Anne Heinz, dean, Continuing Education and Professional Studies (Photo/Larry Harwood)

Last January, the Board of Regents approved a name change for CU-Boulder's continuing education unit - the Division of Continuing Education and Professional Studies. What's up with a new name?

Frankly, our old name (Division of Continuing Education) didn't adequately convey the scope of professional development activities in which we are involved. We consulted with various constituent groups, drawing upon local and national surveys of faculty, staff and students. As a result of our analysis, we sought and obtained approval from the provost, chancellor, president and Board of Regents to add ‘and Professional Studies' to our name.

Increasingly, we partner with CU-Boulder's schools and colleges to offer graduate degree programs, professional certificates and short courses. These programs advance our collective campus mission in education, research and service. For example, some programs serve working professionals (including our alums) in business and industry. These programs promote a skilled and knowledgeable workforce that is critical to our state and national economy. Some programs provide teaching opportunities for our graduate students, while others foster research activities among our graduate students and faculty.

Through our Center for Advanced Engineering and Technology Education (CAETE) program, we work with the College of Engineering and Applied Science to provide masters' degree programs on campus in telecommunications and engineering management. CAETE also partners with the College to offer masters' degrees through distance education in aerospace engineering, computer science, electrical and computer engineering. In conjunction with the School of Education we provide a master's degree program in multicultural and bilingual education. An evening MBA is available to students in conjunction with the Leeds School of Business.

Certificate programs enable students to focus on a coherent sequence of courses in a particular subject matter. We offer graduate level, credit certificate programs in software engineering, embedded systems, project management and teaching or interpreting American Sign Language. We are also exploring other certificate program opportunities with departments, schools and colleges, including online certificate programs designed to enable geographic flexibility and web-based research archives.

Our International English Center, in collaboration with the College of Arts and Sciences, offers English as a Second Language programs for international students, community residents and visitors from other countries. We also offer online writing instruction for international students who need to improve their writing for their course work, thesis or dissertation.

In partnership with the Leeds School of Business, our Executive Development Program offers a range of programs including technology leadership, negotiation, corporate governance and other custom business programs. CAETE provides short courses in computer applications, graphics, web, programming and other special topics.

Shakespeare once wrote, "What's in a name? that which we call a rose / By any other name would smell as sweet." A name change doesn't change our fundamental commitment to providing quality, innovative, lifelong learning opportunities to a diverse student population by extending the educational resources of CU-Boulder. In addition to the programs noted above, our Boulder Evening, ACCESS, High School Concurrent, Independent Learning, Outreach, Personal Enrichment and Summer Session programs provide a wide range of credit and noncredit programs to serve a variety of students and their learning needs. In partnership with campus departments, we also offer various student services including academic advising, financial aid and career counseling. For more information, consult our catalog or web site (www.colorado.edu/conted).

CU-Boulder demonstrated its commitment to the lifelong learning needs of Colorado citizens when it established a continuing education program on our campus in 1911. In the first year of operation, Dr. Loran D. Osborn, the director, said, "[The University's] expert resources are too valuable an asset to the state to be thus limited [to resident students]. They should be at the disposal of individuals who cannot come within the college walls, and communities which are seeking information and guidance in solution of the complex problems of modern life."

In concert with the campus community, the Division of Continuing Education and Professional Studies strives to meet this worthy goal.