Spectrum - Volume 17 Issue 19 February 9, 1995 - Outreach survey undertaken

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Outreach survey undertaken

Spectrum Volume 17 Issue 19 - February 9, 1995

The university is involved in restructuring University Outreach.

The Task Force on University Outreach, chaired by UAP professor John Randolph and CFWR Dean Greg Brown, has been charged with reviewing Virginia Tech Outreach activities and making recommendations to the president and provost on the future of outreach at the university.

In preparation of its March 1 interim report to Provost Peggy Meszaros, the task force will be conducting a telephone survey of faculty members to assess their activities, attitudes, and interest in outreach.

The task force defines outreach very broadly as the transfer and exchange of knowledge and experience between the university and society. It is an integral part of the broad university mission and occurs in a variety of ways, cutting across teaching, research, and service. Outreach involves generating, applying, transmitting, and preserving knowledge to catalyze the growth and development of external individuals, communities, businesses, and the greater society.

Outreach includes continuing education (on-and off-campus workshops and short courses, off-campus credit courses); Extension and other public-service activities (technical assistance, information transfer, and training offered at no charge to individuals, groups, firms, and agencies); sponsored public-service and technical assistance, training, and applied research projects for firms and agencies, both domestic and international); faculty consulting (technical assistance and training offered by individual faculty members for a per-diem fee; and faculty-directed student-service projects (service learning and other projects that provide assistance to outside clients while giving an educational experience to students).

The survey will be administered to a sample of the faculty by the Center for Survey Research through February 19.

The five-to-eight-minute telephone survey asks questions about current and expected future outreach activities and perceptions about how outreach is valued and rewarded at Virginia Tech. It also asks what incentives would prompt increased outreach by the faculty.

The task force encourages all contacted faculty members to participate in the survey.