The Quilt is the national association of regional IT collaboratives, including our clients OSHEAN, MAGPI and MCNC. 

The Quilt seeks to be a dynamic forum where leaders from throughout the advanced research and education network community build on the intellectual capital and best practices of network service providers worldwide.

In this project, The Quilt, wanted to move forward on several strategic and organizational fronts. The primary focus of this effort was to implement a strategic action plan to transition to organization from an interim executive director to a permanent hire. Our role was to facilitate, coach and help manage the process.

Outcomes desired are:

• Creating a strategic plan as a living document
• An outline of a yearly planning cycle with a focus in guiding implementation

Our process to achieve this was:

• Ongoing planning with the Board/Executive Committee
• Collaboration with Executive Director to Produce the Plan
• Design and execute Staff Planning Workshops: New Commons engaged the staff to develop two elements of the plan: draft conditions analysis and first cut of possible strategic initiatives for considering including in the matrix.

New Commons was honored to have been selected to facilitate this crucially important project. The project included two initial phases with the third still under consideration.

Phase One involved a comprehensive process of multiple stakeholder meetings to develop core input. Foundational work completed at an earlier roundtable event identified four "acceleration initiatives" and New Commons organized and facilitated workshops for each. We also facilitated follow-up sessions that dug deep into areas of overlap, producing a set of "meta-projects" that are currently under way (comprehensive energy strategy, access to capital for green companies, workforce development).

Phase Two involved an extensive drafting and editing process to create the actual roadmap, both the summary version and the full, 20-page verion. This included a graphical layout with the addition of some images. 

Phase Three is currently evolving a network of partners to develop capabilities and take 'ownership' of specific projects.

Based in part on our ongoing work with OSHEAN here in RI, its counterpart in the Philadelphia region, MAGPI, held its first “Member Advisory Meeting” on March 22, 2010.

New Commons produced three deliverables for the meeting:
• Define the role of the MAGPI advisory
• Assessment of value provided by MAGPI
• A visual representation of mutual dependencies and potential collaboration opportunities among the MAGPI member segments

On an annual basis, EPSCoR hosts a Diversity Workshop for a variety of stakeholders to further augment their efforts to attract and retain students of color in the STEM disciplines.

Michelle Gonzalez of New Commons was engaged to facilitate the workshop in order to enhance the sustainability of this project. In previous years the Diversity Workshop engaged participants in principles of diversity, but didn't create a plan to further make the diversity initiative a systemic one.

The agenda started with a panel presentation from the following individuals to futher amplify the question of "What is diversity and how do we harness this initiative for our students?"