Plan

Strategic Goals

A female UConn Hartford student with dark hair smiles at the camera, wearing a "UConn" t-shirt with the Husky dog logo and holding a skateboard, wheels out, that says "Huskies" on the bottom, in front of a colorful mural at Heaven Skatepark in Hartford.

Promoting Holistic Student Success

This plan re-envisions how we support all of our students — undergraduate and graduate — to achieve their goals. It centers the whole needs of students across all that we do, whether within our teaching and learning or across our academic supports and co-curricular and enrichment opportunities. Our intent is to ensure a fulfilling higher education experience toward the goal of graduation while also positioning students for academic, career, and life success once they leave us.

A white female student looks into the lens of an electron microscope with a male student of color behind her, looking at a computer screen. Dozens of gray-blue, gray, green, and black wires feed into the large metal cylinder of the microscope, taking up more than half the image.

Expanding Research Impact

This plan asserts UConn’s research preeminence among U.S. public universities in advancing discovery, cutting-edge solutions, and innovation that transforms knowledge, lives, and communities. It outlines key investment areas that build the capacity of our research enterprise, including the recruitment and retention of world-class researchers and scholars at the vanguard of their fields.

The Alexander Calder sculpture, “Stegosaurus,” a large red metal sculpture featuring arches and spikes, outside the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art with Travelers Tower in the background, across the street from UConn Hartford

Powering a Thriving Connecticut

As Connecticut’s public flagship university, this plan will deepen UConn’s partnerships in service of our state and its communities. It recognizes the breadth of our impact via education, research, and engagement and outreach. It identifies targeted areas of future focus that position Connecticut as a leader in our nation and world in health and wellness, economic development, and environmental sustainability.

Student Success Journey

Students entrust us to help them achieve greater success in their lives. It is our goal to provide all students with an excellent education, empower them to achieve personal and professional fulfillment, and support their ability to positively contribute to their communities.

We aim to identify strategies to facilitate an enriching student learning experience and timely and equitable academic progression for all students — undergraduate and graduate — from when they first arrive until when they graduate. It recognizes our critical role in preparing all students to become leaders, innovators, resilient professionals, and global citizens, providing them with teaching, learning, and enrichment experiences that distinguish them among higher education graduates.

A female and two male students sit on the ground, smiling at the camera, in front of a lighted "UCONN" sign at dusk, with a dark blue sky above and blue lights shining from a large metal rig in the background.

Priority Actions Include:

  • Ensure first-year and continued student engagement in high impact co-curricular and enrichment opportunities across campuses.
  • Strengthen students’ ability to financially navigate undergraduate and graduate school at UConn and develop financial literacy skills.
  • Provide culturally competent, sustained advising, helping students to successfully navigate their academic and career pathways, including between undergraduate and graduate programs.
  • Foster life and career readiness competencies in academic and co-curricular activities.
  • Strengthen learning through investing in excellent teaching, experiential learning, academic support systems, and high-quality mentorship to enhance student performance through their programs of study.

Excellence in Research, Innovation, and Engagement

UConn’s greatness is interconnected with its contributions beyond our campuses. Our research and engagement activities fuel knowledge and discovery, accelerate economic growth and innovation across sectors, and change lives.

We will position UConn as a world-class research institution that catalyzes innovation and creativity in our state, nation, and world through training, discovery, and translation. We will define a next generation of research and engagement across all disciplines — from the arts and humanities to STEM programs — for the benefit of humanity. In partnership with industry and the state, we will explore ways to strengthen alignment with Connecticut’s economic development and workforce needs, including cultivating an active entrepreneurial environment.

A female student wearing safety glasses, a white lab coat and blue latex gloves works with small tools in a science lab while an older female wearing glasses, a blue surgical mask, blue latex gloves and a white lab coat and holding a small paint brush looks on.

Priority Actions Include:

  • Hire and retain top-talent faculty conducting cutting-edge research and scholarship in areas of existing or emerging strength at the university.
  • Invest in research infrastructure and systems development to enable greater collaboration, student engagement, data-informed resource allocation, and accountability.
  • Translate and disseminate UConn’s impactful research that improves the human experience and contributes to philanthropy, innovation, and entrepreneurship.
  • Expand support for entrepreneurial activities (startup formation, IP creation) across all disciplines (arts, humanities, STEM, etc.).
  • Ensure academic offerings, research, and experiential learning at UConn that fuels economic development and educates the future workforce in Connecticut, including reinforcing the state’s leadership in emerging technologies and health sciences.

Wellness of People and Planet

At UConn, we recognize that the well-being of people and the health of our planet are inseparable. Our commitment to a brighter future means fostering the physical, mental, and environmental wellness of our students, faculty, staff, and the world at large.

This area of focus amplifies our actions on both health and sustainability fronts. Our work begins on our campuses, elevating our efforts to address the health and well-being of the UConn community alongside decreasing our carbon footprint. Our focus then extends from local communities to the globe, creating collaborative approaches that improve health equity and wellness and support the transition to clean energy.

In the foreground, a male student of color stands in the grass and faces away from the camera in a yoga pose with his left arm on his left thigh and his right arm curved overhead. In the background, a diverse group of both male and female students attending the Yoga on Horsebarn Hill event face the camera, getting into the same pose.
U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm speaks into a microphone at a clear podium with her left index finger pointing upward during a press conference at the Center for Clean Energy Engineering on May 20, 2022. Behind Granholm, four people look on, smiling, including U.S. Rep Joe Courtney and University President Radenka Maric. Behind them is a graphic on a fuel cell that says "UConn is putting clean energy to work."

