Strategic Plan Draft Initiative

Planning at Biola is both dynamic and flexible. In the last several years, the University Planning Group (UPG) has been making steady progress in completing the elements of a strategic plan. We have affirmed our mission, proclaimed our values, completed several situational analyses, and landed on a vision, while achieving alignment among the University’s constituents.

In the last year, we have been defining the initiatives (big steps toward fulfilling Biola’s vision), including encompassing main points from the academic plan draft. The attached nine initiatives outline our thinking. At the same time, the UPG is refining the goals and objectives to accomplish these initiatives. In addition, a set of “Foundational Decisions Needed To Accomplish the Initiatives and Move Biola Forward” has been drafted. Three task force groups have been established to address these critical issues that need answers.

Biola University Strategic Initiatives 2007-2020

March 28, 2007

Download the strategic plan initiaitves (PDF).


As a result of the work of the University Planning Group, these nine Biola University initiatives and supporting goals and objectives provide a conceptual outline of the plan elements that would comprise Biola’s future.

  1. Advance educational excellence

    As an exemplary Christian university we are committed to educational excellence—equipping men and women in mind and character to impact the world for the Lord Jesus Christ. Essential to the pursuit of educational excellence is providing opportunities and resources for faculty and students to identify their callings, carry out their scholarship and creativity, connect with their colleagues, and realize the contributions they can make to the university, the academy, and the world.

  2. Lead in Transformation

    Historically, Biola’s strength is in whole person education, and recently Biola has advanced new scholarship and programs that are helping the academy to understand such learning in more sophisticated and concrete ways. We are beginning to implement models of academic learning that can transform the lives of students, connecting the rigorous work of the mind to the Spirit’s work in the heart so that we might better love God and our neighbors. This involves connecting learning across the campus, from the classroom to chapel to residence halls to off-campus learning and ministries. Moreover, we want to continue to lead in helping the larger academy understand such learning.

  3. Serve the city

    Given our location and history with the city of Los Angeles, we have a unique opportunity—a calling—to reconnect with the inner city. Our goals, among others, are to understand and serve inner city communities and cultures, including their schools, their churches and other non-profits. This calling to the city is also emblematic of our calling to live more fully in God’s Kingdom, recognizing and embracing a global diversity that transforms our perspectives, values, behaviors, and relationships. To do this we must continue to attract and nurture a more diverse mix of men and women representing different ethnicities and cultures across both faculty/staff and student populations. We also must equip Biola students and faculty alike to understand the value of increased multiculturalism in our community, whether in landscape of the inner city or on our own campuses.

  4. Serve the world

    Our desire is to serve the world with lives transformed by Christ. Changed lives and their resulting testimonies have a powerful effect on our campus, the surrounding community, and throughout the world. We are also called to make the Biola experience available to others amid ever-changing educational and cultural landscapes. In order to accomplish this we need to expand learning opportunities, programs and locations to increase our service and accessibility to students. Locations in Chang Mai, Lithuania, Kiev, Manhattan, and our student ministry and study abroad programs have done much to involve Biola in cross-cultural dialogue and service in many places of the world.

  5. Optimize student enrollment

    Within the context of the University’s mission, financial resources, academic opportunities and market niche, recognizing external forces such as demographics, culture, financial realities, and competition, determine and achieve the optimal enrollment for Biola University.

  6. Provide facilities and maximize technologies

    The University’s facilities and infrastructure are an essential aspect of its most basic functioning and can either limit or enhance its ability to move into the future. The University desires to have a right-sized and appropriate-quality infrastructure that will support intended growth and ministry, but not be a burden that becomes the central focus of our existence. Recognizing that Biola University has a larger role to play in advancing God’s kingdom here on earth, this initiative takes a practical look at the facilities and technologies that enhance our ability to be obedient and responsive to God’s leading and direction.

  7. Reach for global visibility

    Strive to represent the University's mission and vision that ultimately positions Biola, and its identified uniqueness, as a distinct Christian university that serves as a global resource. The level of effectiveness needed to gain global visibility will be determined by the quality and measurable outcomes of the University community. This initiative ultimately expands the public’s awareness on how Biola fulfills its mission and vision. Success of this initiative will also require a University-wide integrated and coordinated marketing approach to increase reach and brand messaging with multiple audiences to:

    1. Raise Biola’s brand awareness and profile
    2. Inform stakeholders of the University’s mission and vision
    3. Ensure the highest quality of all forms of communication
    4. Align with Biola’s strategic plan
    5. Increase enrollment and financial support

  8. Attract, develop, and retain quality faculty and staff

    Invest in high quality employees who have a passion for following Christ and building His kingdom. Visions can be fulfilled or fade, depending on who is on the team. This initiative takes a hard look at shaping a team for the future and for outfitting that team with the appropriate training and tools.

  9. Fund the future

    The University’s vision and plans, in many cases, are contingent on the financial funding that makes them possible. This initiative looks at how the University will manage and grow its financial base and what its financial priorities are, in order to achieve the other initiatives listed in this plan.