A master planning effort at the University of Toledo will aim to offer realistic, flexible ideas to guide UT’s next decade, including how to cut redundancies and better connect the campuses.
But only about 10 people, most of whom work for UT, showed up Wednesday afternoon to the first in a series of forums intended to drum up campus and community input on the $750,000 master planning project.
Consultant firm SmithGroupJJR is holding four such events this week, including two today.
Additional forums will take place at 3:45 p.m. for students, faculty, and staff and at 6 p.m. for community members. Both will take place in the Collier Building Room 1200 at the Health Science Campus.
Douglas Kozma, a principal campus planner with the Ann Arbor office of SmithGroupJJR, said this week’s forums are just the beginning of the public process.
He said consultants will return at the start of the spring semester to hold more forums and to share ideas and data.
He expects more people to get involved as the work continues.
“We have to engage the campus community and the larger Toledo community; those are very important foundational pieces for the master plan,” he said.
Mr. Kozma said consultants will strive to develop a realistic plan that has the flexibility of a living document. Planners will consider if the university’s physical footprint should shrink in an effort to save money while also accommodating more students, since UT President Sharon Gaber has set a goal to grow enrollment.
Once finished in about a year, the plan will represent the first comprehensive document mapping out the university’s future since the 2006 merger with the former Medical College of Ohio.
The sparse gathering at the first forum didn’t deter consultants from brainstorming ideas with those who did attend.
“I’m here because I truly believe that one of the important things about the master plan is that we make our classrooms accessible to all of our students and universally design them for all students,” said Toni Howard, director of UT’s Student Disability Services.
Ms. Howard said that includes offering a variety of seating options and access to technology to accommodate all learners.
Participants were handed red, yellow, and green stickers to put on campus maps indicating places they would overhaul, enhance, and preserve. Many of the red stickers — indicating areas participants want to see transformed — were plastered about Scott Park Campus, described by some in attendance as under-utilized.
The master plan work is just one area in which UT has recently sought the advice of consultants. The university inked an 18-month contract for $431,333, plus travel expenses, for enrollment assistance from the firm Ruffalo Noel Levitz.
Contact Vanessa McCray at: vmccray@theblade.com or 419-724-6065, or on Twitter @vanmccray.
First Published October 15, 2015, 4:00 a.m.
