March

26,2012 Building on Success-Planning Our Future North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics Strategic Plan 2012-2017 Executive Summary The North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics began its strategic planning process in early August, 2012 by engaging hundreds of NCSSM constituents--students, alumni, faculty and staff, parents, members of the schools leadership boards and business leaders from around the state--to gather information about the successes of our past and present, and to inform our future. Information gathered through surveys and focus groups, along with research on national and international educational issues, university and business expectations for preparing students, and other topics informed the work of the 34 member Strategic Planning Team which convened for three days in late August to begin developing our Strategic Plan, Building On Success - Planning Our Future: NCSSM 2017. The Strategic Planning Team was representative of all NCSSM constituents. The work of the team during the first planning session was to establish core Beliefs, our Mission, and Parameters to guide the operation of the school. Based on the research and information gathered from surveys and focus groups, the team identified the critical issues the school will face over the next five years and developed four significant Objectives for the school to accomplish in order to effectively address the identified critical issues. The team then identified eight Strategies for reaching the Objectives over the next five years. Below you will find each of the components of the plan (Beliefs, Mission, Parameters, Objectives, Strategies) developed by the Strategic Planning Team during the first planning session. Agreement on each component of the plan listed below was reached through consensus of the Strategic Planning Team, thus they reflect the teams full agreement. Beliefs express the organizations fundamental values and non-negotiable principles We believe that: Our greatest resource is the capability and creative capacity of the human mind. Everyone is unique and has intrinsic value. Diversity enriches and strengthens lives and communities. Embracing challenge inspires excellence. Individuals have choices and are responsible for their actions. Service to others builds and strengthens our community. Environmental stewardship and resource sustainability are everyones responsibility. Anyone can achieve full potential with effort, opportunity, and support. Personal fulfillment and professional success require a passion for learning throughout life. Collaboration fosters learning, innovation, and community. Adhering to high ethical standards is essential for a community to function and flourish. A nurturing living and learning environment develops the well being of the whole person. Quality public education is essential to a free, democratic society. Science and mathematics education stimulates innovation and invention and is critical to the well being of our state, nation, and the world.

 The Mission is the keystone of our Strategic Plan. It defines our identity and purpose. The mission statement below revises and updates our mission, which was last revised in 2009 and currently reads: The mission of the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics, a public residential high school, is to help meet North Carolinas need for responsible leadership in the development and application of science, mathematics and technology, and to act as a catalyst for educational improvement throughout North Carolina and the nation. The revised Mission statement proposed as a result of the strategic planning process is: The mission of the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics, an intellectually stimulating, diverse, and collaborative community, is to: educate academically talented students to become state, national, and global leaders in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, advance public education in North Carolina, and inspire innovation for the betterment of humankind, through challenging residential and virtual programs driven by instructional excellence and the excitement of discovery. The revised mission specifically identifies the virtual component of our school, as well as identifies our focus on educating our students to become leaders in STEM education. The revised mission also explicitly identifies our goals of inspiring NCSSM students to be innovative in order to better the world around us. The objectives, strategies, and specific results identified in our plan should allow us to accomplish our mission. Parameters reflect our self-imposed limitations. These are the boundaries within which we will accomplish our mission. The best interest of students will always be given the highest priority in decision-making. As we strive to achieve our mission, we will preserve the integrity and quality of our residential program. The scope of our program will always include learning in the humanities, social sciences, extracurricular activities, and service. Programs and services should be consistent with the Strategic Plan, and the benefits clearly justify cost. We will always provide safe, secure, supportive environments for living and learning. Critical Issues identified by the Strategic Planning Team based on the initial research compiled in advance of the first planning session. Over-reliance on public funding Inadequate facilities and equipment Insufficient support to under-served students Limited research opportunities Inadequate communication of our value proposition Insufficient IT infrastructure, systems, and services Overextension of faculty and staff Loss of creative energy among faculty, staff and students Ineffective internal and external communications Dissonance between our residential and outreach programs

