Pathway 3 | Think Big | Case Western Reserve University

Social impact and the translation of knowledge is important to CWRU.

Achieve Social Impact

Social impact and the translation of knowledge is important to CWRU. To achieve a deeper impact, we must disseminate our research and teaching more widely beyond our campus, and we must embark on meaningful partnerships. To increase our external student and faculty activities, we must redefine our partnerships with industry and nonprofit organizations to distribute our educational assets. We must become a more distributed university—extending access to our classrooms and scholarship to communities that did not have it in the past. We must continue to broaden the impact of our students through their co-curricular and extracurricular activities.

Our Goal:

Goal: Foster social good through robust engagement of undergraduate and graduate
students, faculty, staff and alumni with the local and global community.

Objectives, Outcomes & Measures

Objectives	Desired Outcomes	Measures
3-1: External Partnerships Engage in meaningful partnerships with an array of industry and nonprofit organizations to advance knowledge creation, from the local to the global	To strengthen relationships with external partners To increase partner investments in research at CWRU To generate high-impact student projects and student career engagement	Increase deep and sustained faculty and staff partnerships Increase student engagement—from the classroom to their first employment destination—with external partners Increase in partnership dollar investments at CWRU
3-2: Local Engagement Act locally for global impact by significantly improving the mental, physical, legal, environmental, and financial health of Cleveland and East Cleveland	To reduce rates of infant mortality, opioid abuse, hypertension and other negative health indicators in Cleveland and East Cleveland To decrease poverty, inequality, environmental threats and structural racism in Cleveland and East Cleveland To connect surrounding communities to CWRU educational programs and research innovations	Show evidence of meaningful faculty, staff and student engagement in Cleveland and East Cleveland programs Show positive tracking in measures associated with an “Anchor Institution” as defined by the Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities Enhance and increase positive involvement of neighborhood residents on campus Show upward tracking of local indicators in mental, physical, legal, environmental and financial health of Cleveland and East Cleveland
3-3: Experiential Learning Increase the number of opportunities for students to translate their knowledge into positive social impact across the world	To create meaningful opportunities for the entire student body to regularly engage with (and in) the community (locally and globally) on social impact projects through classroom assignments, volunteer activities and intern opportunities	Engage at least 50% of students annually in social impact projects Increase number of classes that include social impact projects Show evidence of student learning and growth as a result of experiential learning activities Show evidence of positive impact on the community in which the student is engaged
3-4: Innovation and Entrepreneurship Accelerate the adoption of a culture of translating ideas into innovation and engaging in entrepreneurial thinking, acting and doing	To become known internationally as an institution that values an entrepreneurial culture among its faculty, staff and students To become known internationally as an institution that translates research and new knowledge to benefit society	Increase patents and licenses Increase money raised by start-ups Increase faculty, staff, student and alumni start-ups by 20% Increase the number of CWRU IP staying in Cleveland or the region