cutting edge for a college with diverse programs of study. The assessment tools will be used to establish benchmarks within the college. The outcomes derived from assessment measures will be used routinely to improve all of the curricula, certificate programs and operational functions of the college. Graduates will perform at or above national means for relevant licensure and certification examinations. The programs in the college will be rated in the top 50% or higher by whatever appropriate or generally accepted levels of measurement that are used.  Assessment will address and inform our strategic plan.

The college will be distinguished by its valuing and celebrating diversity; intellectually, ethnically, racially, culturally, and by gender. The student body and faculty will be measurably more diverse. The college will begin to achieve a level of diversity that matches or exceeds national norms for student and faculty diversity and better match the demographics of southeast Michigan. College programs will use inclusive/comprehensive approaches in their admission processes. Hiring practices will be used to enhance faculty diversity in the college.

Admissions processes will include a combination of academic and non-academic factors for all admission decisions in the college. Admission criteria will reflect factors that have been reviewed/studied to show success or lack thereof. Admission criteria will be based on data of student success. Early admission criteria (HealthPro Start) will be defined and assessed to enable the college to better attract and admit the best and brightest.

We will have well established programs in middle schools, high schools, and for students in our residence halls to attract a more diverse student body and to sustain high numbers of qualified applicants for all programs of study. We will have evidence that our efforts to interest children in the sciences and health professions are a success. Other recruitment activities will be monitored to determine their degree of success in contributing to the college diversity. We will have 1,000 students enrolled in the college. Our collective student attrition rate will be 10% or less. We will achieve this through effective retention programs across programs of study. The college will sponsor programs to support on-going cultural competence growth among its faculty, staff, and students. International exchanges will be initiated through actual travel, via telecasting, or web communication. Our graduates will be prepared to practice and work in diverse workplace environments.

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