Our primary areas of focus
We have articulated three commitments that represent our primary areas of work and our responsibilities to BCIT’s primary stakeholders: our learners, our faculty and staff, and our partners. We are intent on being a people-focused organization that delivers future-proof applied education, amplifying our impact through globally relevant connections. These create the structure of our Strategic Plan.
Putting people at the core of everything we do is paramount. Our mandate is to educate people, and the people with whom we work are what make BCIT distinct. In a world characterized by uncertainty, we must ensure that BCIT is a place in which all people—learners, faculty, and staff—are continuously developing while feeling valued, supported, and connected.
A focus on applied education at all levels of credentialing is what differentiates BCIT from most of our peers. We combine theory and practice in a way that enables our learners to leave BCIT confident and able to have immediate impact in their work. We must continue to evolve our methodologies to stay ahead of the needs of industry, and we must nurture an environment in which learners and faculty thrive.
Our connections beyond BCIT—with industry, peers, and government—strengthen us as an institution. Our community is enhanced, and learner and employee experience enriched, by engagement with different perspectives and experience, whether from within British Columbia or around the world. We live in a world in which partnership is increasingly a requirement for success; BCIT must build and nurture those collaborations that propel us forward—individually and collectively.
Threaded through these commitments is a passionate belief in—and institutional focus on—sustainability. We must support our people with processes and systems that facilitate sustainable ways of working. We must design spaces and facilities that advance the health of the environment and manage them accordingly. And we must work tirelessly with our partners to promote and enable sustainable industry and community practices through our academic and operational activities.
Putting people at the core of everything we do is paramount.
Our initiatives
Nine initiatives aligned with our three commitments create a framework for action and decision making. These are pan-institutional endeavours, each of which is operationalized through the efforts of academic and administrative units. Most are likely to be relevant far beyond—and none will be fully completed within—the time frame of this plan. But we have made significant advances in the first two years of implementation and will continue to move the needle in each over the next two. Through this 2020 update to the Strategic Plan, we reaffirm the institutional initiatives guiding BCIT:
People-focused organization
- Strengthen support and services for learners to promote success, well-being, and resilience.
- Invest in faculty and staff development to advance our practice and encourage a dynamic culture of learning.
- Redesign processes, systems, and structures to enhance our agility and effectiveness and to embed sustainability.
Future-proof applied education
- Reimagine flexible studies and extend offerings and credential models to facilitate reskilling and improve learner access.
- Anchor BCIT as a leader in interdisciplinary and integrative learning methodologies that ensure job readiness and career mobility.
- Cultivate exceptional learning environments and communities through technology and sustainable campus development.
Globally relevant connections
- Infuse Indigenous knowledge and practices through the organization and within our
partnerships to mobilize broader societal change. - Reinvent how we work with industry and peers to drive economic, social, and environmental prosperity in BC and beyond.
- Foster and sustain an open, engaged, and multicultural community of BCIT learners, faculty, staff, and alumni.