Student Affairs Values, Vision & Mission

MSU Denver’s values of Community, Access, Diversity, Respect, and Excellence permeate the university experience for learners, staff, faculty, and our community stakeholders.  They guide our decisions and inform our approach to a twenty-first century postsecondary experience.  Student Affairs embraces these values, manifests them through our resources and programs, and holds each other accountable to working in congruence with them.

Student Affairs at MSU Denver is a highly innovative, human-centered team that invests in justice- and community-engaged strategies to transform the learner experience.

Student Affairs educators at MSU Denver are committed to supporting the learner experience by centering their unique life journeys in the programs, resources, and services that we offer.

Read the 2022-2023 Annual Impact Report.

Access: We advocate for resources and opportunities to ensure learners have the support they need to succeed.

Student Engagement & Career Success: We create opportunities for learners to recognize and grow the essential skills needed to create positive change in our/their communities and in their career(s) progression/journey/endeavors.

Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion:  We insist on and hold ourselves accountable to respond actively to inequity, injustice, and racism.

Each phase of the creation of the strategic plan for student affairs built upon the original and continued in six phases.

Phase 1 (September – October): We engaged student affairs leaders in ideating our future and hosted visioning sessions using appreciative inquiry to gather information that highlighted the good already being done.

Phase 2 (October – November): We hosted several SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) focus groups with directors, associate/assistant directors, coordinator/entry level staff to assess student affairs.

Phase 3 (December): Senior leadership in student affairs reviewed all information gathered through visioning sessions, and SWOT focus groups, along with supplemental documents (I.e., National Survey for Student Engagement, RealCollege Survey, Engaged Leaders Survey Data) to create the values, vision, mission, guiding commitments and a draft version of the strategic plan goals.

Phase 4 (January – June): Strategic plan goals were finalized following an ideating session with all Student Affairs staff. We identified working groups and lead facilitators using a nomination process. Teams then took time to create strategies and tactics to meet our five strategic goals.  The Vice President for Student Affairs and lead facilitators embraced shared governance and sought feedback on initial drafts of the strategic plan.

Phase 5 (July – August): Student Affairs will finalize the plan and launch it at the Fall Student Affairs Kickoff on August 11, 2023.

Phase 6 (Ongoing): Assessment of the strategic plan will be on-going and will include goal revision/resetting, if necessary.