We Will Succeed When and Roadmap and Projects

Committed to serving as your trusted, strategic technology partner, WashU IT has developed a plan. Enabled by the university’s mission and emboldened by our own. ImpacT, our strategic plan, informs our next steps across the span of 5 years. We will we strive to deliver secure, innovative, and information-rich solutions with excellence. Inspired by the university’s Here and Next strategic plan, ImpacT captures our current needs, while anticipating our technology future.

Informed by the steps we are taking today, the next phase of our strategic journey will begin early with proper planning, forethought, and important conversations. We will continue fostering a culture and climate that supports all people, and decision making that is data driven in the vanguard of technological development, as well as financially prudent. 

The goals of the Network Modernization Project are to significantly increase the campus network capacity and implement enhanced network security capabilities to meet the demands of the campus for the next 10 years.

The implementation of Workday for Human Capital Management, Finance, and Payroll was a key milestone of the MyDay initiative to replace the University’s administrative systems. This was a major project that enhanced the back-office suite of products and moved the University closer to becoming a data-driven organization. In addition to Workday, the team implemented Adaptive Budgeting and Planning to provide greater insight into future spend and revenue forecasts. The project also delivered Talent and Performance Management, Workday Learning, and Adaptive Strategic Planning, strengthening the University’s ability to manage its workforce, develop talent, and make informed, strategic decisions.

A once-in-a-generation project that will replace many of the systems that currently support WashU’s academic areas, reimagine operations in the academic and student support space, and over time, improve the student experience. Consolidating many student tools into a single, integrated system will help streamline operations, reduce manual processes, and provide faster, easier reporting for decision making.
Project completed on time in December 2025.

The data management and analytics roadmap aims to create a data-driven culture within all levels of the university through rich data collection, easy access, data literacy, and innovative technology, such as artificial intelligence and machine learning. The university community can access these data resources from anywhere to make informed decisions to drive a more significant impact in research, education, and patient care at WashU, our region, our nation, and our world.

The goal of the WashU Data Strategy is to establish a single, trusted source of rich, reliable data that empowers bold decisions, accelerates revenue growth, and fuels innovation for students and researchers. This includes unifying data on the Databricks Lakehouse platform to enable collaboration and simplify access, focusing institutional resources on Power BI as the primary analytics tool, and strengthening Data Governance to ensure quality, trust, and consistent standards across the enterprise.

The Student Data Program brings together academic data from multiple source systems into the WashU Data Warehouse to support business analysis and self-service reporting. The program fills reporting gaps in Workday Student, supports historical and longitudinal reporting, and combines data across systems to provide a more complete view of a student.

The rebranding project establishes a clear, data-driven path for transitioning the university’s domain from wustl.edu to washu.edu. The work encompasses three phases:

1. Domain Impact Analysis: Assess the technical, operational, and financial implications of the domain change to clarify costs, risks, and resource requirements.
2. Asset Inventory & Prioritization: Develop a comprehensive, prioritized inventory of departmental assets requiring brand alignment, along with estimated effort and resources.
3. Application Readiness & Planning: Evaluate applications to estimate remediation needed for authentication and identity changes and inform planning for the next phase of execution.

The project positions the university to make informed decisions and plan the next phase efficiently and with minimal disruption.

Our strategic plan strives for aspirational stakeholder experiences. We seek to elevate the end user experience for our customers, taking feedback provided through surveys, focus groups, and conversations and applying what we learn to enhance delivery. Now more than ever, IT has the opportunity to innovate, captivate, and motivate. 

The IT Governance project is intended to establish the organizational structures, processes and guidelines to manage technology investments, align the IT portfolio with the University Here and Next strategy, and prioritize projects and programs within the portfolio. The structures, processes and guidelines collaboratively developed in this project will specify how to make technology investment decisions and implement and manage technology changes to ensure effective and efficient use of IT resources to enable and support the university’s strategic priorities. 

The goal of this project is to develop a foundational cost model that can be leveraged for financial and project reporting against a standard framework called the ATUM Taxonomy. It will increase transparency regarding the cost, consumption and value of WashU IT services through show back reporting to customers. 

IT will build a framework for employee progress and support through training and engagement opportunities, data and tools that facilitate effective constructive dialogue, and concrete actions that foster an engaged and valued workforce

The goal of Research Storage and High Performance Computing Capability Expansion project is to build central IT infrastructure and services that allow the WashU Researcher to focus on their research instead of acquisition and support of their own IT infrastructure. This multi-year project will design, implement, and support a high-performance computing platform for WashU researchers.

As cybersecurity threats increase in intensity and impact, the Department of Defense (DoD) has created the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) (inclusive of NIST Special Publication 800-171) as a way to verify compliance with the CUI security standards. This certification will ultimately be required for any entity that seeks to contract with the DoD. Through the Washington University in St. Louis Security-Enhanced Environment for Government Research (WUSTL Secure Enclave,) we offer a safe environment for our research and education partners and protect their data.    

The purpose of this Genomic Data Sharing Policy (GDSP) Remediation Project is to deliver a coordinated response to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) guideline disclosures, specifically in the GDSP, using Research Infrastructure Service’s (RIS) facilities: Compute1, Compute2, Storage1, and Storage2. 

WashU IT is a collaborative partner supporting digital enhancements, advancing discovery and ground-breaking research, and shining light on the path in the pursuit of knowledge. Technology serves as a force-multiplier driving change and shaping how information touches our lives and inspires future generations. 

The Enterprise AI Platform Enablement program establishes a secure, scalable AI platform for WashU, built on a hybrid, multi-vendor approach that supports multiple leading AI models and tools. Rather than relying on a single provider, this platform supports a curated set of popular AI vendors, models and tools that can be integrated into everyday workflows through shared security, governance, and user experience standards. By delivering AI as an enterprise capability, with choice, flexibility, and strong guardrails, we accelerate adoption, improve decision-making, and enable innovation across the University.

WashU IT’s Optimization Initiative is designed to maximize the performance and efficiency of our artificial intelligence systems across the University. Our goal is to create a robust, optimized AI ecosystem that drives innovation and supports smarter decision-making. By fine-tuning models, streamlining workflows, and leveraging advanced analytics, this project ensures that our AI tools deliver faster insights, improved accuracy, and greater value for every department at WashU.

The Epic Electronic Health Record – WashU and BJC Strategic Roadmap offers a secure platform for the storage of patient medical records, allowing clinicians to access that information from any location across BJC and Washington University in St. Louis. Governed under a joint BJC/WUSM organization structure named Health Information Partners (HIP,) this partnership enhances the clinical experience for patients and providers, offering more seamless delivery of and access to care.  

The Washington University School of Medicine Neuroscience Research building, located at 4370 Duncan Avenue, is a planned state-of-the-art, 609,000 square foot facility that represents a new center of gravity for the campus. This facility will enable the strategic alignment and co-location of the School of Medicine’s nationally recognized program strengths in neuroscience, neurology, and psychiatry through research and its applications to education and clinical practice. WashU IT will partner with the university to implement a world-class technology plan within the facility. 

The new Ambulatory Cancer Center (ACC) will be a nine-story state-of-the-art cancer building, located at Forest Park and Taylor Avenues. The 657,270-square-foot building will emphasize multi-disciplinary care and enhanced connections between research and clinical care. The programs moving into the building include multi-disciplinary clinics, diagnostic and treatment areas and multi-specialty clinics. We will enable the ultra-high-speed network infrastructure in this new facility, ensuring full support of the mission of our partners in medicine.