News and Progress

The Mizzou Advantage

Learn about five areas of strength at MU

Oct. 29, 2009

Play up your strengths. Business leaders use this strategy, and now Mizzou is using it, too. This fall, Chancellor Brady Deaton and Provost Brian Foster are rolling out “The Mizzou Advantage,” a set of strategic initiatives based on five areas of strength at the University of Missouri.

“The goal was to find the assets that give us a competitive advantage and position us uniquely in higher education, then to take those assets and build some program thrusts,” Foster says. “It’s investing strategically in our strengths.”

The five interdisciplinary areas of strength include:
• Food for the future
• New media
• The convergence of human and animal health
• Sustainable energy
• Managing change from transformational technologies

MU will support these areas through a $6 million coordinated effort. This will include hiring new faculty and staff in the initiative areas, building bridges to outside partners, supporting new curriculum offerings, expanding research funding opportunities, and bringing academic conferences and internationally prominent scholars to campus. Private gifts will be sought to further support The Mizzou Advantage.