Strategic plan advances Baylor’s Christian mission

Baylor University’s new strategic plan, Baylor in Deeds, offers multiple opportunities for the school to advance its mission to be a distinctively Christian research university, President Linda Livingstone said.

“Guided over the next five years by the Baylor in Deeds strategic plan, Baylor will continue to bring an important Christian perspective in an increasingly complex and challenging world,” Livingstone said in a public statement released after the Baylor board of regents fall meeting.

“We are blessed at Baylor to be a Christian Research 1 university where academic excellence is elevated, a Christian commitment is celebrated, and research is cultivated.”

Livingstone and Bill Mearse of Houston, chair of the Baylor board of regents, spoke with the news media via Zoom Nov. 8 immediately after the regents’ fall meeting.

“In student life, there is a tremendous amount of emphasis on how we continue to enhance the spiritual formation of our students,” Livingstone said.

The ongoing Faith and Character Study is helping the university evaluate and improve how Baylor is making a long-term impact on students’ faith and character formation, she noted.

Rather than using a “one-size-fits-all” approach to spiritual formation, Baylor is “meeting students where they are spiritually and helping them in their spiritual journey,” Mearse added.

Through a variety of mission experiences, Baylor also “provides opportunities for where they want to go” to live out their faith, he said.

Livingstone pointed to the potential for global engagement made possible through the university’s affiliation with the Baptist World Alliance and North American Baptist Fellowship. International involvement includes research and study abroad opportunities, as well as mission trips, she added.

While emphasizing the spiritual formation of students, Baylor also is focusing on ways to help foster the continuing spiritual growth of faculty and staff, Livingstone said.

“If our faculty and staff are healthy spiritually, it will help our students be healthy spiritually,” she said.

In reporting on the regents’ meeting, Mearse noted Baylor is “strong and stable financially.” The university is committed to being “good stewards” of its resources, even as institutions of higher education face “financial pressures and uncertainties,” he said.

During their board meeting, regents approved two new graduate degrees—a Master of Science in Materials Science and Engineering and a Master of Science in Learning Design and Technology.

Livingstone noted Provost Nancy Brickhouse reported to the board a continuing upward trend in the university’s four-year graduation rate and an all-time record fall-to-fall retention rate, with 90.0 percent of last year’s freshman class returning this fall. She also pointed to marked gains in fall enrollment and a significant increase in freshman male enrollment.

With additional reporting by Lori W. Fogleman of Baylor media and public relations.