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IMCPL Strategic Planning Process to Be Led by Former Purdue University President Martin Jischke and Patty Jischke

Library News & Announcements RSS Feed December 13, 2007

Former Purdue University President Martin C. Jischke and Patty Jischke will co-chair the Strategic Planning Committee
Former Purdue University President Martin C. Jischke and Patty Jischke will co-chair the Strategic Planning Committee

Identifying service and programming priorities as well as funding capabilities for the Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library over the next five years will be the focus of a strategic planning process to begin in the first quarter of 2008.

Former Purdue University President Martin C. Jischke and Patty Jischke will co-chair a Strategic Planning Committee that will solicit community input and develop plans to meet the learning needs of a broad range of constituencies, including children, teens, adults, senior citizens, immigrants and the disenfranchised.

"Libraries are on the cutting edge of personal education and an essential element to a thriving, successful community," the couple stated. "The better the public library, the better the community. We are thrilled to be asked to work with the community to help shape the planning for the continued improvement of this vitally important library, in the Indianapolis-Marion County area."

This past summer, Dr. Jischke retired after seven years as President of Purdue University. He led the university through a successful seven-year strategic plan that fulfilled many goals, including the generation of over $1.7 billion in private gifts and the undertaking of major capital projects. Among them was the new $350 million Discovery Park, a hub for interdisciplinary research for biosciences, the environment, nanotechnology, advanced manufacturing, cyber-infrastructure and health care engineering.

In 2006, Dr. Jischke was appointed to the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. He received the Centennial Medallion of the American Society for Engineering Education. He also served as science adviser and consultant for many federal and state agencies and corporations, including a term as a White House fellow and special assistant to the secretary of transportation.

For the past six years, Dr. Jischke's "Science Bound" program has given low-income and disadvantaged inner city students from Indianapolis Public Schools the opportunity to pursue careers in science through specialized course work and free tuition to Purdue University. Today there are more than 250 students enrolled in the program. Recently, Rolls Royce provided funding for a $100,000 endowment in Dr. Jischke's name to maintain the program.

Patty Jischke was designated as "Ambassador for the President of Purdue University" by the school's board of trustees, signifying her many leadership roles. She holds a degree in social work, a master's degree in library science, and a juris doctorate from the University of Oklahoma, and was awarded an honorary doctorate from Purdue.

Patty Jischke is active on the state and national level. She has served on the boards of the Indiana Youth Institute, the Trinity Nursing Center for Infant Health, the Community Foundation of Greater Lafayette, and the Greater Lafayette Community Development Corporation. She also initiated a research study to measure the impact of reading to children in child care centers. Wherever she goes, she recruits readers for the study and a broader Ready to Read program that she plans to launch. She has started Friends of the Library groups in Norman, Oklahoma: Rolla, Missouri: and Ames, Iowa.

Patty Jischke also served on the boards of Heifer Project International and later the Heifer International Foundation, which helps people around the world obtain sustainable sources of food and income.

Martin and Patty Jischke have targeted early childhood reading initiatives as their area of philanthropic focus in the coming years.

"We are extremely fortunate to have the strategic planning experience of Dr. Jischke and the library and reading programs expertise of Patty Jischke as they assist us in this important endeavor," stated Louis Mahern, President of the IMCPL Board of Trustees. "The Library and the citizens of Indianapolis will benefit from their leadership as we move into the future of library service."

Guided by a committee of Marion County residents and business leaders, the strategic planning process will help the Library gain a solid sense of the community's needs, develop plans to best meet them, and allocate resources according to community priorities.

The last strategic plan for IMCPL was conducted in 1996. It resulted in the construction of six new library branches, which replaced older, smaller branches, the expansion of the Pike Branch, and the renovation and expansion of Central Library, which opened on Sunday, December 9.