Assure the long-term strength and stability of the University by preserving, caring for and developing human, intellectual, financial, structural and marketing resources.
Goal 4: Assure the long-term strength and stability of the University by preserving, caring for and developing human, intellectual, financial, structural and marketing resources.
PERFORMANCE INDICATORS | BASELINE | 2022 TARGET |
Campus climate and environment | Fall 2018 campus climate survey | TBD from survey data |
Employee job satisfaction | Participate in Chronicle of Higher Education “Great Colleges” job satisfaction survey | Improvement from 2017 baseline |
Number of endowed faculty positions | 36 | 60 |
Total annual university revenue | $505.6 M | $555 M |
Growth of university endowment | $450 M | $650 M |
Deployment and full utilization of Enterprise Management Systems | Underway | Completion |
Implementation of an incentive-based, decentralized budgeting system | Beginning | Completion |
Review and update of all university regulations and policies | Underway | Completion |
Campus Sustainability Ranking (STARS) | Not designated | Bronze |
When Jo Chytka first came to the University of Wyoming as a freshman from Riverton, Wyo., in 1975, she had no idea what path her career would take. Now it’s her job to help incoming freshmen think about their interests and career aspirations early on—to find the right majors and experiences to get them where they want to go.
“Attending UW is what set me up for my life,” Chytka says. After she earned her bachelor’s degree in marketing, she worked for a bank, returning to UW for her MBA and again working in the private sector before landing a job at UW. At UW, she advanced to director of the Center for Advising and Career Services, now called ACES—Advising, Career and Exploratory Studies—in 1986.
“I have a great job working with students and hopefully making a difference in their
lives and helping them see what the future might look like,” she says. “I help connect
them with opportunities and employers—working with great faculty and staff across
campus to make things happen. It’s been totally rewarding.”
The center provides resume help, internship and mentoring connections, and hosts job
fairs, among other things. ACES will also play a key role in some of the university’s
strategic plan initiatives.
“Our goal is to move to a first-year advising experience that infuses career,” Chytka
says. Instead of being undeclared, students can take exploratory studies tracks, and
ACES will help them think about where they want to go, what they want to do and their
strengths so that they can make informed decisions on the best majors as well as build
up their resumes.
“We’re creating strong partnerships with the alumni association and strong partnerships
across campus to get students experiential opportunities,” she says. “Even more, we
help students articulate what they’ve done.
“There’s so much opportunity in online tools,” Chytka adds. These include EPIC, which
helps students prepare for their career, and the new Handshake platform, which includes
mentoring options for students via UW alumni. “Students will be required to go through
our EPIC platform to learn how to do informational interviews, and then through Handshake
they’ll connect with alumni. I’m very excited about that.”
As part of the strategic plan, ACES will also track where students are working in
the years following graduation (previous surveys were done at graduation and three
months out). “We are looking at ways to get better data three years out or five years
out to help us see who are the employers in the state, what skills are they hiring,
what degrees are they hiring and then to help shape the diversification efforts,”
Chytka says. This could result in new majors and partnerships to help UW meet workforce
needs.
“I think it’s a really exciting time,” she says. “I think the strategic plan is going
to be so impactful.”