Building a sustainable future takes:
- Skilled, connected people
- Knowledge that is created in partnership with those closest to the challenges
- Work that is explicitly oriented toward outcomes
It takes all of these things working together – and organizations capable of bridging the distance between knowledge and action.
Since 2007, the Institute on the Environment has built the infrastructure to make this type of collaborative research possible at the University of Minnesota and beyond.
Our strategic plan charters our course for 2024–29. It reflects a year of evaluation, community input and honest reckoning with what’s working, what’s changed and what’s needed now.
Growing Impact
Since 2019, IonE has organized much of its grantmaking and programming around “Impact Goals.” These goals aim to address globally significant sustainability challenges where new knowledge and stronger leadership can make a real difference.
Our first set of goals focused on three big visions for energy, water and land use. And we drove meaningful change through this initiative. Impact Goals inspired collaboration, shaped our grants program and deepened our understanding of how IonE can catalyze collective action. But we learned that breadth matters, too.
With this plan, we’re expanding to 10 interconnected domains that better reflect the full range of sustainability expertise within the University: Adaptation, Biodiversity, Clean Energy, Decision Support, Environmental Justice, Food Systems, Mitigation, Natural Capital, Planetary Health and Water and Land.
And rather than defining specific outcomes in advance, we’re moving goal-setting to the project level. Now, the teams of researchers and partners who are closest to the challenges are the ones who define what success looks like.
“And what happened as a result?” That question drove one of the clearest calls to action we heard in our planning process: Do more to track and report on outcomes and longer-range impact.
This term, we’re investing in the infrastructure needed to improve our tracking. We’re evaluating our current capabilities, developing integrated tracking systems, aligning with external frameworks (like the UN Sustainable Development Goals) and building dedicated evaluation capacity across IonE programs and projects.
Most communications programs exist to advance the goals of the organization behind them. Public interest communications programs are different. These initiatives use the tools of strategic communication, journalism and storytelling in service of outcomes that transcend the interests of any single organization or individual to serve a greater societal good.
During this term, we’ll restructure our communications program around measurable societal outcomes. We plan to pilot this approach at the individual project level, aligned with our 10 domains, and launch a public interest communications lab as a hub for innovation.
We envision sustainable and thriving communities – locally and globally – equipped to rapidly, collectively and effectively overcome the environmental challenges of both today and tomorrow.
IonE Strategic Plan 2024–2029
Investing in Excellence
Cultivating Community
Strengthen our Affiliate Network
Institute affiliates are faculty, researchers, practitioners and sustainability professionals who span all five University campuses and beyond.
Fostering interdisciplinary connections across the University was one of IonE’s founding charges – back in 2007 – and remains essential to how we drive change. Our affiliate network has grown significantly in recent years, bringing new opportunities and needs.
This term, we’re aligning programming and resources more closely with affiliate feedback; supporting hubs of activity across all system campuses; and continuing to cultivate a culture of inclusion and belonging throughout our University community.
Deepen Partner Engagement
Collaborative engagement isn’t a precondition for IonE’s work; it’s the work.
This term, we’re continuing to build our external engagement. We’re working to welcome an even broader set of partners to the table, recognizing diverse ways of knowing and learning, and investing in more structured mechanisms to steward the relationships that make this collaborative work possible.
We’re also investing in key engagement platforms to strengthen the ways we bring people together, support collaboration and provide opportunities for long-term partnerships to emerge.
Expand Distinctive Offerings
One of IonE’s roles within the University ecosystem is developing impactful learning experiences and professional development opportunities – across all ages and career stages – at the intersection of individual expertise and sustainability.
We help cultivate the skilled, connected people our vision describes through various channels. This includes innovative, cohort-based programming for both students and early-career faculty; a nationally recognized postdoctoral fellowships program and platforms like Speaking Science.
This term, we’ll refine and expand our popular cohort-based programming. We plan to refine our offerings for students, faculty and practitioners – and offer new opportunities that advance IonE’s distinctive approach to research, leadership development and public interest communications.
Dig deeper into the ideas and people behind our strategic plan.