To: USC Columbia Administrative Units
From: Provost Mary Anne Fitzpatrick, Executive Vice President for Acadentic Affairs; Ed Walton, Executive Vice President for Administration and Chief Financial Officer
Date: Sept. 23, 2025
Subject: Administrative Unit Assessment

Since the university's SACSCOC reaffirmation in 2021, USC Columbia has committed to enhancing annual planning and assessment activities to foster a culture of best practice regarding institutional effectiveness processes. The university will implement lessons learned from our last reaffirmation to improve efficiency and quality, and to embrace continuous compliance.

The Office of Institutional Research, Assessment, and Analytics has been tasked with the responsibility of working with university administrative units to help administrators navigate the new administrative unit assessment (AUA) process. The AUA process is accomplished by revitalizing the previously established Blueprint for Service Excellence process for administrative units. Administrative units assessed for SACSCOC Standards 7.3 [pdf] or 8.2.c [pdf] now draft either a Blueprint for Administrative Excellence or a Blueprint for Academic and Student Services Excellence in the Blueprints 2.0 SharePoint site. Please know that this reporting is meant to catalog and document what you are already doing. It is not meant to create significant additional work or process redesign.

Dr. La Trice Small, Director of Institutional Assessment, will be reaching out to schedule time with each of you to discuss the new AUA process. Your participation and collaboration in this effort will ensure that we have a smooth transition. Together, we can create a consistent, meaningful, and streamlined process that supports our administrative units while also meeting the mark for university accreditation needs. Thank you in advance for your support!

CC: Members of the President's Cabinet

Dr. La Trice Small
Director of Institutional Assessment