A Focus on Our Future

A hallmark of all Rice presidents is their vision for the future of the university.

The original vision of our founders was that Rice would be a full range university with undergraduate, graduate and professional schools. And throughout each chapter of Rice’s history, the visions of our great leaders have shown us where we are headed, what we aspire to become and where we will focus our efforts.

Edgar Odell Lovett, our first president, had bold ambitions for Rice as a premier research university, noting, “Faculty must be involved in research because the best person to lead the learner from the unknown to the known is the individual who is continually leading themselves from the unknown to the known.” He further stated, “The privileges of research are necessarily related to the pleasures of learning.”

Most, if not all, of the visions brought forth by subsequent Rice University presidents were similar and focused on growing the university’s research enterprise, commitment to undergraduate education, hiring world-renowned faculty, expanding our programming and international reach, and enhancing the overall college experience through capital improvements and preservation of our residential college system.

My vision for Rice aligns with these noble goals. As I said during my inaugural speech in October, Rice will in the coming years significantly increase its visibility and impact as a premier research university. We will have graduate programs of the same distinction as our undergraduate programs, all the while strengthening what Rice is well known for — an unparalleled undergraduate education. This university will be grounded in all we do by the values of diversity, equity and inclusion, a place known for its culture of care, tolerance and understanding.

I look forward to hearing your ideas on where Rice should be headed over the next decade. I encourage you to think big on all fronts, explore how we can build on our strengths and forge courageous new paths.

Refining these goals and determining how to best accomplish them will be a process that evolves over time based on feedback from the Rice community and those invested in the university. In January, the university will launch a strategic planning process to formally collect feedback from all sectors of our community, including faculty, students, staff, alumni and board of trustees members.

A 15-member strategic planning committee will lead the process and ensure that we gather diverse perspectives. The end result of this yearlong effort will be a thorough strategic plan that articulates Rice’s vision for the next 10 years. The plan will define how the university will focus its resources to realize the vision, outline metrics that will allow Rice to measure progress against our strategic goals and propose strategies to achieve those goals.

Laying out the how and making sure we have the accurate why is extremely important to Rice’s future success. Your input, buy-in and support is too. As Gen. Colin Powell put it, “Organization doesn’t really accomplish anything. Plans don’t accomplish anything, either. Theories of management don’t much matter. Endeavors succeed or fail because of the people involved. Only by attracting the best people will you accomplish great deeds.”

I look forward to hearing your ideas on where Rice should be headed over the next decade. I encourage you to think big on all fronts, explore how we can build on our strengths and forge courageous new paths.

Rice is an exceptional institution with brilliant faculty, ambitious students, strong leaders and an unmatched staff. In addition to providing a top-notch education to our students, we contribute meaningful and impactful research, scholarship and creative pursuits to the betterment of society. But I believe we can do even more, and we will now chart this course together.