Board of Trustees Update, Nov. 11, 2024

College Community:

From Nov. 1-2, the Harvey Mudd College community gathered in Palm Springs for the 64th annual Saddle Rock board retreat. Trustees, students, faculty, staff and members of the Alumni Association Board of Governors came together to connect and explore some exciting topics, including the draft Strategic Plan, the Innovation Accelerator, and preparations for a future comprehensive fundraising campaign. It was a great opportunity for everyone to share ideas and brainstorm on these important areas. 

On Friday, Peter Hayashida, Senior Consultant and Principal of Marts&Lundy, the College’s counsel for planning our fundraising campaign, and Assistant Vice President for Development Kimberly Stafford framed strategic planning within the context of campaign fundraising, especially as it relates to how fundraising can help provide a pathway to “big ideas.” Following their presentation, President Harriet Nembhard, Assistant Vice President for the Office of Institutional Research and Effectiveness Laura Palucki Blake and Vice President for Communications and Marketing Tim Hussey led a discussion with attendees about how we might evaluate our effectiveness in achieving our strategic goals as well as how we might begin to craft a compelling story about Harvey Mudd College’s impact on the world as the College approaches its 75^th anniversary in 2030. 

Our discussions and work on Saturday centered around the recent call for proposals for the College’s first Innovation Accelerator, a key component of the College’s strategic plan and one designed to help foster innovative ideas that will have an impact on the College and the world. Trustees were excited to hear that 21 proposals were received as part of the Innovation Accelerator call for proposals process. We heard “mini-pitches” from each of the proposals and then broke into smaller groups of trustees, students, faculty, staff and alumni to discuss the ideas, provide suggestions for potential improvements and ultimately. While we realize the proposals will continue to be refined further and the list of ideas moving forward will be narrowed, we were all extremely impressed with the variety and quality of the proposals. 

Our table discussions and suggestions were one of the main highlights of the weekend, and everyone came away from Saturday looking forward to hearing more about the various ideas and to seeing which ones are selected to move forward. 

Sunday, Peter Hayashida joined our new Vice President for Advancement Jennifer Eccles in discussing how we are building our campaign plan, including highlighting the assessment and campaign readiness work that Marts&Lundy is conducting in partnership with the Office of College Advancement. Following their presentation, President Nembhard led us in another set of group discussions on the Innovation Accelerator Summit to be held next year, where the ideas selected to move forward in the IA process will be pitched to stakeholders. It promises to be an exciting time as our community comes together to continue to find ways to innovate and advance Harvey Mudd’s mission. 

In closing, this has been a particularly challenging year—both in higher education, on our fellow campuses in the consortium, and at Harvey Mudd. The trustees have been heartened to see the care and support our students, faculty and staff have shown for each other as well as your dedication to our continued strategic planning efforts. We want you all to know how deeply committed we are to continuing to support this community in our role as trustees and how grateful we are for your ongoing efforts to support each other in our work together. 
 

Sincerely,

Jim Bean ’77

Chair, Harvey Mudd College Board of Trustees