Campus and Unit Branding

The VSU system is a large organization spanning five physical campuses and hundreds of sub units. Campus and unit branding aims to make communication about and wayfinding across VSU’s units clear and recognizable.

This chapter has two main parts:

• Naming Conventions is about how offices and designated positions ought to be written in text, mentioned by word, or presented visually.

• The Wayfinding Guidelines llay down the basic principles on how physical signages can help everyone navigate their way around the university campus.

The basis of these naming conventions are the units, offices, and designated positions as laid out in the approved VSU organizational structure and previous structures and traditions in nomenclature.

In this chapter, a “Brand” is a way a designated position or an office is written, said, or even visualized for public-facing documents and materials. The full office name shall be used when dogmatically required. But whenever it is optional, we can choose a simpler way.

Harvard University brands itself simply as “Harvard” and Harvard Law School as just “Harvard Law”, or the United States Military Academy as “West Point”. Recognizability is the name of the game.

Glossary of Terms

• Designated Position - the job title held by a certain VSU employee as appointed by the President or the VSU Board of Regents

• Office / Unit - the organizational affiliation and physical location of a group of VSU employees performing clerical and specific professional duties

• Acronym - the condensed yet recognizable version of an office/unit name, usually for brevity and repetition in documents

• Code - the condensed version of an office/unit name, for use in the quality management system and other internal information systems; letters only in ALL CAPS, maximum of 8 characters

• Brand - the way designated positions and office/unit names are written or said for public-facing documents and materials

A QMS Guideline shall spell out brand names of offices and designated positions, as well as their acronyms and codes for both internal and external use.

Naming of Offices

The nomenclature of university offices and units shall follow these principles:

1. C-Level Offices where the top official’s position is central to the operations of the office shall start with “Office of the…” This includes, but is not limited to:

• Office of the President

• Office of the Vice President (for…)

• Office of the Chancellor

2. Director-Level Offices where the designated position is central to the operations of the office shall start the with “Office of the Director for…” such as, but not limited to:

• Office of the Director for Instruction & Evaluation

• Office of the Director for Administrative Services

• Office of the Director for Financial Management

3. Some centers may start with “Center for” like “Center for Continuing Education”.

4. Administrative units under C-Level and Director-Level Offices should not start with “Office of” but instead start with its function or widely accepted name and may end with “Office” “Unit” “Center”, with a few exceptions as approved by the Office of the President. For example:

• Payroll & Leave Benefits Office

• Information and Communication Technology or ICT Management Center

• Grounds & Landscape Maintenance Unit

• Exception: VSU Printing Press

5. For academic units, the basic unit is called a Department or Institute, composed of faculty under a common academic field. A College is usually constituted by a group of departments and institutes. The Graduate School and Open University, as well as the College of Nursing which currently has no department under it, are considered exceptions to these rules.

Designated Positions

The nomenclature of designated positions is based on the approved organizational structure of the university and as stipulated by the VSU Code. Those who look at the organizational structure should understand that the structure is a visualization of who reports to whom and who has authority over whom, but it does not go on to mean the “Office of the Head” is the name of the office.

While definitely not comprehensive, the following principles shall guide the university in presenting its units, designated positions, and office brands:

1. In more formal contexts especially on paper, the full office name or title shall be preferred. This includes, legal documents, memoranda, and the like.

2. In promotional materials and in speech, the office brand and the position’s simpler version is preferred. This more understandable route should be chosen when the non-use of formal names and titles are not consequential.

3. Office acronyms, especially the less understandable or more confusing ones, should be avoided especially when non-university stakeholders are the audience of such materials and events. Instead, the office/unit’s brand names should be used.

4. When the office name contains the designated position, only one should be retained in mentions and signatures to avoid repetition. For example, it would be redundant to say, “Vice President, OVPAA”. Instead, we may say, “Vice President for Academic Affairs”, “Vice President” or “VP for Academic Affairs”.

In 2019, the status of the university’s satellite or external campuses in Villaba, Isabel, Tolosa, and Villaba, Leyte (or VITA) were upgraded to Component College. With this, the usual references no longer apply. The VSU Component Colleges or Campuses are now called “Visayas State University [Component College]” or “VSU[CC]”.

Referencing VITA

Official Component Campus Names:

• Visayas State University Villaba, VSU Villaba, or VSUV

• Visayas State University Isabel, VSU Isabel, or VSUI

• Visayas State University Tolosa, VSU Tolosa, or VSUT

• Visayas State University Alangalang, VSU Alangalang, or VSUA

Such reference shall not use hyphens (like VSU-A or VSU Alangalang), nor add “Campus” at the end (like VSU Isabel Campus). Its old college names (CEAT, etc.) and its logos are no longer useable as well.

When referring or citing any component college aside from its formal name, either say “Component College” (recommended) or “Campus”. Do not use “Satellite Campus” or “External Campus”; the latter sounds like an inferior reference.

The university’s main campus in Baybay shall remain to be referred to as “VSU Main Campus” or just “VSU”, although the term “VSU Baybay” is also an accepted style to elevate the VITA when all five (5) campuses are mentioned together in communication materials.

VITA Campus Logos

A pill design with the campus location is added below the VSU Text Logo in lieu of the standard VSU seal/brand logo + text logo combination as follows: