Approvals:
11/28/05
USF-SM Campus Board

2/20/06 ACE Work Group

3/2/06
USF Board of Trustees

THE STAGES OF TRANSFORMATION OF THE REGIONAL CAMPUS

• Stage One

• Stage Two

The USF Sarasota-Manatee has experienced two stages of development since it was established on the Sarasota bayfront in 1975.  At that time, USF Sarasota-Manatee was co-located with New College as the latter was merged with USF as part of the state university system.   These two stages define the foundation for strategic planning in the next chapter of campus development.  These stages are described as follows:

Stage One: 1975-2000 – Establishing the Campus

The first quarter of a century of USF’s experience was characterized by slow growth, limited resources and some inevitable tensions as New College and the USF Regional Campus pursued distinctively different approaches to learning and service. New College had a national and statewide mission, while the University provided local public access to higher education.  After two- and–a-half decades, USF Sarasota-Manatee had only sixteen (16) resident faculty members and was heavily dependent on adjunct faculty and faculty commuting from USF-Tampa.  Headcount enrollment averaged 1,370 per semester over a five-year period from 1996-2000.

Stage Two: 2001-2005 – A Time of Transition

Beginning in 2001, the USF Sarasota-Manatee Regional Campus was transformed by legislative action establishing New College of Florida as a separate institution in the State University System (SUS) and creating a fiscally autonomous Sarasota-Manatee campus with a local campus board.  In the past five years, student enrollment rose over fifty percent. The semester headcount enrollment for fall 2005 approaches 2,000 students. Currently, over 3,400 students enroll in course work annually, resident faculty number 51, and the number of degree completion programs has risen from nineteen (19) to 37.

Of greater importance for the future, the state legislature has provided the financial support, which combined with private fund raising, will provide a $26.5 million dollar academic complex adjacent to the current campus setting.  The opening of this new complex in the fall of 2006 will provide a state-of–the-art instructional setting with infrastructure facilities to serve over 6,000 students. The new building will become the Campus Center for USF Sarasota-Manatee, providing classroom and office space for the entire faculty and staff. With our own facilities, classes can be provided for students throughout the day, evening, and weekend hours.  Wireless networking will offer Internet access throughout the campus in addition to wired areas for instruction and individual study. Seminar rooms and a 190-seat lecture hall will provide opportunities for formal and informal campus and community functions.

This same period has resulted in creation of an infrastructure in enrollment management, marketing, institutional advancement, student services and academic administration to support growth and systematically collect data to make the strategic planning process more precise.  The opening of an office for institutional research in the spring of 2005 has inserted the last critical piece in this administrative structure.  The operations research accumulated over five years can now shift to assessment and reporting systems to guide campus development.

Another important dimension of this period of change has been expansion of linkages to the local community.  Through the efforts of the CEO, management team, faculty, and staff, the campus is well represented in organizations, boards, and professional groups to ensure there is a rich array of avenues for sharing information.  This is vitally important in making judgments regarding potential markets to be served and the professional needs of specific industries.  Notably, the development of the School of Hotel and Restaurant Management, the MBA, and master’s degree programs in social work, criminal justice administration, as well as the program in information technology, have been designed in collaboration with the professional communities. The site in South County received funding from the Gulf Coast Community Foundation of Venice in fall 2003 to provide higher education opportunities in this rapidly growing area.

Much has been done and more remains to be accomplished with enhanced institutional and operations research.   The end of Stage Two: A Time of Transition now defines the framework for the next five years in which new strategic choices will be implemented, the campus becomes settled on its new campus site, and the planning as well as assessment become more comprehensive to ensure academic excellence, support for faculty research and provide an ideal climate for student learning.