Returning for the fall semester, NIU’s Strategic Planning Task Force is closing in on completing a plan for the university.

The Strategic Planning Task Force, consisting of 45 members from various groups on campus and led by NIU Provost Ray Alden, is working on a strategic plan for the direction of the university.

A finished document of the strategic plan is currently undergoing minor corrections this week, Alden said, and the finished plan should be posted on the Strategic Planning Task Force Web site sometime next week.

“What was done last year was to form the big-picture sense of what we want to advance in this university,” Alden said. “Now we’re getting in to the tactics of how do we do it at the college level.”

The document will be released as an information item and will likely be posted for the campus to review, Alden said. Though numerous changes will be made, the document will be completed by next week.

“Many universities take three to five years to do this,” Alden said. “We did the first step, which usually takes several years, in eight months.”

Alden said the members of the committee spent their time not talking, but working to get a consensus developed.

After the completion of the planning document, more detailed work will begin on how to accomplish the set goals, as well as more specific plans for the different schools within the university, Alden said.

“Where we go from here is to college-level plans where we get more specific on how specific goals, strategies, action items and milestones will be developed in the colleges that could really support what we now call strategic imperatives,” Alden said.

The four major goals of the strategic plan are noted as the Teaching and Learning Environment, Research/Scholarship Clusters, Regional Impact and the NIU Community, according to the Web site.

Strategic planning has not changed the values of the university, but has allowed for a consensus to be reached that will allow the use of the strategic imperatives as guides, Alden said.

“By doing this process, we can bring the sense of values, tradition and direction to the university as a whole,” Alden said.