Contents

• Mission Statement
• Advisory Board Members
• Strategic Planning Committee Members
• Strategic Plan
  • Background
  • University Context
  • Planning Process and Principles
  • Goals, Objectives, Strategies
  • Expected Outcomes

Albert Dorman Honors College Mission Statement

To attract the ablest and most highly motivated honors scholars and to develop and prepare them for professional careers, graduate studies and positions of leadership in business, industry, medicine, law, government, and service to community.

Honors College Advisory Board

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Honors College Strategic Planning Committee

Richard Bowles, Chair
Joel Bloom
C. Stephen Cordes
Phyllis Denbo
Stephen M. Fischbein
Mohammad Hassan (Student Rep.)
Sharon Toscano (Student Rep.)
Robert Humphreys (resigned 11/2000)
Mark Mellini (Student Rep.)
Satoshi Oishi
Amy Pappas
Peter Tomasi

Strategic Plan

Background

In 1985, New Jersey Institute of Technology enrolled its first group of students in the University Honors Program.  Twenty-eight of the best and brightest freshmen and sophomores were offered the opportunity to participate in an intellectually stimulating educational experience that included honors-designated courses, a colloquium series, and other special activities.  By 1990, the Honors Program had grown to 160 students and graduated its first class, sending them on to positions in prestigious corporations or to further education in such fields as medicine, law and the sciences. 

The initial success of the program was recognized in 1992 by the Commission on Higher Education of the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools.  Following an accreditation site visit, the Middle States evaluation team acknowledged the Honors Program’s “potential for development” and called it “a jewel in the NJIT crown.”  As a result of the team’s report, the university engaged an external consultant to assess the potential for developing an honors college.  A self-study was conducted, a task force was formed, and the NJIT faculty and Board of Trustees approved the concept of an honors college in early Fall 1993.

The Honors Program at NJIT was reorganized in late October 1993 as the Albert Dorman Honors College (ADHC), named in recognition of the generous endowment of a distinguished alumnus.  The program’s organizing mission, to attract the ablest and most highly motivated honors scholars and to develop and prepare them for professional careers, graduate studies and positions of leadership in business, industry, medicine, law, government, and service to community, was reviewed, affirmed, and promulgated.

The next seven years saw steady growth in enrollment and a continuous process of examining and expanding the educational opportunities available to the ADHC scholars.  The challenge for the Honors College, having successfully recruited this talented group of undergraduates, was to provide them with an educational experience that inspired and prepared them to assume positions of leadership. 

When Dr. Joel Bloom was appointed the first ADHC Dean in 1997, there were more than 450 NJIT honors students with an average SAT score of over 1300, an outstanding cadre of academically talented, highly motivated, and creative young men and women.  A concept paper outlining the key components of the ADHC program was drafted in early 1998, widely disseminated, and revised based upon extensive review and discussion.  The document describes a tripartite program strategy that requires the students to assume an early and ongoing proactive role in their education.

• Students learn from and work closely with distinguished faculty and researchers, industry experts, and government leaders.
• Students develop individualized educational plans comprised of carefully selected honors courses, colloquia, seminars, and coordinated undergraduate/graduate degree programs, as well as options in research, practice-oriented projects in industry or government, international academic and work experiences, and leadership practicums.
• Students have access to a comprehensive support structure including financial aid, honors faculty advisors, honors residential accommodations, honors lounge and computer lab, and much more.

As of Fall 2000, 485 students were enrolled in the Albert Dorman Honors College, representing fifteen percent of the total university undergraduate enrollment, and all elements of the ADHC concept document had been implemented.

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The University Context

The Albert Dorman Honors College was developed during a period of extraordinary growth and development universitywide.  With a total of more than 8,600 students, including over 700 freshmen, NJIT’s Fall 2000 enrollment was at an all-time high.  This growth has not occurred at the expense of academic quality.  The average combined SAT scores for incoming freshmen to the university was nearly 1100, another record. 

