Institutional Effectiveness

For Western Carolina University (WCU) to provide a premier public educational experience for its undergraduate, graduate, and distance education students, it must ensure the effectiveness of the full range of its operations. In this context, institutional effectiveness is an accountability function that specifically pertains to the assessment of major areas of WCU through a continuous review of performance and improvement (to see how institutional effectiveness integrates into the planning and budgeting processes, check out this diagram).  Institutional effectiveness activities occur broadly at every organizational level. Specifically, the major divisions undertake action planning processes that identify significant goals, activities, performance outcomes, timelines, and assigned responsibilities based on the WCU mission, strategic directions, and related strategic goals.  WCU also develops special initiatives to target gaps/needs in programs and/or services that require immediate attention and to address internal and external constituent needs. These special initiatives include the formation of new strategies and implementation frameworks, processes, evaluation systems, and data management frameworks to meet an identified need/gap.

Charts of Institutional Effectiveness & Planning Frameworks