University Advancement
Quinn 1
617-287-5320
giving@umb.edu
Alumni Relations
Quinn 2
617-287-5330
alumni@umb.edu
Strategic and Master Plans
"In providing young people equality of opportunity, we have the obligation to see that the opportunities that we offer them are indeed equal to the best that private schools have to offer."
John F. Ryan, 1966
The words of John Ryan, UMass Boston's first chancellor, resonate ever more powerfully as the university looks to its next 25 years of growth. In November 2007, Chancellor J. Keith Motley unveiled the university's strategic plan, the result of a comprehensive, year-long planning process that involved the broad university community. UMass Boston Renewal: Building the Student-Centered, Urban Public University of the New Century is charting the university's strategic path over the next three years and beyond. Goals include: increasing student access, engagement, and success; attracting, developing, and sustaining highly effective faculty; creating a physical environment that supports teaching, learning, and research; and enhancing campus engagement with the community.
On a parallel course, the Master Plan addresses the renewal of UMass Boston's physical environment in order to meet the twenty-first century needs of students, faculty, and staff. By making these necessary revisions, our community is better able to contribute to the university's leadership in public higher education and research, while pursuing its urban mission. The plan calls for a transformation of the university's campus, capitalizing on its Dorchester Bay location. The redesigned layout includes new academic buildings, garages and dormitories, and replaces the university's vast brick plazas with a series of grassy quads linked by pedestrian walkways. The re-centering and reorganizing of campus space will result in a more vibrant and engaging university life. State-of-the-art facilities will inspire our students, faculty, and staff, and connect them with the university's local, national, and global communities, and serve to bolster ties with our surrounding neighbors.
A Boston Globe editorial said that the lasting value of the university's planning “is its vision of offering students a vibrant, 21st-century education.” UMass Boston's ability to achieve its potential in these areas will be directly related to the philanthropic investment of its alumni and friends.