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Strategic Framework Implementation

Progress Reports

January 2023

The College of Built Environments collectively developed and adopted a strategic framework in Spring 2021 and began implementation Autumn 2021. This update reflects our key activities and progress toward the accomplishment of the goals we set. This reports on five key areas that support the objectives of multiple pillars. Each report includes direct outcomes, indirect outcomes, and progress status.

  • Student Support
  • Cohort Faculty Hire
  • BE Commons
  • Research Support
  • Faculty and Staff Support

Read the Report

Strategies and Actions

Our first pillar, collaboration and impact, reflects a transformation that academia is undergoing to match our current global circumstances. Today’s grand challenges—climate change, the housing crisis, and others—require a full range of disciplinary skills and the ability to work well with others. Every day, our students, faculty, and staff bridge disciplinary divides and gain vital, practical experience with our academic, industry, regulatory, governmental, and community partners. With that in mind, at CBE we seek to:

  • Build our college’s reputation for collaboration. Our graduates will be known for their collaborative skills and partner with groups from local to global scales.
  • Integrate disciplinary and interdisciplinary pedagogy. Through updated curriculum, we’ll enable students to bridge disciplines and apply pedagogical training to real-world scenarios, especially around climate solutions and EDI.
  • Expand CBE capacity. We’ll dedicate our resources to sustaining interdisciplinary, applied, and community-engaged work.
  • Know and celebrate CBE. We’re on a journey to understand how CBE can advance and celebrate a more just and beautiful world.

CBE is a leader in built environments [this statement could include a link to stats]. We’ve ranked among the top 20 graduate programs in architecture. UW is among the top five institutions globally in scientific research. And over the next three to five years, we’re turning our focus on just and equitable climate solutions for the communities we serve.

Sharing how built environments encompass our everyday lives is as important as conducting research. Bold thought leadership—our second pillar—is vital to conceptualizing and communicating how the built environment influences the planet’s most pressing social and environmental problems. At CBE, we pledge to:

  • Grow CBE’s reputation as a trusted thought leader. We’re working with our partners to tell stories about our bold solutions to the “wicked” problems facing built environments.
  • Advance climate solutions. Built environments can be both the cause of and solution to climate problems. Our faculty will advance teaching and research on climate solutions that support health, equity, and resilience.
  • Foster innovative use of technology. Our students and faculty will explore developing technology to address the urgent issues facing humanity.
  • Leverage CBE Humanities expertise. CBE isn’t just about applied sciences. We need the humanities to examine what it means to construct just and resilient built environments.

Built environments powerfully affect personal and community well-being. They can promote prosperity or be used to exclude marginalized populations based on their identities. That’s why our third pillar is equitable and just practices. At CBE, we’re working to eradicate disparities in built environments through inclusive teaching, research, practice, and service. Specifically, we seek to:

  • Cultivate an inclusive CBE culture. We’re working to welcome people from every identity regardless of age, race, gender identity, ability/disability, and ethnicity.
  • Model and embody equity and inclusion. The built environment is for everyone. We’ll continue to model values of equity and inclusion in CBE culture, whether on or off campus.
  • Establish inclusive pedagogy. We’re creating curriculum guidelines to support diverse topics and underrepresented voices in all CBE courses.
  • Use equity and justice as a research lens. CBE scholars will center equity and justice as they conduct research.