Sciences Po 2022 “Understand the World, Make a Difference”

STRATEGIC ORIENTATIONS A SUMMARY

May 2014

Boasting a student body made up of 46% foreign students, Sciences Po has now joined the club of world class universities. Over the past 15 years, the school has succeeded in transforming its academic training paths, investing largely in research and building a strong global network of partner universities. After a year in office, Director Frederic Mion recently exposed the strategic orientations that will design the future of our institution. Untitled “Understand the World, Make a Difference” this project draws on Sciences Po’s strengths, looks at today’s challenges and sets up goals towards 2022, a year that will mark Sciences Po 150th anniversary. Sciences Po: a place where thought and action meet

Sciences Po has attained the highest international standards but does not simply represent a French version of the global research university. For its attractiveness is largely based on the uniqueness of its educational model.

• A university specialized in social sciences with an interdisciplinary approach At Sciences Po we focus our energies on gaining an understanding of the world and its transformations, bringing to bear the tools of social science through a systematically interdisciplinary approach. The very object of Sciences Po programs is to give students, future decision makers, and actors in a changing world a profound understanding of the complexities of social dynamics.

• A university giving a very important teaching role to practitioners Next, our training programs give a very important role to practitioners, who are best placed to grasp the ongoing issues and challenges in their respective fields. They now number nearly 4,000, from a wide range of professional backgrounds and the highest level of professional accomplishment, bringing real-world context to our teaching programs and giving a topical quality to our education that is unrivaled among peer institutions.

• A university cultivating a high sense of social responsibility Finally, we are keenly aware of our social responsibility, which consists in building tomorrow’s higher education and research within the framework of our public service mission, taking particular care not to create forms of exclusion and privilege. This commitment has led us to provide nearly 30% of our students with scholarships based on economic criteria. But, beyond this, our sense of social responsibility makes us very attentive to the values we seek to pass on to our students, in order to prepare them for the challenges they will be called upon to meet.

>> Sciences Po, this extraordinary place where thought and action meet and mutually enrich each other. Sciences Po benefits the entire university community, because we all have something valuable to learn here. Students come to make sense of the world in which they will become significant actors.Lecturers, who are often graduates, come to get a better sense of what they do every day and to pass it on to others. Researchers to advance knowledge and understanding, which is the very vocation of the social sciences. Our administrative staff, as I see every day, is committed to and proud of bearing so much value and meaning. Sciences Po allows them all to act as thoughtful women and men and to think as actively engaged women and men.

The challenges of a changing environment

This vocation is Sciences Po main asset in building its future and setting itself apart in the face of a profoundly changing environment. What are the challenges we face? 1. Globalization of the university: each year, more and more students around the world opt to pursue higher education in a country other than their own. The options available to our students know no boundaries and we can thus no longer be content with our privileged status within the French educational system. We must be among the best in the world. 2. Digital technology: by making knowledge accessible to all, digital technology further accelerates the globalization of the university. We must take part in this revolution and in the rise of student-centric learning. 3. Finding new resources: finding the necessary resources to meet the needs of internationalization, academic competition, and pedagogical innovation. Sciences Po 2022

Sciences Po success today is just the latest in a long line of accomplishments for a unique educational and training model. We must now continue to develop this model on a larger scale, a prospect that will unfold through the following dimensions:

I. BECOMING A GLOBAL LEADER IN HIGHER EDUCATION AND RESEARCH

… With a bachelor degree that will enjoy international reputation Our three-year undergraduate program must lead to the awarding of an undergraduate degree with greater autonomy from our master’s programs and an international recognition. The undergraduate college provides an education that is unique on the French academic landscape and it should stand on its own, on the model of the international Bachelor’s degree. Upon completion of the Sciences Po undergraduate program, students should be encouraged to consider options for further study outside the institution and to apply to leading institutions around the world. The College must develop an international reputation for excellence in undergraduate education. This will also allow our graduate programs to recruit students of more diverse backgrounds.

… With the building a strong permanent faculty No institution of higher learning can claim to compete globally without a sizeable permanent faculty. Sciences Po is already endowed with a high profile research faculty, comprised of 220 permanent professors, which plays an invaluable role in its teaching programs. Yet, we must continue to recruit academics over coming years. We must also seek new multidisciplinary scientific collaboration with USPC partners (University Sorbonne Paris Cité) and develop our research on new emerging topics.

… With the expansion of our urban campus Our Parisian campus will be expanded and made more efficient thanks to the acquisition of the 14000 square meters Noviciat des Dominicains located right next to our current campus sites. The acquisition of this facility will bring together all of Sciences Po’s research centers on a single site and provide the finest conditions for study and research, while offering on-campus student housing.

… With the launching of a MOOC factory Digital technology has radically changed our relationship to knowledge and our ways of sharing it. Sciences Po has been at the vanguard of these changes—creating the Medialab and e-courses in 2009—and we intend to remain there. Sciences Po has thus positioned itself for the production of MOOCs in early 2014 and will set up a “MOOC factory”. We will produce a dozen MOOCs every year and offer them on both French and international platforms.

II. ENHANCING ACCESS TO THE PROFESSIONAL WORLD

… With the creation of three professional schools by 2016 : a School of Public Affairs, the School of Urban Studies and the School of Economics and Management with a strong international orientation that will offer new competitive programs to Sciences Po master’s level applicants. These schools come in addition to the School of Journalism, the School of Communication, the Law School and the School of International Affairs. They will all provide stable structures, within which students can define their increasingly specialized and customized courses of study, and which will readily adapt to the changing needs of the professional world. As spaces for networking and socialization, they will take responsibility for the successful professionalization of their students. … With the introduction of one-year-intensive programs designed to meet the needs of young professionals.

… With more active guidance to undergraduate students will help ensure their subsequent professional success. An individualized support program (workshops, trade forums, individual interviews) will be required for all students, enabling them to better anticipate the choices of specialization they will need to make.

… With an executive education that offers a greater international perspective. We must define new objectives with regard to executive education and better articulate it with our undergraduate education, taking advantage of the strengths of our Schools, and bringing our research activities to bear.

… With new doctoral programs that will respond to the new for so-called “professional” doctorates.

III. CONTINUING TO PLAY A PIONEERING ROLE IN SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

Already attentive to issues of handicapped accessibility, gender equality, environmental responsibility, student diversity, good governance and management, the Sciences Po community is committed to continuing its efforts.

…With an expanded commitment to greater social diversity. We will be maintained through a strengthening of the Priority Education Conventions (CEP) system—already unique in its scope and impact. Sciences Po will also maintain its level of 30% scholarship students and further diversify its student body at the master’s level through new initiatives (partnerships with new undergraduate colleges and IUTs, within the framework of USPC, as well as between our regional campuses and the Institut du Service Civique, etc.).

…With a strong culture of civic commitment and participation in public debate. We will thus launch new initiatives mobilizing our entire community around a common deadline, as we are doing with the Paris 2015 Climate Conference.

This strategy for our school will rely on a viable economic development policy that will allow us to find new resources necessary to reach our goals: we will indeed embark on a major fundraising campaign that will culminate with the celebration of the 150th anniversary of Sciences Po in 2022.