To a significant degree, the ability of the university to attract excellent students is owed to its growing national reputation.  Yahoo! Magazine currently ranks NJIT as America’s most wired public university in recognition of its pioneering work in the use of computing and information technology (IT).  Computers and IT play an important role in virtually every activity on campus, from course registration to cutting-edge research. Computers assist in teaching and independent study, campus communications, library work, and engineering and architectural design.  The ATM network backbone connects more than 4,000 nodes in classrooms, laboratories, residence halls, and faculty offices.

The university’s reputation for research excellence in such fields as environmental science, information technology, manufacturing, microelectronics, transportation and building science is evidenced by a significant increase in funding; the current research budget is nearly $40 million.  This external support is the result, in large measure, of the continued development of an outstanding cadre of faculty and state-of-the-art facilities.

NJIT’s leading role as a public, urban university is evidenced by the diverse student population it serves, the range of public policy research projects it undertakes, and the extent of its economic development program.  Of special note is the current development of University Heights Science Park, a 50-acre, mixed-use, multi-sponsor science and technology park.  Adjacent to the university’s Newark campus, Science Park will provide opportunities to transfer university-based research and technology to public uses.  NJIT was a founding partner of this major initiative, and President Saul K. Fenster currently serves as Chair of the Science Park Board of Directors.

As a technological university, NJIT reviews its educational programs and its methods of instruction in order to emphasize marketplace skills for a technology-driven economy and to reflect best-practice pedagogy.  The Honors Program was founded, in part, to experiment with the curriculum, i.e., honors courses and colloquia, and its delivery through interdisciplinary student projects. Another curriculum innovation, Fundamentals of Engineering Design, features a hands-on, team-based freshman design course that integrates engineering, computer science, and communication skills in order to solve real-world design problems.

For more than a century, NJIT has been an effective agent of change, not only transforming the competencies of individuals, creating jobs, and supporting entrepreneurism, but also continually anticipating and responding to new developments in science and technology.  At the beginning of the year 2000, NJIT embarked upon a university-wide strategic planning effort.  A primary focus of this initiative has been to engage the university more fully in rapidly emerging fields of scientific endeavor. The vehicle proposed to involve the university in significant new scientific arenas is the interdisciplinary research council, a faculty collaborative organized around a broad, interdisciplinary theme such as materials science, information technology, health sciences, urban studies or environmental studies, that will coordinate cutting edge research and didactic academic programs in each of the designated fields.

Conceptually, NJIT would become a “matrix university,” in which excellence in the traditional scientific and technological disciplines would be maintained within the existing departments and colleges, and cross-disciplinary work would be conducted through the councils in coordination with the departments. The principal advantage of such a structure is its fluidity and flexibility; the disadvantage, its inherent instability.  Administratively, each council would have an executive committee, led by the council chair, which would serve as a strategic planning and decision making body.  Faculty would maintain their primary affiliation with the traditional departments but may also elect to join one or more councils, depending upon their research interests.

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ADHC Planning Process and Principles

As part of the comprehensive planning initiative, Dean Bloom and the ADHC Advisory Board were charged to consider the future of the Honors College and to recommend next steps.  The time had come to plan for the Albert Dorman Honors College during the first decade of the new millennium.

The Advisory Board’s first step was to convene a Strategic Planning Committee.  At their initial meeting on February 3, 2000, the members of the committee, led by Advisory Board Chairman Dr. Richard Bowles and also including two currently enrolled ADHC students, agreed upon the importance of developing a rich data set that would include quantitative and qualitative information on the Honors College and its environment. 

