Universities are needed now more than they have ever been, and that is certainly true for the University of Saskatchewan. To be a university for the future, it is incumbent upon us to stay connected to the communities we serve, locally and globally—to contribute to them and, in so doing, to be the university the world needs.
Guiding us towards achieving this aspiration is our 2025 University Plan. Built through consultation and collaboration, it evolves from our 2016 Vision, Mission and Values, and is informed by and takes us beyond previous integrated plans.
This 2025 University Plan is grounded in our strengths. As our Vision document states, “we use interdisciplinary and collaborative approaches to discovery.” No other research-intensive, medical-doctoral university in Canada has the array of colleges and interdisciplinary schools we do. None has the unique scientific infrastructure we have, nor our unique signature areas through which we are having a global influence. We have an unparalleled breadth of expertise in our professional colleges, social sciences disciplines, humanities and fine arts departments, and fundamental and applied sciences units. Together, we have the tremendous variety of programming and research—and the faculty, staff, and student talent— to serve and inspire our communities: this city, this province, this country, and beyond.
Fundamental to all of this is the key role our university plays in reconciliation. This plan must impel us, and clarify our purpose, in this regard. It is fundamental because we will achieve much when we are a strong university of common purpose, a trusted partner in the national imperative of reconciliation, engaging together the many communities we serve in an era of unprecedented political and technological change.
Our challenge, to be met in this plan, is to make this whole greater than the sum of its parts. When we are successful at doing so, students around the globe will see the university in particular as a place to develop the knowledge and skills they need to thrive in a future defined by constant change. Faculty will view the university as a place that creates unmatched possibilities for collaboration, discovery, and impact. Staff will find inspiration in the opportunity to create solutions—systems, practices, physical spaces—that reflect the university’s ambition. Our diverse communities will engage with and find inspiration in everything we do. We will take our place among the world’s top institutions of higher learning.
And in the process we will be the university the world needs. I invite all of us to join together in reaching that aspiration.
Peter Stoicheff
President and vice-chancellor