Help Shape UNO's Future

This November is a time of exciting opportunities for our Maverick community.

It is a month where UNO students, staff, faculty, and community partners are able to help share their vision for UNO's future.

In addition to having the opportunity to speak directly with UNO Chancellor Joanne Li, Ph.D., CFA, through a continuing series of campus listening sessions, we are also inviting you to participate in one of our upcoming campus facilitated discussions, which will provide a unique brainstorming opportunity to help define UNO's strategic direction.

“UNO is a people organization," Chancellor Li said. "To honor our commitment to our people, we need each of your voices, your perspectives, and your ideas if we are to make UNO a campus that can truly transform our city, state, and the world. We are a community of Mavericks and, as Mavericks, we innovate; relentlessly pursuing to carve a path that no one else has gone down before.”

To ensure as many Mavericks can participate as possible, there will be multiple opportunities to find a session aligned with your relationship to campus.

Information about how the discussions will be organized, how to participate, and why participation is important is included below:

• What Are Facilitated Discussions?
• How Will the Facilitated Discussions Work?
• Why Are We Holding Facilitated Discussions?
• What Times Are Sessions Being Held?
• How Can I Attend?
• What Happens After My Session?

What Are Facilitated Discussions?

Facilitated discussions are web-based structured conversations where participants can provide feedback about UNO’s trajectory.

These web-based, facilitated sessions will serve as the first step in a reinvigorated strategic planning process using techniques developed through UNO's Center for Collaboration Science and led by Doug Derrick, Ph.D., associate dean of the College of Information Science and Technology.

How Will the Facilitated Discussions Work?

Each session will include up to 30 participants. As a participant, you will be prompted to provide, through quick-fire writing exercises, your ideas on several topics while also commenting on ideas proposed by others. All comments are anonymous, allowing for highly interactive, powerful brainstorming and robust, in-depth discussion of UNO’s priorities.

Additionally, each group will be homogenous, which allows the data to be analyzed based on stakeholder groups (students, staff, faculty, and community) rather than individual characteristics.

Why Are We Holding Facilitated Discussions?

This is your time, as our students, our faculty, our staff, and our community partners, to elevate UNO's metropolitan mission. Through these sessions, we will learn what it is about UNO that excites you and what opportunities lay before us.

What Times Are Sessions Being Held?

Students

• Friday, November 5 from 2:30 – 4 P.M.
• Tuesday, November 9 from 11:30 A.M. -1 P.M.
• Thursday, November 18 from 9 – 10:30 A.M.

Staff

• Monday, November 1 from Noon – 1:30 P.M.
• Thursday, November 11 from 9 – 10:30 A.M.
• Friday, November 19 from 2:30 - 4 P.M.

Faculty

• Wednesday, November 3 from 10 – 11:30 A.M.
• Friday, November 12 from 11:30 A.M. – 1 P.M.
• Thursday, November 18 from 3:30 – 5 P.M.

NOTE: Additonal times may be added based on need and availability.

How Can I Attend?

The format of these facilitated discussions allows you to attend from pretty much anywhere. Please note: you are expected to type during the session, so we strongly recommend that you participate on a laptop or desktop, rather than a mobile device or tablet. Details about how to participate will be shared once the RSVP form is completed.

What Happens After My Session?

Based on the analysis, themes will be identified, and a follow-up survey will be developed for our campus community to react to the findings of the facilitated conversations.

The facilitated discussions and follow up survey efforts are critical first steps that will allow us to build on our past strategic planning success while charting a way for the future.