Transforming Learning for a Shared Future | Strategic Plan 2026-2031

Pathways forward:

• Advance strategic hiring priorities in areas that include actively recruiting Indigenous, Black, 2SLGBTQIA+, HPSM, persons with disabilities, and diverse faculty and staff through targeted outreach, inclusive job postings, and strategic networking.
• Create a marketing plan to enhance recruitment of students, and reflect the diversity of our Faculty community.
• Recognize and showcase Educational Leadership stream faculty contributions to educational excellence through awards, fellowships, funding opportunities, and mentorship.
• Develop clearly articulated procedures, resources, and structures to better support the success and retention of new staff, faculty, and students.

Pathways forward:

• Organize regular community events and experiences that strengthen connection and belonging for students, faculty, staff, and alumni.
• Ensure diverse representation in advisory councils and committees, with meaningful engagement for Musqueam, Syilx Okanagan, and other Indigenous, Black, 2SLGBTQIA+, HPSM, and persons with disabilities.
• Expand and promote well-being resources tailored to the specific needs of faculty, staff, and students through internal communications and professional learning.
• Strengthen transparency and accountability through clear decision-making processes, reciprocal accountability practices, and confidential pathways for reporting concerns and accessing support.

Pathways forward:

• Steward Faculty resources through a shared responsibility to improve programmatic and operational efficiencies.
• Expand and diversify funding sources, including grants, bursaries, seat funding, special project funding, and philanthropic support to foster and sustain the Faculty’s priorities.
• Establish new revenue streams aligned with community needs, such as professional programs and social enterprises.
• Track and report contributions to the University’s Climate Action Plan 2030 and build partnerships across campuses and communities to advance climate action.

Pathways forward:

• Assess existing accessible, culturally safe, and identity-affirming spaces, and co-create improved virtual and physical spaces based on reported needs.
• Build capacity by promoting the uptake of available resources and toolkits to enhance accessibility.
• Support and model accessible and inclusive approaches to teaching and learning practices.

Pathways forward:

• Enhance community-based relationships with Musqueam and Syilx Okanagan Nations in ways that meaningfully recognize knowledge contributions of community members to teaching and learning, as well as provide opportunity for students, staff, and faculty to learn about Musqueam and Syilx Nations.
• Integrate anti-oppressive, anti-racist, Indigenous resurgence, and decolonial foundational content across all graduate and undergraduate courses through collaborative curriculum review and development.
• Co-create and develop culturally responsive, authentic, and varied assessment methods to support equitable learning outcomes through collaboration across units.
• Prioritize the integration of world issues and polycrisis through critical dialogue and community forums.

Pathways forward:

• Broaden experiential education opportunities and increase student awareness of their value, through practicum, community field experiences, work-integrated learning, and community engaged and service learning.
• Explore new models to increase flexible and inclusive delivery formats and options for credit and non-credit programs, such as micro-credentials, stackable courses, condensed courses, and online learning opportunities in areas of demand and faculty expertise.
• Establish more lifelong learning opportunities tailored to adult learners, working professionals, and mature students.
• Analyze learner data from the Ministry of Education & Childcare, school districts, and community organizations to develop and advance culturally relevant, responsive, and sustaining curricula. Prepare professionals, scholars, and practitioners to meet the diverse needs of learners.

Pathways forward:

• Increase credit and non-credit programs that foster curiosity, compassion, and care to meet the diverse needs of learners and the schools, and communities they serve.
• Create learning environments that model relational practices and collaboration across undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs, engaging professionals, scholars, and practitioners.
• Incentivize student-led teaching and learning projects that foster leadership, promote engagement, and connect across departments and community contexts.

Pathways forward:

• Assess the range and nature of interdisciplinary courses and program offerings to create opportunities for greater collaboration within and beyond our Faculty.
• Co-create knowledge and practices across our Faculty through joint forums, workshops, and events.
• Increase interdisciplinary teaching clusters and joint course assignments that integrate identified relevant topics across departments and other faculties.
• Advocate for critical dialogue in relevant forms of knowledge that inform public debate and contribute to solutions of complex and contentious societal issues.

Pathways forward:

• Equip units with new and progressive algorithmic and digital literacy practices to enable instructors and students to critically and ethically use AI and other emerging technologies in research, curriculum development, and teaching.
• Promote the use of professional learning opportunities and expand access to free, high quality digital teaching resources to support faculty and students in using AI and other emerging technologies for research, teaching, and learning.
• Develop and highlight research on the use of educational technology, including AI, digital justice and their rapidly evolving roles in learning and teaching.
• Pursue funding and partnerships to build expertise and expand leadership in algorithmic and digital literacy, Indigenous data sovereignty, and the ethical use of emerging technologies.