U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer M. Granholm lauded UConn’s clean energy leadership during a campus visit.

Priority Actions Include:

  • Improve mental health supports for students, faculty, and staff, promoting caring and healthy campus environments.
  • Engage with local communities in research and policy development to address health disparities, food insecurity, and wellness.
  • Address UConn’s carbon footprint by implementing a student-engaged climate action plan that articulates academic offerings supporting sustainability.
  • Strengthen our leadership in sustainability through partnerships with established and startup companies, including expanding our impact through public-private partnerships such as our Future Climate Venture Studio.
  • Serve as a key partner in state, national, and international efforts to meet sustainability standards.

Seven World-Class Campuses, One Flagship University

Students entrust us to help them achieve greater success in their lives. During our strategic planning process, many students, faculty, and staff reiterated that the presence of UConn campuses throughout the state is a strength. As Connecticut’s flagship university, they expressed the desire for UConn to operate more holistically and efficiently as a university while increasing support for our multiple and unique campuses.

This area of focus balances campus-specific and University-wide needs to enable standout programs across campuses, while ensuring integrated university systems and processes. The goal is that at each of our multiple campuses, our faculty, staff, and students share in a consistent UConn experience.

Two female and five male students are among a large group of students gathered outside Gampel Pavilion before First Night. The male student at the center smiles and is wearing a UConn Husky logo hat and a "Connecticut" basketball jersey.

Group of Students gather outside Gampel Pavilion before First Night.

An aerial view of Fairfield Way, a pedestrian thoroughfare in the middle of UConn's Storrs campus, with the dome of Gampel Pavilion and other campus center buildings in sight

Storrs

The Avery Point Lighthouse, a concrete structure with a large wooden lantern at the top, flanked by the Branford House - a large stone structure - and the Marine Sciences building

Avery Point

A view from inside the UConn Hartford courtyard with students congregating at tables in front of the Hartford Times Building, with tall glass windows, a 2nd-story walkway, and large pillars

Hartford

A view of the Meskill Law Library at the UConn Law campus in Hartford with students sitting at tables on a patio and walking down pathways in the foreground

UConn Law

A male student and two female students representing various ethnic backgrounds sit facing each other, smiling and talking, on a stone wall outside UConn Stamford with city buildings in the background

Stamford

Four female students pose together, smiling, for a selfie in the courtyard in front of UConn Waterbury's main building.

Waterbury

UConn John Dempsey hospital tower in spring with a blue sky and white fluffy clouds.

UConn Health

Priority Actions Include:

  • Offer signature regional academic and research programs that are destinations within UConn, while also facilitating synergistic academic, research, and outreach programs between campuses.
  • Examine the relevance of interdisciplinary and online education, artificial intelligence, and entrepreneurship across disciplines so that our offerings remain competitive nationally and internationally.
  • Deliver equitable undergraduate and graduate student support across campuses including mental health services, student advising, and career services and assist in facilitating housing, transportation, and dining options.
  • Increase operational efficiencies, reduce redundant systems and processes, and create borderless information technology that enables campus collaboration. Advance analytics and data integration to better serve students.
  • Develop efficient and shared facilities that enable 21st century teaching and research.

Husky Pride and Resilience

UConn pride is everywhere. We consistently rank among the top universities and are home to renowned faculty, staff, and academic programs. Our more than 280,000 alumni stay connected and give back in multiple ways, from donations to mentoring our students. Our excellent athletics program has amassed 23 national championships since 1981, providing Connecticut residents many opportunities to rally around the University and bond as lifelong members of the extended Huskies community.

This area of focus builds on our excellence in key areas that leverage our school spirit, furthering our institutional priorities.

A Black woman's basketball player wearing a #44 UConn jersey jumps to make a shot into the opposing team's basketball hoop in a large arena with a crowd full of fans wearing white shirts, many with their mouths open expressing awe and excitement
The costumed Jonathan the Husky mascot, wearing a baseball uniform, poses for a photo with three middle-aged UConn fans holding UConn banners at in front of large metal beer brewing vats at an alumni event before a New York Mets baseball game.

Priority Actions Include:

  • Celebrate faculty, staff, and student contributions to teaching, research, and service.
  • Amplify the impact our nationally recognized athletics program has on our school pride and visibility.
  • Leverage the Foundation’s comprehensive campaign to foster alumni engagement and philanthropic support for institutional priorities.
  • Build our alumni community and continue to engage, support and celebrate their successes with the world as they move forward in their lives and careers.
  • Identify and pursue new revenue opportunities, including industry partnerships and joint ventures that expand technology commercialization and startup creation.

A Stronger, More Inclusive University

Our faculty, staff, and students reaffirmed our commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion and justice (DEIJ) during this strategic planning process. We believe UConn can set the standard across higher education for how to embrace these principles and infuse them across everything we do.

We aim to strengthen community and sense of belonging at UConn, with targeted efforts to increase access to higher education for diverse learners. We also seek to enable equitable career progression and growth for UConn faculty and staff.

Hundreds of diverse students pose together, many waving at the camera and smiling and grouped into about a dozen sections by matching color-coded shirts that indicate which UConn Learning Community they belong to.

Priority Actions Include:

  • Expand opportunities for early college experiences and lifelong learning to empower a diverse range of learners.
  • Strengthen pipeline programs to provide equitable access to national caliber education for all of Connecticut’s students.
  • Cultivate an environment that promotes belonging and inclusion across cultures, identities, and abilities and empowers each individual to feel connected to the Husky community.
  • Recruit diverse faculty and staff and strengthen strategies that increase their retention.
  • Support career progression and professional growth for staff, faculty, teaching, and research alike, across all campuses.