Mission and vision statements

Hello there! We have been studying how universities work and how their mission and vision statements define them. This article helps to give a global idea of how universities function but we need a more deeper comparison. A mission statement explains the existence of the university, the policies that govern it and the methods the university uses to achieve its desired policies.

The vision statement is more on the university’s values and principles, what makes the university stand apart and what it plans to achieve in the future. These two statements sound very similar as they define the university’s present and the future but they are distinct in their functions- the mission explains the aim of the university while the vision explains what the unniversity aims to be. Might seem the same but is not!

I looked over my colleagues’s comparisons to for some inspiration and then decided to compare the Mission and Vision statements of two similar but different institutions (just like how the phrases differ!)- Virginia Tech and Yale University. There are a few similarities these universities share:

• Both universities are on the East Coast of the United States, thus sharing a very similar academic culture and environment.
• Both universities have performed cutting-edge research across a multitude of fields.

There are of course differences between the universities too- for starters, Virginia Tech is a public, land-grant university while Yale is a private Ivy league university. Let’s look at their mission and vision statements and analyze more about them:

Virginia Tech

Mission

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) is a public land-grant university serving the Commonwealth of Virginia, the nation, and the world community. The discovery and dissemination of new knowledge are central to its mission. Through its focus on teaching and learning, research and discovery, and outreach and engagement, the university creates, conveys, and applies knowledge to expand personal growth and opportunity, advance social and community development, foster economic competitiveness, and improve the quality of life.

Vision

Virginia Tech is a high-performing research university with a world-view that advances the land-grant values of discovery, learning, and outreach. We serve and engage the citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia, the nation, and the world. We attract motivated, high-achieving students, staff, and faculty who excel in an academically energized, technologically creative, and culturally inclusive learning community. Our bold spirit, climate of innovation and service, open boundaries of study and research, and entrepreneurial approach positively transform lives and communities.

Yale University

Mission

Yale is committed to improving the world today and for future generations through outstanding research and scholarship, education, preservation, and practice. Yale educates aspiring leaders worldwide who serve all sectors of society. We carry out this mission through the free exchange of ideas in an ethical, interdependent, and diverse community of faculty, staff, students, and alumni.

Vision

Yale aspires to be the most student-focused research university in the world. We will achieve that vision through a distinctive commitment among our faculty to teaching, close engagement with students, and by ensuring that all students are prepared and able to take full advantage of their educational programs and of the extraordinary strengths and assets of a preeminent university that is unified, innovative, and accessible.

Comparison

Comparing the mission statements of both universities, Virginia Tech defines itself right at the start as a public-funded, land grant university serving the Commonwealth of Virginia, the nation and the world community in that order whereas Yale defines itself as a university to improve the world without specifiying its private-funded status or that it lies in the state of Connecticut. Virginia Tech highlights the importance of teaching and research, outreach and engagement while Yale focuses more on research and scholarship. The way the two universities intend to carry out their mission is different too- while Virginia Tech plans to create,convey and appliy knowledge to expand personal growth and opportunities for each individual student, Yale intends to achieve it using a free exchange of ideas in an ethical, interdependent and diverse community of faculty, students and alumni- here, the university defines itself as a platform for not just students but also the alumni. Here, the alumni may serve as a guiding direction-vane for the university to tilt to but also influence major decisions of the university.

The alumni statement in my opinion is something to be extremely cautious. Yale is known for its powerful alumni (this group includes 65 Nobel laureates, 5 American Presidents and 19 Supreme Court justices). In a way, the alumni may exert power on the university (endowments, faculty hiring, dean appointments etc) and this would have a direct impact on the current students and their way of thinking. Virginia Tech on the other hand does not specify any such alumni role.

Looking at the Vision statements of the universities, Virginia Tech again defines itself as a public, land-grant university while Yale defines itself as a world-class university. Here, Yale describes itself as “unified, innovative and accessible” while Virginia Tech defines itself as “academically energized, technologically creative, and culturally inclusive learning community”. This is highlighted towards the School of Engineering and School of Sciences, the Virginia Tech schools regarded as the powerhouses of the university. While Yale is known more for its School of Arts, Pure Sciences, Law and Business, it does not highlight its eminence in any way in the vision statement. I think Virginia Tech’ s statement gives an ‘undue’ preference to its STEM departments which may not encourage students to apply to its other schools.

Both universities use short, succinct statements to express themselves and what they plan to achieve in the future years highlighting on certain elements strongly that I disagree with- Virginia Tech for its strong hints on its Schools of Sciences and Engineering and Yale for stating an exchange of ideas from alumni also. I feel universities should not place a strong preference on a certain element. Rather, they should strongly emphasize on areas where they are lacking their missions to achieve that vision.