The Strategic Planning Committee quickly and strongly affirmed the success of the Albert Dorman Honors College, in terms of both the quality of its students and programs and its impact on the entire university.  To quote Dr. Bowles, “The Honors College is an experiment that has worked.” This finding served as the basis for the committee’s planning principles, which continued to evolve as the work progressed.   The Planning Principles were:

• To build upon the success of the Albert Dorman Honors College
• To preserve the vision of producing students with technical and leadership excellence
• To engage in boundary-less thinking about the future directions of the College
• To seek continuous feedback from stakeholders
• To support the vision of the university.
• To strive for consistency with NJIT’s overall planning goals, objectives and strategies
• To ensure that honors students are attached to areas of academic excellence
• To link honors students with opportunities for scholarly pursuit in emerging fields
• To contribute in significant ways to the academic excellence of the university

In order to perform its work, the committee agreed on a three-part work plan:

• Review ADHC archival materials and enrollment, SAT, financial and other data.
• Convene a series of meetings with key ADHC stakeholders.
• Identify and visit benchmarked institutions.   

Over the next several months, the members of the committee met with President Saul Fenster, Provost William Van Buskirk, the Deans of the Newark College of Engineering, the School of Architecture, the School of Management and the College of Science and Liberal Arts, and the members of the ADHC Student Council.  In addition, representatives of the committee attended a feedback session open to the entire ADHC student body and visited the Honors Program at the University of Maryland.

The committee began with a number of key questions relative to the effectiveness of the College to date, its future enrollment, funding and financial aid needs, curricular and co-curricular directions, faculty and facilities requirements, staffing needs, and visibility.  As they met with key stakeholders, the committee’s view expanded to embrace questions of program design and external influence.  Are there alternate or additional designs that might better serve the needs of enrolled students and attract more new students?  And how can and should the Honors College influence the university community and its external reputation?

During the planning process several organizational models were explored as optimal paths for the development of the college.  Consideration was given to establishing honors programs affiliated with the academic colleges and/or departments; developing programs affiliated with the emerging research councils; and initiating the development of other Honors Colleges.  Following discussions about these models and possible variations, it was concluded that no one model would be adopted; rather the college would be opportunistic, developing Honors Programs aligned with the emerging strengths of the university.  Among the first could be an Honors Program in Information Technology (IT), owing to the establishment and rapid growth of the new IT department and major at NJIT, and the inclusion of Honors students by this department in a successful, multi-year research grant.*  The grant will offer opportunities for the development of upper division courses in several disciplines and student research. 

In addition, the college would affiliate with emerging interdisciplinary research councils in which there would be opportunities for Honors students to conduct research and work closely with faculty.  The college would also affiliate with industry and corporate interests having the same goals and objectives as the Honors College, e.g., the development of talented students who are underrepresented in the sciences, mathematics, engineering and technology professions.  The development of Honors Programs closely aligned with the growth areas of the university would be monitored and evaluated annually by the ADHC Board of Advisors.

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Goals, Objectives and Strategies

The next step in the strategic planning process was to provide a framework of integrated goals, objectives and strategies that would guide the development of the Albert Dorman Honors College over the next five years.  The proposed framework would incorporate past ADHC goals that had been reviewed and refined, as well as new goals that emerged during the planning process.  They were designed to build and improve upon the excellence of the ADHC, and attract additional honors level students. 

1.  GOAL:    To create a university-wide Honors learning community of students, faculty and staff.

A.  OBJECTIVE:  To partner with academic departments to develop curricula and projects which will engage students in challenging learning opportunities.

STRATEGIES: 

• Work with departments to develop challenging new curricula, including upper division honors courses.
• Identify faculty research and development projects in which honors students may participate.
• Develop project-oriented interdisciplinary courses for honors students.
• Institute a senior honors thesis requirement.
• Continue to develop joint admissions agreements with graduate programs at NJIT and other universities.
• Design BS/PhD programs in appropriate fields.
  

B.  OBJECTIVE: To affiliate with established university research centers, emerging university research councils, and other interdisciplinary research initiatives including industry-based research opportunities (e.g. University Heights Science Park and the Enterprise Development Centers) in order to involve students in emerging fields of study, work closely with faculty and industry experts, and achieve the academic and service requirements of the college.