Pathways forward:

• Increase the number of educational opportunities focused on polycrisis, environmental justice, and relational approaches to land, water, and all living systems.
• Incentivize community-driven research with respect to education’s relationship to land, water, food sovereignty, biodiversity, and sustainability.
• Coordinate existing and new environment and sustainability-related initiatives, programs, and research to support climate resilience, Indigenous land and place-based learning, ecological stewardship, and innovation activities across both campuses.

Pathways forward:

• Advocate for research and other creative practices that bring together diverse disciplines and ways of knowing to address urgent societal issues.
• Broaden and incentivize the uptake of interdisciplinary research clusters and methodologies across our Faculty.
• Promote opportunities for interdisciplinary research funding, external partnerships, and grants by sharing stories of the outcomes of this work.

Pathways forward:

• Increase communication strategies to showcase community-engaged research, strong partnerships, and promotion of Indigenous perspectives.
• Mobilize knowledge of research informed policies and practices to support partnerships.
• Create opportunities and mechanisms to promote collaboration, creativity, and participation in all stages of inquiry.

Pathways forward:

• Seek internal and external funding opportunities, including previously untapped sources in industry, government, and philanthropy, to advance research areas.
• Promote and increase opportunities to celebrate, recognize, and reward stories of research, scholarship, and other creative practices.
• Advocate for funding and support structures that amplify the contributions of diverse scholars.
• Support Indigenous research and knowledge mobilization by Indigenous scholars, students, and community members by re-affirming our commitments to reconciliation, decolonization, language revitalization, and Indigenous-identified priorities.

Pathways forward:

• Promote the value of undergraduate research and increase student participation.
• Establish a dedicated research infrastructure to support and amplify student-led research initiatives and engagement projects.
• Design collaborative spaces and opportunities for undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, early-career researchers, and faculty to connect.
• Explore and implement new structures to support post-research and opportunities, such as mentorship, publishing, and knowledge exchange.

Pathways forward:

• Further develop conversations on methodologies for different ways of knowing that are relevant, progressive, and dispelling of harmful practices.
• Recognize and champion diverse and emerging methodologies to address complex world issues.
• Create structures and mechanisms to encourage faculty and student researchers to enact principles of respect, reciprocity, relevance, responsibility, and relationality into their research context.

Pathways forward:

• Create opportunities to align Faculty programs with emerging Musqueam, Syilx Okanagan, and other Indigenous priorities through consultation with Indigenous partners and communities locally, across Canada and globally.
• Develop communications and outreach strategies to promote relevant, reciprocal connections with Indigenous communities and to strengthen our Faculty’s relationship with Musqueam and Syilx Nations.
• Expand pathways to education for Musqueam, Syilx Okanagan, and other Indigenous learners and community members.
• Promote and support non-Indigenous allies in undertaking decolonization and reconciliation work to lessen the burden carried by Indigenous community members.

Pathways forward:

• Showcase our Faculty’s academic and research strengths at the Vancouver and Okanagan campuses and strengthen cross-campus pathways, collaborations, and partnerships.
• Build and sustain formal and informal reciprocal partnerships with diverse local, regional, and rural communities and school districts across BC.
• Create opportunities and structures to deepen ongoing community conversations and feedback sessions to assess the relevance and effectiveness of programs and partnerships.
• Co-design flexible outreach programs and create partnerships with communities to address identified needs and develop educational resources and initiatives that support sustainable relationships.

Pathways forward:

• Strengthen and expand academic partnerships with international universities and research institutions to support collaborative scholarship.
• Heighten collaborations with international institutions, government, and community organizations to develop joint learning opportunities, research initiatives, and projects.
• Assess and map out structures and mechanisms to explore and support strategic opportunities internationally.

Pathways forward:

• Develop strategies to strengthen public perception of the role of our Faculty in leading inclusive and transformative change in society, education, health, research, leadership, and professional practice.
• Create a marketing strategy to promote stories of success and innovation, and to ensure research and scholarship are accessible beyond academia.
• Redesign the Faculty’s website to improve communications, enhance public engagement, support recruitment efforts, and encourage philanthropic support.
• Strengthen partnerships with donors and alumni to expand philanthropic support and enhance our Faculty’s impact locally and globally.

Pathways forward:

• Expand opportunities for alumni engagement locally, nationally, and globally.
• Develop a Faculty alumni survey to establish the value and contributions of a Faculty of Education degree for personal and professional learning.
• Further recognize, celebrate, and share alumni stories and their achievements.
• Leverage alumni networks to support mentorship, professional growth, and collaborative activities that connect alumni and current students.