 Objectives are the goals that we will achieve through implementation of the Strategic Plan. The objectives reflect specific, demonstrable and measurable results that exceed our present capacity and allow us to address the critical issues we face. The four objectives for the Strategic Plan are listed below. The goal is to accomplish these objectives over the next five years. Have each residential student develop and be engaged in a real world learning experience. Annually increase the percentage of graduates who are actively engaged in STEM-related fields. Have a collaborative partnership with a majority of school districts in each congressional district in North Carolina to provide high-quality educational content and services to teachers and students. Engage 1,000,000 students and 100,000 teachers through NCSSM products or services over the next 5 years. Strategies are the broad statements that describe how we will accomplish our mission and objectives. We will: 1. Increase and diversify our sources of revenue and resources as well as ensure sustainable use to best achieve our mission and objectives. 2. Improve our IT systems and services as well as provide the facilities and equipment to effectively accomplish the mission of our residential and virtual community. 3. Ensure our residential and virtual programs work collaboratively to fulfill our mission. 4. Increase the capacity within our faculty, the community, our alumni, and professional partnerships to provide students real world opportunities to apply their learning. 5. Improve communication, public relations, and marketing to achieve our mission and objectives. 6. Improve the academic preparation of students admitted to NCSSM and provide sufficient support for their success while on campus. 7. Create an environment that stimulates the creativity, innovation, and excellence of our faculty and staff. 8. Expand our outreach activities for teachers and students throughout North Carolina and beyond. The eight strategies listed above each have multiple specific results and action plans that detail how each of the strategies will be accomplished over the next five years. Each strategy had an Action Planning Team that worked over the past six months to develop the results and action plans. The Action Planning Teams presented their plans to the Strategic Planning Team at the second planning session on March 13th and 14th . The results listed below reflect the those results and action plans approved by the Strategic Planning Team during their planning session. The results statements for each of the eight strategies listed below include reflect all of the results that we will accomplish over the next five years. The results statements in bold are the results we will implement in the first year of the plan, which covers the next sixteen months. Each of the results statements has an associated action plan or plans that were developed by the Action Planning Teams. These action plans will serve as guides to the individuals assigned responsibility for seeing that the results are implemented. Following each of the strategies and results listed below is a high level overview of what will be accomplished through implementation of the strategy over the next five years.

 Strategy 1: Increase and diversify our sources of revenue and resources as well as ensure sustainable use to best achieve our mission and objectives. Specific Results 1. Secure recurring state funding specific to the current operations and the expansion of distance education programming. 2. All elected and appointed leaders of NCSSM, including members of the Board of Trustees, Foundation Board of Directors, and Alumni Association Board of Directors, model a culture of charitable giving by donating financially to NCSSM. 3. NCSSM employees and students foster a culture of charitable giving to the institution by donating financially to NCSSM or making other contributions to the institution. 4. Increase charitable giving from NCSSM alumni by an addition of $30K and 200 alumni annually. 5. Increase charitable giving from current NCSSM families by an addition of $25K and 40 families annually. 6. Increase corporate charitable donations to NCSSM by $200K annually. 7. Generate revenue from financially self-supporting outreach programs to support the schools mission. 8. Apply for and receive contract or grant awards from state, federal, private foundation, or other qualified sources to fund institutional priorities. 9. Generate net returns from NCSSM intellectual properties and products. 10. Establish sustainable use of environmental resources as a standing priority in operational and instructional practices. This strategy focuses on increasing financial support for NCSSM through multiple sources of new revenue including revenue from the state, private giving, and NCSSM generated products and services. This strategy has a plan for receiving new recurring state funding of approximately $1.5 million dollars for distance education programming for which we do not currently receive state funding. The strategy also focuses on increasing the culture of giving to NCSSM by all of our constituents and through these plans we will generate, within five years, an additional $1.3 million dollars annually from private giving. This strategy also has plans that focus on generating revenues from NCSSM developed products, services, and grants that will allow us to financially support our outreach efforts. Finally, this strategy also focuses on becoming more environmentally conscious in order to more sustainably use our resources on campus. As you can see above, we will begin working on the majority of results in this strategy during the first year of implementation. Strategy 2: Improve our IT systems and services as well as provide the facilities and equipment to effectively accomplish the mission of our residential and virtual community. Specific Results 1. Implement best practices to increase efficiency in maintaining the physical plant and facility. 2. Increase energy efficiency by 20% in order to reduce costs for utilities for the physical campus. 3. Meet current NC Building Code standards and energy efficiency recommendations by upgrading the infrastructure and facilities. 4. Adopt International Standard Organization (ISO) 27002 as the code of practice for information security. 5. Upgrade IT infrastructure to protect and improve IT services. 6. Continuously improve manageability, flexibility and cost efficiency of campus IT systems, staff and operations while maintaining or increasing end-user satisfaction. 7. Increase student satisfaction by restructuring housing assignments and resource replacement cycles to meet recommended levels of UNC system schools. 8. Reconfigure and equip identified learning environments to facilitate student-centered, active learning. 9. Evaluate existing and potential lab spaces and upgrade lab facilities, equipment and safety practices to effectively accomplish the schools mission.

