19 Sep Planning For Action
Last September (2011) the Woodstock Board enthusiastically adopted 2020 Vision as the basis for Woodstock School’s next strategic plan. 2020 Vision takes an ambitious view of Woodstock’s future as one of the world’s most distinctive international schools. It envisages significant growth in eight areas of the school’s life ??? academics, enrichment, student diversity, staff quality and community life ??? based on our three key roots: India & the Himalaya, our Christian values and heritage, and our strong and supportive alumni community. One of the great things about 2020 Vision was that many, many people contributed to it, through departmental meetings, focus groups, MSA planning teams, surveys, emails, websites etc. We don’t want to lose that engagement as we turn the vision into the plan and the plan into the reality. If you’d like to follow the progress of our planning over the next few weeks, and comment on what we are doing, please keep checking back ??? or subscribe for automatic updates.
Peter Jenks
Posted at 12:31h, 19 SeptemberLove to follow what is going on . . .
T. Z. Chu
Posted at 13:32h, 20 SeptemberIf you truly want participation from Woodstock communities all around the world, I suggest that we need to be consistent with the usage of our vocabularies. The title of the next section, i.e. "The Plan is finished and approved" is confusing at best. I surmise that Woodstock has a VISION STATEMENT in place today, but not yet a PLAN that explicitly lists and define OBJECTIVES and relative PRIORITIES, attainment of which would lead us to the VISION 2020. Then, we need to collectively come up with enabling programs, activities,and schedules, in which alumni and friends can and should be asked to participate and contribute to for the purpose of achieving these OBJECTIVES. As you have recognized, it is a process and the more you get alumni and friends to engage in the process, the more likely are you going to be successful in meeting your objectives. And, the broader a base you have in engagement, the more meaningful and lasting will the Vision be to the extended Woodstock communities.The role of the Board is to review, advise and give consent. Keep in mind that many board members have never been a student, teacher, or alumnus/a of Woodstock and/or had not ever interacted with Woodstock from the perspective of alums living elsewhere. They bring other important expertise to Woodstock, but the attainment and sustaining of VISION 2020, in my view, can only be reached with the extensive participation of the Woodstock communities all around the world. The mistakes in the past is to rely only on the input of the board and administration, and not even asking for their personal engagement and commitment.