Johnson C. Smith University

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We are a private liberal arts university with proud HBCU traditions and a future aimed at diversity. We enroll approximately 1,600 highly talented, and motivated students from various backgrounds. Our faculty and staff members are equally unique, coming from all over the world.

We invite you to learn more about our rich history and our ambitious vision for the University's future.

Johnson C. Smith University will be recognized in North Carolina as Charlotte's Premier Independent New Urban University. Defining characteristics of what JCSU will become include:

• High-quality market-driven curriculum centered in the liberal arts and sciences.
• A multicultural, multi-generational, and multi-racial faculty, staff, and student body.
• A risk-oriented, entrepreneurial, independent presence in a historic urban neighborhood.
• A teaching mission with emphasis on faculty and student research.
• A mix of undergraduate and graduate programs.
• Viable and sustainable community, professional, and corporate partnerships.
• Delivery of educational programs in new venues and formats.

Johnson C. Smith University is an independent new urban university rooted in the HBCU tradition and charged with an urgent public mission: to recruit and equip a diverse student body through innovative teaching, learning, and faculty-mentored and applied research with the knowledge, skills, values, and ethics that will enable them to solve complex problems in a fast-changing global economy.

Founded in 1867 to educate freed slaves, today, JCSU faces new challenges to produce the next generation of graduates who make up a new demographic majority consisting of students of color. JCSU must prepare them to navigate and thrive in a marketplace where people of color suffer disproportionate unemployment and underemployment rates. Our students rely on us to help them reverse those trends. They understand that the value of education is the promise of freedom and personal fulfillment. For the large number of our students who are first-generation students, a college degree provides a viable route out of poverty. To accomplish all this, the University must continue moving forward with its radical transformative strategy.

JCSU offers a rich intellectual climate supported by 103 faculty, 251 staff members, and a $45-million annual operating budget. It leverages its numerous community partnerships to guide various faculty-student applied research initiatives, many of which focus on improving education, health, and economic mobility in the surrounding Northwest Corridor.

JCSU's vision for adapting to new economic realities in higher education are informed by Jake B. Schrum's, The Role of the New Urban University, and the research of Blue Ocean Strategy (BOS), the widely-cited business management study by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne, Professors at INSEAD and Co-Directors of the INSEAD Blue Ocean Strategy Institute. Initially published as a series of Harvard Business Review case studies, BOS aims to uncover new methods and insights within organizations that lead to a higher value at a lower cost. BOS nearly drives corporate teams to redefine their traditional yet restricted market for their product by using existing resources to access a larger group of potential users and revenue streams. Over the past year, JCSU, in collaboration with a team of BOS consultants, reviewed the University's product and value proposition to modify JSCU's student experience that will measurably improve retention and graduation rates.

The University's leadership is committed to building a healthy and sustainable new urban university with a reputation as a close-knit community that integrates the liberal arts with business, the sciences, and technology in innovative, socially-conscious ways to empower tomorrow's diverse entrepreneurial citizens and leaders. Whether in or out of the classroom, we offer our students growing edge experiences that will not confine them to dream small or accept what is. Our students understand that they must see challenges and solve them and demand thought growth and change in every community they touch. Our commitment to building a premier new urban university that delivers a high education at a relatively low market cost will ensure our impact and viability for generations to come.

The mission of Johnson C. Smith University is to provide an outstanding education for a diverse group of talented and highly motivated students from various ethnic, socioeconomic, and geographic backgrounds. Johnson C. Smith University offers liberal education in conjunction with concentrated study in a specialized field in preparation for advanced study and specific careers.

The University endeavors to produce graduates who can communicate effectively, think critically, learn independently as well as collaboratively, and demonstrate competence in their chosen fields. Further, it provides an environment where students can fulfill their physical, social, cultural, spiritual, and other personal needs. They can develop a compelling sense of social and civic responsibility for leadership and service in a dynamic, multicultural society. Likewise, the University embraces its responsibility to provide leadership, service, and lifelong learning to the broader community.

Regarding teaching effectiveness as paramount in its educational enterprise, Johnson C. Smith University commits to recruiting and retaining an outstanding faculty. To this end, the University promotes faculty development, encourages faculty involvement in research and other creative activities, and endorses academic freedom principles.

JCSU offers 22-degree options for undergraduates and one graduate degree. Students earn their degree through one of our three colleges – the College of Arts and Letters, the College of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics), and the College of Professional Studies.

JCSU has captured a valuable research niche for our students. As undergraduates, they gain the advantage of publishing as co-authors on peer-reviewed papers and conducting in-depth primary source research. Through applied research experiences, our students become adept leaders who can use creative thinking to solve real-world problems.

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