WSU is being overhauled, based on these six pillars

WSU President Elizabeth Cantwell has announced the start of a redesign of Washington State University as a whole, under her six aspirational “pillars” of higher education. 

The goal of this redesign is to help bring WSU closer to its land-grant mission, to improve post-graduation outcomes, improve coordination between campuses across the WSU-system, and much more.

Before announcing the redesign to the public, WSU President Cantwell detailed her key performance indicators for the 2026 financial year to the WSU Board of Regents. In the document provided to regents, she detailed six strategic pillars for WSU in 2026, which are as follows.

The first pillar was “Access and Student Success.”

To achieve this pillar, they are tracking and evaluating various data points, including a student’s “time to degree” and post-graduation outcomes. The document describes a goal of this data as a way to compare student progress in foundational and prerequisite courses. 

The second pillar was “Academic Excellence and Modernization”

To achieve this pillar, the document suggests implementing new technologies at WSU, such as Augmented or Virtual Reality (AR and VR) in the sciences, and leveraging AI to help grow enrollment. This document also discussed developing a task force to explore partnerships with universities, highlighting Arizona State University specifically as a candidate.

The third pillar was “Innovation and Use-Inspired Research.” 

The key performance indicators here included goals to increase external grants and to improve WSU’s ranking in national publications. They also highlighted an interest in establishing a system to measure research intensity among faculty, “using metrics such as books, peer-reviewed journal articles, conference proceedings, and citations.”

The fourth pillar was “Systemwide Integration and Institutional Agility.”

To achieve this pillar, the document describes building “a capable and aligned leadership team to modernize operations and empower faculty and staff with a ‘yes’ mentality.” The document also highlighted an interest in unifying internal communications among WSU campuses.

The fifth pillar was “WSU as the 21st Century Land Grant.”

Achieving this pillar is a crucial part of the re-design itself, as WSU is in this endeavor of the systemwide redesign to align itself with its land-grant mission. This pillar also includes WSU’s interest in broadening its reach with key donors and community relations.

The final pillar was to “Elevate the Cougar Identity and Brand.”

To achieve this pillar, the document expresses an interest in elevating WSU’s visibility in the greater Puget Sound area. WSU plans to expand its visibility by increasing its engagement with civic organizations, community events as well as local governments when it’s deemed “appropriate.”

To enable the re-design process, President Cantwell has postponed all presidential listening sessions with students, faculty, and staff till 2026.