 This strategy focuses on improving the infrastructure of our campus facilities, learning and living space, and improving IT services and security. Through our efforts in this strategy to improve campus infrastructure, we will also be significantly improving energy efficiency and lowering operating costs. Much of the improvement to our infrastructure occurs in results 1 and 2, which we will start during the first year and will complete in phases over the five years of the plan. Along with improving our aging heating and cooling, and water and electrical distribution systems infrastructure over the next five years, we will also be upgrading lab and classroom space as well as room and lounge space in our residence halls. Included in the enhancements to our lab space are renovations to significantly enhance our Applied Sciences lab space. These renovations will include the building of a Fabrication Lab, for which we already have $350,000 of private funding to outfit the lab with equipment. Enhancing our Applied Sciences lab space will allow us to expand our Applied Science course offerings to meet student demand. All of the projects covered in this result are aligned with the Discovery Center Capital Improvement Plans. The goal of this strategy is to move forward in improving our facilities as we continue to pursue funding for the Discovery Center. Along with improving our facilities this strategy focuses on improving IT security and services. Over the next year we will move forward in adopting ISO 27002 standards for IT security and begin migrating some IT services off campus which will improve security and efficiency. This strategy also has a focus on improving our IT services on campus and looking forward in our planning needs using both internal and external planning resources and expertise. Strategy 3: Ensure our residential and virtual programs work collaboratively to fulfill our mission. Specific Results 1. Develop a school calendar and daily schedule that will optimize opportunities for collaboration between residential and virtual program. 2. Academic Programs and DEEP will have shared responsibility for supervision of NCSSM faculty with DEEP responsibilities. 3. Academic Programs will become responsible for the content of all NCSSM courses and will work collaboratively with DEEP to develop curriculum and instructional technology, and to determine the best delivery of the content for both residential and virtual programs. 4. Unify, or ensure the interoperability of, NCSSMs Learning Management Systems (LMS) and Student Information Systems (SIS). 5. Faculty will create lessons on the web and for use in virtual and residential classes. 6. Consider and support opportunities for social, academic, and service-learning interactions among all NCSSM students, virtual and residential. This strategy focuses on addressing structural and cultural impediments to our residential and virtual programs working more in unison. Many of the structural differences between how our residential program and DEEP operate make it difficult for faculty and staff to work simultaneously in both programs, thus creating challenges for staff and for the programs to operate efficiently. This strategy will look at how to create a calendar and schedule that better facilitates the ability of faculty to work in both programs. We will also have faculty in both programs be a part of the same academic departments with joint supervision by DEEP and Academic Programs. Greater collaboration between faculty in DEEP and Academic Programs will benefit curriculum development and instructional delivery in both our virtual and residential courses.

