Strategic Planning
February 5, 2010
To: The CFS Community
From: The Rev. Edmund K. Sherrill, Head of School
Re: Strategic Thinking and Planning
At its most recent meeting, the CFS Board of Directors established a Strategic Planning Task Force that is to consider the following important question:
“What should CFS look like - five and ten years from now?”
With oversight responsibility, the work of the task force is to help the School canvass all of its constituencies in a process geared to learn what we value and/or desire most within several major areas of School life. These areas are School Profile, Academics, Residential Life, Co-curricular Program, and the Environment.
The process intends to be open and dynamic. It will become so as the task force generates central questions, airs them within a schedule of meetings, solicits and receives responses provided across all school constituencies, distills the answers, and communicates its progress with opportunity for all to provide feedback along the way. While there is not student representation on the task force itself, we will be sure to involve students and solicit their opinions about this work along the way. The task force is charged to provide a draft response by the end of June. This draft is intended to be comprised of several well-articulated strategic goals within each of these areas including preliminary action steps and suggested timelines for completion.
This is an ambitious undertaking, yet the Board is convinced CFS is poised as a community to take this project on for many have voiced an eagerness to move ahead. Good ideas are already circulating and this process will give them a frame, forum and finally focus.
While the task force has oversight of the process and depending on the nature of the contemplated goal, much of the work may be accomplished in smaller groups, such as the faculty and staff. For example, some of the academic work is already underway under the guidance of Ken Rodgers and department chairs. Starting with the question, “What should a CFS graduate look like, say in 2018 at the School’s centennial, and what does he need to get there?” these educational professionals have been talking about academic standards, curriculum and school schedule. Of course, other constituencies such as alumni and parents will weigh in on these important issues, too. As work in the five areas progresses and a plan developed, future assignments to Board committees, school administration, and other groups will become clearer.
All of this will take hold in a process managed by the task force and periodic reports will be sent to the school community as it progresses. The final product will be reported out to all constituencies.
Members of the Task Force are:
Ned Sherrill, Chair
Mark Carroll P ’00, ‘01
Dick Gherst
Cannie Shafer
Peter Hamilton
Ken Rodgers P ’09, ‘10
Bart Bronk ‘96
Todd Elliott ‘80
Pamela Long P ‘11
Chuck Watterson
Heather Farrell
Carol Houck
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