PLU 2000: Embracing the 21st Century emerged from a process which invited the advice and counsel of every constituency of the University and which succeeded in attracting the thoughtful attention of many, including the members of the Board of Regents. Their work is reflected here with as much faithfulness as seemed consistent with the production of a comprehensible as well as comprehensive document. It is submitted now to the Board of Regents for authorization as the official long-range plan of the University.

The undertaking which has eventuated in this document originated in the presidential selection process launched by the Board of Regents in 1990-91. That process conferred priority in securing the University's welfare on long-range planning.

The PLU 2000 planning effort began formally in December, 1992, when President Loren Anderson commissioned a Long-Range Planning Committee to identify the focal points of the study and to nominate administrators of the process. Study commissions were established for eight subjects: Academic Affairs, Student Life, Enrollment Management, Personnel, Physical Plant, Development, External Relations, and Finance. Information technology and communication, diversity, and organizational structure and decision making were thought to constitute themes of such importance and universality that each commission was asked to attend to them. Provost J. Robert Wills and Associate Dean of Nursing Carolyn Schultz accepted the administrative task, and in February and March, 1993, they enlisted the chairs, co-chairs, and membership of the commissions, each of which was constituted of faculty, staff, and student representatives. Each study group commissioned "issue papers"; which were to guide campus-wide discussion during the academic year 1993-94. In all, 42 papers, many of which were written collaboratively, emerged from this process, and these were used to focus discussion at two forums hosted by each study commission during the year. By early summer, 1994, the commissions submitted their final reports, and a draft of the PLU 2000 report was then prepared by Professor Schultz and William Frame, Vice President of Finance and Operations.

From that first draft to this, the authors have been guided by the advice and helpful criticism of members of the Board of Regents, the panel leaders and participants in five University forums held in October-November, 1994, and of the membership of the Long-Range Planning Committee (which reviewed our work on five occasions since September). We are especially grateful to the authors of at least a dozen essays submitted this past fall and touching every aspect of the document. Finally we wish to express our gratitude and that of the University to Professor Philip A. Nordquist for editing the document, to Vicky Winters and Opal Huston for preparing and managing publication of the draft and the original papers, and to the Long-Range Planning Committee for its encouragement and counsel.

January 9, 1995