Theme III
Achieve national recognition as a fully-integrated research university with a commitment to human health.
VCU has a rich history of contributing to community-based participatory research and ameliorating health and social disparities. Few urban research universities can match the emerging strengths and established areas of excellence in such a diverse array of academic disciplines in the humanities, social sciences and biomedical sciences complemented and enriched by an outstanding academic medical center. Unifying the university around the achievement of collaborative and innovative approaches to health care and health promotion can focus our instruction, scholarship and practice across diverse disciplines and bring distinction to VCU as an institution committed to interdisciplinary teaching, research, service and patient care. Our commitment to interdisciplinary research and study is not new. We will continue to support an environment of collaboration across the university. We also recognize the strengths of our emerging branch campuses with distinctive foci in medicine, professional programs and the arts.
With a more coordinated approach to instruction within pre-health and basic science academic programs as well as the development of other emerging undergraduate programs that could potentially provide quality and diversity for our health science pipelines, VCU is poised to become a national leader in the preparation of the next generation of leaders in fields of health care and human health. Additionally, the recent Clinical and Translational Science Award positions VCU for enhanced levels of distinction in fostering community-based participatory research that will improve delivery of care to the underserved members of our community and throughout the world. Such distinction will require the combined expertise of multiple disciplines and a culture of collaboration that uniquely blends the art and science of health and wellness in the preparation of the next generation of health care professionals and in the transformation of clinical practice. To achieve this distinction will require a partnership between scholars who are the disseminators of knowledge and practitioners who are the disseminators of services. Under this goal, VCU will become a community of scholars and practitioners working together to educate, to serve and to improve the human condition.
Not all academic study, research, scholarship and community service will be focused on the health care spectrum. We will continue to strive for excellence in all areas of our work. However, providing the opportunity for all disciplines to engage in creative and innovative collaboration around a common theme will not only improve the quality of health care delivery but will advance our understandings of the power of transdisciplinary approaches to improve the human condition.
Theme III – Goals, metrics and initiatives
| Goals | Metrics | Illustrative university initiatives | |
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| III.A | Increase the number and quality of initiatives that prepare students for careers that advance health care, improve health status, and contribute to STEM related fields |
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| III.B | Increase interdisciplinary/inter-professional scholarship and practice focused in areas of public health |
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| III.C | Achieve national recognition for significant advances in clinical and translational research focused on important issues across the health care spectrum |
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