Department

Goals for everyone, and goals for leadership.

Goal 1: Community

Community: Build a sense of communal OSU physics identity and build trust among community members.

Vision of where we want to be in 5 years: Department members feel like they are part of the OSU physics community, know people across a variety of career stages, and feel that service to the department and broader community are valued and acknowledged.

Action 1: Reserve colloquium slots for department professional development, APS-IDEA, and student groups
Action 2: Provide professional development opportunities regarding human interactions
Action 3: Make colloquia more accessible to graduate students
Action 4: Monthly drop-in meetings (like the C&D “office hours” or chair lunches held in March 2025)
Action 5: Support different types of interaction points. Empower and support people/organizations who are or want to organize events
Action 6: Service to the OSU physics department and the broader OSU community and public are expected, valued, and wide-spread

Goal 2: Recruiting and Retention

Recruiting and Retention: Identify and retain excellent students and staff.

Vision of where we want to be in 5 years: Excellence in recruitment operates on all levels of admission and hiring over which the department has control, and people feel confident of their career trajectory through the department.

Action 1: Develop criteria and process for hiring lecturers
Action 2: Advertise professional development opportunities on campus more broadly
Action 3: Develop criteria and process for hiring teaching faculty
Action 4: Develop system of backups for critical tasks (e.g., GTAs or instructors who get sick, people out on vacation)
Action 5: Broaden the pool of applicants for admissions and hires
Action 6: In the department surveys (see goal 3), respond to needs expressed by different groups in the department, attending to needs expressed across groups with a wide variety of lived experiences
Action 7: Work with college on making compensation more competitive

Goal 3: Safety

Safety: Community Members feel physically and psychologically safe in the OSU physics environment.

Vision of where we want to be in 5 years: Community members feel safe, know who/where to go if they need help, and have confidence that their concerns will be addressed.

Action 1: Work with Office of Civil Rights to develop remediation strategies
Action2: Develop and publicize pathways for feedback to department leadership
Action 3: Maintain and publicize sufficient access to restrooms, including single-stall bathrooms, in physics spaces to meet the department's needs
Action 4: Sexual harassment and assault trainings are offered annually with incentives for participation
Action 5: Triannual update to the code of conduct, with reporting and remediation policies articulated and acted upon
Action 6: Trainings focused on creating a welcoming and supportive community free of harassment are offered with incentives for participation
Action 7: Publicize wellness, health (physical & mental), financial, and other local resources to department members
Action 8: Identify, maintain, and publicize physical spaces in the physics area for wellness and religious purposes
Action 9: Triannual climate surveys of the whole department. Annual surveys for undergraduates, and awareness of the university’s annual graduate surveys

Goal 4: Communication

Communication: Community members are well-thermalized with policies, activities, and practices they need to know about.

Vision of where we want to be in 5 years: Department members are knowledgeable about regular department business and policies and communicate efficiently with others in the department.

Action1: Hold semesterly ”state of the department” town halls
Action 2: Make information easier to find on website and Teams
Action 3: Develop a common department calendar
Action 4: Develop communications pathways for people involved in teaching the large intro pathways (e.g., make sure there is appropriate communication between GTAs and instructors)
Action 5: Create space for sense-making discussion around hard issues or changes to the department (e.g., faculty meetings, town halls)
Action 6: Create informational videos about common processes
Action 7: Create a schedule for regular reminders regarding policies (e.g., expectations for GTA workloads, university deadlines for grades, grad school deadlines) and email them & present at meetings on the schedule

Goal 5: Clarity, Transparency, and Accountability

Clarity, Transparency, and Accountability: Policies and practices are well-articulated, and people and organizations take responsibility and pride in their work.

Vision of where we want to be in 5 years: We have well-functioning processes for documentation, for tracking and resolving issues, and communication outcomes to the department.

Action 1: Communicate outcomes at “state of the department” town halls, and in the weekly newsletter
Action2: Empower and support groups that are making change
Action 3: Have a “committee of committee chairs” that meets at the start of each semester to coordinate effort
Action 4: Annual reviews performed for grad students, staff, and faculty, with IDPs (or equivalent) as appropriate
Action 5: Survey department so community members can identify service and outreach opportunities of interest
Action 6: Track progress on strategic plan
Action 7: Committee presentations & reports
Action 8: Develop a plan to make committee assignments faster and with less burden on the chair.
Action 9: Restructure committees to aim for staggered 2-year terms for chairs, and for as many members as is possible
Action 10: Make annual committee reports public to the department.
Action 11: Identify strategies that need a specialized task force with extra resources, for things that require more than committee-level effort
Action 12: Train committee chairs on project and meeting management