 Strategy 4: Increase the capacity within our faculty, the community, our alumni, and professional partnerships to provide students real world opportunities to apply their learning. Specific Results 1. Modify and increase the capacity of the Research program, Mentorship program, and summer internships and research to better meet student demand. 2. Increase focus on authentic real world opportunities in our courses, Mini-Term, and workservice. 3. Expand academic and service opportunities (summer and school year) to build leadership, planning, communication, and organizational skills of students. 4. Facilitate interaction between the school and families, alumni, corporations, government, nonprofits, and universities to increase the real world opportunities for students. This strategy focuses on expanding opportunities for students to participate in real-world experiences during their time as students at NCSSM. During the first two years of implementation we will double the number of students who will have research and mentorship opportunities. This strategy also calls for better utilizing the summer months to provide students with research, mentorship and service opportunities that provide them with real-world experiences. The results in this strategy also expand the Applied Science offerings to provide students with greater opportunities in courses that will not only allow them to apply their learning in math and science, but prepare them for careers in areas where forecasts indicate there will be increasing demand. Through this strategy we will also be looking to catalogue how our courses integrate leadership, communication, planning and other skills into the curriculum and how our service opportunities reinforce these skills that students will need not only in college, but when they start their careers. Strategy 5: Improve communication, public relations, and marketing to achieve our mission and objectives. Specific Results 1. Improve the NCSSM website to enhance both internal and external communication. 2. Increase positive awareness of NCSSM. 3. Improve communication with all constituents of the NCSSM community such that pertinent information is available in a timely manner. 4. Standardize NCSSM branding. This strategy focuses on improving our ability to communicate both externally and internally by clearly defining the NCSSM brand and developing communication and marketing programs targeted to our various constituencies. These plans include clear messaging, protocols, resources and metrics for measuring the success of our efforts. An important component of this strategy that will allow us to facilitate both better communication and marketing is improving the aesthetics and operability the NCSSM website. Resources will be employed during the first year of implementation to improve the site and to develop guidelines for style and content. We will also clearly define ownership for web development and management of the website.

 Strategy 6: Improve the academic preparation of students admitted to NCSSM and provide sufficient support for their success while on campus. Specific Results 1. Create an admissions rubric that aligns with factors correlating with success at NCSSM and that includes qualitative factors such as motivation and interest in science, technology, engineering, and math. 2. Improve the Advising Program by increasing interaction between advisors and advisees, and improving the quality by implementing an Advisor training and evaluation program. 3. Train faculty, staff, alumni, and students to offer recruitment activities that include academic workshops for potential applicants in their home communities each year. 4. Revise registration and scheduling practices to increase students chances for academic success. 5. Create a summer program to provide prerequisite content for accepted juniors whose placement scores and other appropriate criteria indicate a need in order to introduce and acclimate them to the level of rigor at NCSSM. 6. Enhance student support by increasing the quality and quantity of extracurricular staff-to-students interaction. 7. Enhance student support by increasing the quality and quantity of staff-to-student and student-tostudent academic interaction outside of the classroom. 8. Provide student information to faculty and staff and enhance their ability to meet students needs. This strategy focuses on improving our ability to support the success of students at NCSSM. The results in the strategy address this effort by improving our ability to recruit talented students from across the state and to identify indicators of success for students at NCSSM that will better inform our selection criteria. The strategy also provides for increased support for students once they are accepted to NCSSM. The talented students accepted to NCSSM come from all over the state and have had varying academic opportunities prior to NCSSM. One of the results in this strategy is to provide a summer Bridge program for students who can benefit from academic enrichment in math and writing prior to the start of their junior year. This program will allow students to acclimate to the rigors of NCSSM and set them up for success at the start of the school year. This strategy also calls for improving our advisor program and for increasing the quality and quantity of opportunities to build relationships through enhanced student-to-student and staff-to-student interactions on campus. Strategy 7: Create an environment that stimulates the creativity, innovation, and excellence of our faculty and staff. Specific Results 1. NCSSM curriculum standards will encourage the freedom to incorporate thoughtful innovation, careful risk-taking, reflective practices, and the promotion of original ideas. 2. Innovation and creativity will be factors considered in hiring and evaluation practices. 3. Our school calendar and/or daily/weekly schedule will allocate specific times for creative and innovative pursuits. 4. The work environment at NCSSM will include collegiality, collaboration, recognition of employees contributions, and support for balanced lives for employees. 5. Administration will clearly communicate expectations and protocols, value and honor innovation and creativity, be transparent in its decision-making, and be responsive to faculty and staff. 6. NCSSM financial procedures for faculty and staff projects will be streamlined, flexible, clear, and responsive to instructional needs. 7. Individual faculty and staff work schedules will be negotiable to allow time for innovation. 8. NCSSM will have a professional development program that accounts for individual faculty and staff needs including internal and external collaboration.