STRATEGIES:

• Establish Honors Programs of the Honors College in connection with the centers, councils, and grant initiatives such as the NJI-TOWER Project that would provide instruction, research opportunities, special colloquia, and senior honors thesis supervision.
• Implement the Honors Programs in phases, beginning with the newly established Research Council in Materials Science and the NJI-TOWER Project.  Consider affiliation with other councils (informational technology, health science, urban studies, environmental study) as they are initiated.
• Showcase student projects, research and other outcomes on campus and at conferences and competitions for visibility and recruitment.
• Seek external funding to initiate and maintain the Honors Programs and support of students.
  

2.  GOAL:    To increase the enrollment of Honors students at NJIT with a focus on underrepresented populations in scientific and technological fields, including women and minorities.

OBJECTIVE: To achieve an undergraduate Honors population of 600 students, representing approximately 18 percent of the projected full-time NJIT undergraduate population, by fall 2005; of these students, a minimum of 35 percent will be women and a minimum of 20 percent will be minorities, an increase of ten and nine percentage points respectively.

STRATEGIES:

• Expand the national pool of recruited students.
• Develop articulation Honors agreements with county colleges, magnet high schools and targeted comprehensive high schools, nationwide.
• Develop the intra-university sophomore transfer process.
• Partner with NJIT’s Education Opportunity Program, The Murray Center for Women in Technology, and Center for Pre-College Programs and corporate programs which have goals in common with the colleges.
• Affiliate with national, state and local programs, foundations and corporations, which share the common goal of preparing high achieving underrepresented students.
• Increase fundraising to support competitive full-scholarship packages.

3.  GOAL:   To develop leaders for their careers and communities.

OBJECTIVE: To integrate leadership education throughout the Honors College experience.

STRATEGIES:

• Incorporate leadership education into the Honors Freshman Seminar curriculum.
• Identify leadership education programs at other technological universities.
• Work with the deans, department chairs and faculty to revise appropriate existing courses and develop new courses with a focus on leadership, work teams, hands-on projects and problem solving experiences.
• Affiliate with corporate and community-based leadership education and training programs for experimental and service learning opportunities.
• Work with co-curricular programs to provide opportunities for leadership experiences in campus organizations and activities.
• Review the feasibility of and criteria for a certificate in leadership education open to all qualified NJIT students but with a to-be-defined Honors component.

4.  GOAL:   To ensure an Honors experience, with a balance of technical and leadership education, for each student enrolled in the College.

OBJECTIVE: To develop the necessary infrastructure for recruitment and enrollment, student financial support, advisement, curriculum coordination, student activities, program development, facilities operations, reception, record keeping and reporting, marketing, visibility, fundraising and Advisory Board relationships in order to serve the mission of the Honors College and its anticipated 600 students.

STRATEGIES:

• Annually support, highlight and publicize student outcomes (academics, research, industry projects, service, and awards).
• Implement the Students’ Individual Educational Plans, coordinating related student placements with university departments, research centers, councils, industry and agencies.
• Plan and execute a fundraising activity a minimum of twice a month.
• Identify the staff required to assume responsibility for the following activities at levels appropriate to the effective functioning of a 600-student college.
  • Recruitment (receptions, interviews, correspondence, follow-up and financial awards)
  • Advisement (academic advising, review of IEP’s, placement in research and industry-based projects, and oversight of projects)
  • Record keeping and annual outcomes reporting
  • Programming (colloquia and freshman seminar)
  • Coordination of advisory board meetings and related activities
  • Fundraising (individual corporate, proposals and grant writing)
• Develop and operate facilities dedicated to Honors students including computing (minimum of 50 seats); quiet study; lounge and resource center (occupancy for a minimum of 100 students); presentation/project rooms (minimum of three, each to accommodate 20 people); and interest-based  housing.

