Middlebury’s Strategic Planning Initiative is an institution-wide effort and shared opportunity to rearticulate our mission, purpose, and aspirations for the next decade and more. Through this process, we will collectively consider who we are and what, together, we are for.
President Ian B. Baucom announced on October 29, 2025 that Jessica Holmes, the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Global Health, and AJ Vasiliou, associate professor of chemistry, would lead this effort as co-chairs a Strategic Planning Steering Committee for the coming year. LeRoy Graham, associate provost, will serve as project manager.
Steering Committee
The steering committee comprises 13 members, including the two co-chairs and other faculty, staff, students, and trustees from a range of Middlebury backgrounds. They will convene in the fall and work intensively during winter term, with the goal of developing recommendations this spring for a new strategic plan that President Baucom will bring to the Board of Trustees for its discussion, review, and approval in May 2026. Once this planning phase is complete, we will move forward with executing the plan.
President Baucom charged the steering committee with facilitating a widely collaborative and transparent process in consultation with trustees, faculty, staff, students, alumni, and administrative team. The steering committee will invite all of Middlebury to participate in this process in a variety of ways throughout this process, from small group lunches to community gatherings.
Working Groups
In addition to the steering committee, 12 working groups—with representatives from across Middlebury—will focus on three overarching themes:
- Strengthen the Core
- Connect the Whole
- Meet the Moment
Each of those groups will be charged with engaging broadly and deliberatively across our community—including with standing faculty, board, staff, and other committees––with the goal of developing a set of priorities and recommendations that are at once bold and feasible: dreams with deliverables. The steering committee will work to consider those recommendations, seeking to identify which ones should animate our long-term strategic priorities and then synthesizing those highest priorities in a comprehensive plan to recommend to President Baucom to bring to the board in May 2026.
What Is Middlebury For?
Middlebury marked its 225th anniversary on November 1, 2025. As we mark this historic milestone and reflect on our past and present while planning for our future, we will collectively engage a question inspired by the historian Premesh Lalu: What is Middlebury for?
Our strategic planning process allows us to explore this question—not just for the next decade, but, if we do this wisely, for Middlebury’s larger future ahead. As we launch that work,we will take that question as the framework for our shared work and thought.
- What is Middlebury for?
- What are we for enduringly?
- What are we for currently and urgently?
- What are we for in this moment and for the future we have this opportunity to shape?