Strategic Plan

(Please click here to view the Strategic Plan)

Friends of the CRMS Community,                                                                                February 2008

We are delighted to present the new CRMS Strategic Plan. Based on discussions and insights about our mission as well as recent surveys, this plan gives us a road map that will focus our collective energy and guide us toward ways to better provide powerful and meaningful experiences for our students. We expect the plan to stimulate important conversations about the school’s future and to help us capitalize on our passion, place, and philosophical origins to remain a leader among independent schools. In the end, the plan will better equip us to produce active, thoughtful young adults prepared for the unique demands of the 21st century while remaining steeped in the strong work ethic, sense of community, and relationship with the natural world exemplified in 1953 by our founders, John and Anne Holden.

Members of the school community, including the board of trustees, faculty, staff, and students, have spent the past year developing this plan, which focuses on eight areas: financial strength, land use, facilities, sustainability, diversity, retention, professional development, and technology. Here, we outline these goals, each representing an important opportunity for us to further align our program with our mission.

We are fortunate to be on firm financial footing, with a generous endowment and sustainable operating budget. But many of the improvements we seek have cost components and require bolstered financial support. And so financial strength is key not only to our ability to fulfill the plan’s other goals, but also to providing a stalwart foundation for the school’s future. We want CRMS to remain accessible and affordable for all qualified students, allowing us to maintain a diverse learning environment. We also want to grow and support our faculty and staff, so they may better fulfill the school’s diverse and demanding academic, active, and community programs.

So much of our school’s program has been influenced by our magnificent setting on a 300-plus acre ranch at the confluence of the Crystal and Roaring Fork rivers. Since this land has shaped so much of what we do, our strategic plan seeks to align our land-use policies and programmatic practices with the CRMS mission. Paired with our land-use goal is a desire to improve our facilities. We envision a two-phase campus master plan. The first phase will include the building of two new dormitories, thereby improving our boarding students’ quality of life, unifying the North and South campuses, and increasing the school community’s exposure to the Crystal River. This phase will also include improvements to our administrative space (which will move to the present New Boys Dorm) and restoration of the historic Holden House. The second campus master-plan phase will upgrade our library and science facilities, with subsequent efforts addressing the need for an active program center and a music building.

Sustainability has been a CRMS hallmark since the school’s origin as a working ranch. Over the years, the school has adeptly transferred its sustainability ethos among the field, the classroom, and the community—and the rest of the world is beginning to catch on. Our strategic plan commits us to remaining a leader in this area and to developing citizens with the passion and practical know-how to maintain our natural world for future generations.

To truly prepare students for our modern world, the school must pursue diversity from two angles. It must attract a balanced, representative demographic, and it also must prioritize programs that promote tolerance and appreciation for varied perspectives. To continue to fulfill CRMS’s core values and guard against provinciality in attitudes and purpose, our community, from trustees to faculty to student body, must attract and celebrate diverse views, perspectives, and backgrounds.

Attracting such individuals is not where the challenge ends. Entering a distinctive residential community such as ours can be a major life event for a young person. We must keep the school as welcoming, respectful, and supportive as possible, thereby improving retention and inspiring students to remain loyal, contributing members of our community through graduation and beyond.

A vital aspect of CRMS is the close and powerful bond among students and faculty. A quality education and safe, meaningful experience begins with the adults who guide the students. At CRMS, we seek lifelong growers and improvers; our faculty are expected to lead in a variety of settings. Through our goal of professional development, we will ensure that faculty realize their potential as educators and remain on the cutting edge of their fields.

Finally, CRMS will continue to bolster its footing regarding technology. While our unique market position has enabled us to be deliberate about which improvements to embrace, the increased role of technology in the lives of our students is undeniable, and we aim to use technology to enhance and develop CRMS’s learning/teaching environment and administrative functions.

It is worth noting that many strategic plans are rigid and adhere to a particular time span. In contrast, this plan is open-ended and will address the school’s long-term health while remaining relevant to the current school community. It will be flexible and inclusive enough to ensure that the areas being addressed remain priorities at CRMS. The board of trustees will review the plan’s progress annually, and we will give formal plan updates from time to time in the coming years.

We have spent much time shaping the course of CRMS to better position it for future health and prosperity. We are delighted that our strategic plan has sprung from the basic foundation the Holdens envisioned when they drove cross-country in a green truck to start this incomparable school. We encourage you to review these goals, and we welcome your participation in a process that will help us continue to fulfill our school’s promise.

Sincerely,

Michael Kennedy                         Jeff Leahy                               Rob Sayre
Board Chair                                 Head of School                       Chair of the Strategic Plan Committee