Published on Nov. 1, 2021

Dear Campus Community,

This is a historic moment for our university. Over the next 10 years, the University of Missouri will undergo a transformation as we launch MizzouForward, a comprehensive strategy with the goal of enhancing MU’s research and education missions through a planned $1.5 billion investment.

As the largest investment of its kind at Mizzou, this bold plan focuses on boosting excellence and instilling a renewed culture of high expectations for an institution that must compete as a leading national university. It embodies our highest aspirations and connects our commitment to engage in research that is transformative to our land-grant mission to serve our community, society, the nation and the world.

These expectations come with a commitment to a sustained strategy and support over the next 10 years to help us reach greater heights in research and scholarship, student success and service to our state. We all have an important role to play in furthering a vibrant culture of excellence.

The grand opening of the Roy Blunt NextGen Precision Health building, the first comprehensive research building on our campus since 2004, embodies the spirit of our new ambition. Mizzou’s NextGen Precision Health building brings together interdisciplinary talent, technology and a vision for achieving new discoveries via intentional, coordinated and strategic investments. NextGen is just the beginning. It is one example of an enterprising push into the future, which we will match in every area of our university. We must support areas of strength, prioritize innovation and, at times, make hard decisions to help us attain our university’s highest goals.

MizzouForward provides a blueprint for our investment priorities; it is an investment in a future where we will break our silos and come together as a community to solve our most challenging problems. MizzouForward will use existing and new resources to recruit 150 new tenured and tenure-track faculty and 150 new staff to support our research mission. This ambitious investment will help us build and upgrade research facilities and instruments, augment support for student success, and retain our talented faculty and staff via additional salary support and proactive merit raises.

You can read more about the details of the revenue for the plan as well as our targeted investments here.

As a university, we have worked very hard over the last five years to maintain our financial stability despite challenging circumstances. Now is the time for MU to double down on our mission, to come together and invest in ways that empower and support our faculty, staff, and students to greater achievements.

We will be successful when we all do our very best and contribute – MizzouForward is an investment that will drive our collective success.

Thank you for all you do for Mizzou. We look forward to this exciting time of growth and energy.

Sincerely,

Mun Choi, Ph.D.
President, University of Missouri

Latha Ramchand, Ph.D.
Provost & Executive Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs,
University of Missouri

Tom Spencer, Ph.D.
Vice Chancellor for Research and Economic Development,
University of Missouri