 The focus of this strategy is to create a culture and climate that promotes innovation and collaboration in faculty and staff. Several of the results in this strategy can be cross-referenced to results in other strategies, particularly as related to developing a calendar and schedule that will allow time for faculty and staff to engage in innovative pursuits such as curriculum and course content development, and developing new products and services. This strategy also focuses on improving processes and protocols (communication, business practices, decision-making) on campus that inhibit faculty and staff from efficiently and effectively pursuing innovative and creative endeavors. Strategy 8: Expand our outreach activities for teachers and students throughout North Carolina and beyond. Specific Results 1. Define the goals, objectives, and intended outcomes for NCSSM outreach activities. 2. Develop and implement an NCSSM Partnership Model in order to expand our outreach activities. 3. Establish administrative processes for coordinating and documenting outreach activities as defined by the goals, objectives, and intended outcomes. 4. Prioritize and support outreach activities with adequate internal human, technical, and financial resources. 5. Develop, organize, and share digital resources for teaching and learning. 6. Provide academic enrichment and support for K-12 students in North Carolina, particularly addressing the needs of under-represented students and academically gifted students. 7. Develop and disseminate relevant, innovative, and student-centered teaching and learning methods and materials. The focus of this strategy is to organize, coordinate and expand our outreach activities throughout the state. During the first year of implementation current outreach activities will be inventoried with the goal of aligning our outreach efforts with the needs identified by school districts and the outcomes universities and business are expecting from students across the state. Other results in the strategy focus on establishing clear goals, objectives and metrics for measuring the success of our outreach programs. We will also establish a model for developing partnerships with institutions throughout the state in order to more effectively serve students and teachers. The Partnership Model will establish a basis for establishing partnerships with institutions we are serving, as well as institutions we are partnering with to provide outreach services. The model will establish criteria, processes and expected outcomes for working with partner institutions in our outreach efforts. Implementation Implementation of the first year of the plan will begin in Spring, 2012. The next steps in moving forward with implementation are to finalize the Resource Allocation Plan (a draft of the Resource Allocation Plan for Year 1 is attached in Appendix 1) and to develop the metrics for evaluating the success of the action plans. Also, individuals will be assigned responsibility for implementation of the Year 1 action plans. Throughout the first year of implementation there will be regular updates on the plans progress on the NCSSM website, at Board of Trustee meetings and other meetings on campus of staff, students and parents.

 Appendix 1 NCSSM Strategic Plan: Resource Allocation Plan Year 1: FY 2013

Strategy # Strategy 1 Strategy 2 Strategy 3 Strategy 4 Strategy 5 Strategy 6 Strategy 7 Strategy 8 Result #s (1,2,3,4,5,6,10) (1,2a,3a,4,9) (1,4,6) (1,2,4) (1,4) (1,5) (3,5,6) (1,2,3,5) Total = Recurring Sour Costs ce* $210,000 O, F $57,000 O O $90,000 O $120,000 O $75,000 O $75,000 $627,000 Non-Recurring Sour Costs ce* $720,000 RR O $100,000 RR $80,000 O $25,000 O $10,000 O $10,000 O $25,000 $970,000 Total Cost- All Strategies $210,000 $777,000 $190,000 $450,000 $100,000 $85,000 $10,000 $25,000 $1,597,000

*Source: O = Operating Budget RR = Repair and Renovation Funding F = NCSSM Foundation Funding

Note: Totals listed above are based on preliminary estimates from the Cost-Benefit Analyses of each plan. These totals do not assume restructuring of some job responsibilities that will reduce the need for new revenues.