The Rensselaer Idea Bank is now closed. Thank you to all who submitted an idea! Our strategic planning committees have reviewed the submissions and will reflect on these thoughtful ideas and respond as appropriate in their final reports. We hope to release these final committee reports to the Rensselaer community in early September, with a goal to complete the Rensselaer Forward Plan by December 2023.
Most Recent Ideas
Student Academic Success
Students who are struggling in the classroom are not getting enough support. They often are reluctant to ask for help. Some of their classroom struggles are more complicated due to financial struggles (needing to get more help to navigate/advocate as a first generation college student), mental health struggles (it takes 3+ weeks to get access to counselors) and academic skills. These issues need to be addressed before we can get to help them achieve their career goals (internships, jobs,....) I feel like there should be more help to support these vulnerable students to be successful.
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Outreach/Community/Sports Camps/Summer Camp
In addition to childcare for pre-K, RPI used to offer sports-related camps and Lego Robotics for school age children to be on campus. As a parent, this was fantastic and is nice for children of alum and the community at large to be on campus. RPI is one of the few local universities and colleges that really offers nothing in this area.
Vegetarian Hot Dogs
Whenever there's cookouts, there are meat hot dogs and hamburgers, but there are only ever vegetarian hamburgers (veggie burgers) which can be too spicy or just overwhelming to the senses. I've found that vegetarian hot dogs are not spicy and are less textured.
It would be great to have a vegetarian hot dog option as well as the veggie burgers as they are easy to get and some people like them more than veggie burgers. Thanks.