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Expected Outcomes

By the year 2006, the following Honors milestones will have been achieved:

Curricula and Projects

• Beginning with the Fall 2001 (or 2002) entering class, all honors students will be required to submit a senior thesis representing a significant research effort in order to be designated as an honors student upon graduation.
• A minimum of 20 upper division honors courses will be offered by academic departments, with the departments enrolling the largest number of honors students offering as many as three courses.
• A database of active research projects and principal investigators, by department, will be developed and maintained.  Students will have access to the database and be provided with guidelines for achieving the most productive research project placement. 
• Project-oriented interdisciplinary courses (e.g., FED) will be initiated and offered to honors students in their sophomore and/or junior years. 
• A minimum of five joint admission agreements between the ADHC and graduate programs at other universities will have been signed.  At least one such agreement will be developed each year for the next five years.
• A minimum of two BS/PhD programs in appropriate fields (e.g. Information Technology) will be offered to highly qualified honors students.
• A BS/MBA program focusing on the management of technology including corporate funded internships for academic credit will be offered to highly qualified honors students.

Honors Programs

• Honors Programs of the Albert Dorman Honors College will be established in partnership with the NJI-Tower Project and IT Department, the newly established Interdisciplinary Council in Materials Science, at least one additional interdisciplinary council to be established, and an industry/corporate partner.  Working closely with the ADHC, these programs will provide research opportunities, special colloquia, senior thesis supervision and student financial support.
• Honors students will participate in a minimum of three professional conferences or competitions annually, presenting or displaying their research activities as appropriate.

Enrollment

• Enrollment will total 600 honors students, including a minimum of 35 percent women and 20 percent minorities.
• Articulation agreements will be operational with all county colleges in the State that offer honors programs, as well as with a minimum of ten carefully selected magnet and/or academically strong comprehensive high schools, nationwide.
• Collaborative recruitment programs and activities will be operational with NJIT’s Educational Opportunity Program, the Center for Pre-College Programs and the Murray Center for Women in Technology.
• Mutually supportive relationships will be developed with a minimum of five new foundations, corporations and/or national programs with a commitment to increasing the number of underrepresented students entering scientific and technological fields.
• Fundraising for an endowment of $20 million will be implemented to support the delta increase of 100 students with competitive scholarship packages.

Leadership

• The Honors Freshman Seminar curriculum will include a minimum of two sessions devoted to leadership skills and knowledge.
• An analysis of existing courses will be conducted to identify those that are relevant to leadership development and the content of these courses modified as appropriate. 
• Honors College students will be required to become involved in at least one student organization annually and seek a leadership position when possible.
• The feasibility of a certificate in leadership will be studied and, if appropriate, the criteria for awarding the certificate will be determined, including a special honors component. 
• A cadre of leaders will be developed with a focus on underrepresented students.

Infrastructure

• The Individual Educational Plans will be an integral part of every Honors student’s educational experience.  A formal system of review and feedback will exist, and oversight arrangements with participating departments, research centers, interdisciplinary councils, industries and agencies will be formalized.
• A minimum of two fundraising activities, such as telephone contacts and follow-up letters, visits, and/or proposals will be completed monthly.
• A network of alumni/nae to assist the currently enrolled students (e.g., mentoring, graduate school admissions, internships, COOP and job placements, scholarships) will be established.
• An analysis of staffing needs to undertake the full array of programs and activities to fulfill the mission, goals and objectives of the strategic plan will be completed and the full complement of honors staff will be in place.
• An honors computing lab with a minimum of fifty seats, an honors lounge and resource center accommodating a minimum of one hundred students, and three project/presentation rooms accommodating twenty people each will be available for use by the honors students.
• An annual report of honors students outcomes and achievements will be compiled, published and widely disseminated.

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* NJI-Tower (New Jersey Information-Technology Opportunities for the Workforce, Education & Research) is a $25 million state-funded multi-purpose grant to NJIT which will serve as one model for developing honors courses across multiple disciplines and engaging students in industry-based research projects.