Welcome to CMDI

We’re honored to welcome CU Boulder’s environmental design department to the renamed College of Communication, Media, Design and Information.

This exciting development recognizes the role design plays in connecting industries and disciplines such as technology and data science, urban design, communication, sustainability, storytelling, and media creation. 

As a part of the CMDI community, environmental design alumni become part of a much larger family that includes thousands of Buffs working in media production, technology, environmental journalism, corporate communications, advertising and more. 

Be involved
at CMDI

 

Connect with classes 
Delivering a guest lecture or serving as a capstone judge is an easy way to make a lasting impact on a large group of students. Our professors welcome input from experts who are doing the work every day and can provide important professional context to classroom lessons. Email us for more information.

 

Hire students 
Providing internships for our students helps them apply their classroom knowledge, strengthen their portfolios and start building the networks that will guide them throughout their careers. For more information, contact Nate Jones.

 

Submit a class note
Watch your mail this fall for your first issue of CMDI Now, our college magazine. We will be including updates from ENVD alumni about their professional and personal accomplishments. Submit yours now →

Be sure you’re on our mailing list for the magazine and invitations to alumni events and networking opportunities by ensuring your contact info is up to date. 

 

Support ENVD students and faculty 
Gifts from alumni help our college invest in lab infrastructure, maker spaces, software, scholarships, study abroad trips and more, helping students make the most of their college experiences and ensuring they graduate with a market-ready set of skills. 

 

Support CMDI 
Alumni support gives our college the flexibility to quickly identify new opportunities for academic programs, research and more. Gifts to the dean’s fund also support scholarships, travel for students and faculty to conferences, modernization of buildings and technology, and more.

About the integration

Bringing ENVD into CMCI and renaming the college as CMDI is a way to bring together two strong programs at CU Boulder that emphasize hands-on learning and project-based classes led by industry-active faculty. 

Both prize innovation and a recognition that, amid continuous change, yesterday’s solutions are tomorrow’s pitfalls. And both are driven by a shared vision of sustainability, a commitment to solving problems and a drive to do work that matters. Locating ENVD within a growing college gives it significantly more marketing, fundraising and recruiting resources to ensure its long-term strength. 

Adding “design” to the CMCI name allows the environmental design program to retain an identity forged from decades of leadership in the fields of architecture, sustainable design and urban planning. It also demonstrates the importance of design skills and perspectives for professionals working in communication, media and technology fields, to understand both the tools of the trade and design’s role in solving the interconnected problems of the future. 

As a college, when we look at some of the big problems facing us—like how to make the built environment work better for people, how to incorporate sustainability into everyday solutions, or how to elevate equity into what we build and create—it’s clear that design is an important part of developing effective solutions. Hands-on learners, innovators and problem-solvers are at home in both CMCI and ENVD, which will allow our communities to seamlessly collaborate in seeking sustainable solutions to the great challenges facing our society and the world. By adding ENVD’s majors to CMCI, we will cultivate faculty and student collaborations that encourage us to explore new areas, look at problems from a different perspective and marshal creativity in developing innovative solutions. 

An advantage of the curriculum each student takes in earning the B.ENVD—which is not going away—is it offers both depth and breadth, encouraging curiosity about topics like sustainability while requiring a deep dive into their major-specific coursework. The integration will give students greater flexibility in their studies and help them graduate with a well-rounded set of professional skills in areas like communication, presentation and media literacy, without changing the important skills they develop in their upper-level courses and labs. 

Graduates with CMCI or ENVD majors benefit from a larger and more diverse network of alumni. Especially for ENVD graduates, the move to CMDI allows for much greater resources that can be used to connect you with students and alumni in different fields and keep you abreast of what’s happening in the college and at the university.

Currently enrolled students will complete their degree plans with no changes. As CMDI takes further shape, curricula may be adjusted in order to provide further skills and broader perspectives to students, better equipping them for the complex, interdisciplinary problems they will engage in the workplace.

‘Joy and excitement over what’s possible’ 

Students, faculty, alumni and leadership from CMCI and ENVD share their excitement about coming together under a new name. Read more →

Alumni Updates

Sara Fischer (Jour, Engl’78)

Sara Fischer oversees worldwide production for all Shondaland TV series. Fischer recently led production on Shondaland's groundbreaking hit, Bridgerton, the most-watched series debut in Netflix history, as well as Inventing Anna.

Harvey Hine (EnvDes’78)

Harvey Hine has been the owner of HMH Architecture + Interiors for the past 36 years and started a nonprofit, Month of Modern, 10 years ago. He spends his time working on his cabin, skiing, making jewelry and working on his classic Jaguar.

Scott Takeda (Jour’89)

Scott Takeda will be a recurring guest star on a new comedy called Panhandle and recently shot with Catherine Zeta Jones in the new Disney series National Treasure. He still appears on General Hospital.

Sarah Broughton (EnvDes’96)

Sarah Broughton and her partner, John Rowland (EnvDes’96), who met in their first architecture design studio at CU, just published their first monograph, Designing Aspen: The Houses of Rowland+Broughton.

Brent Schrotenboer (Jour’96)

Brent Schrotenboer, an enterprise and investigative reporter for USA Today, recently won three national top 10 writing awards from the Associated Press Sports Editors for work he did in 2021. He has received 11 national top 10 awards since 2014. 

Morgan Gallo (StratComm’17)

Morgan Gallo is a nationally touring comedian who was recently awarded Best of Fest at the Big Pine Comedy Festival in San Diego. This year, she plans to perform back home in Colorado for the first time since she began her career.

Sepp Kuss (Advert’17)

Durango native and professional cyclist Sepp Kuss won the Vuelta a España in September, becoming the first American cyclist in a decade to win a Grand Tour. 

Shannon Mullane (MJour’19)

Shannon Mullane joined The Colorado Sun as a reporter covering water issues and tribal affairs in the West. In the fall, Mullane won a first-place award from the Colorado Press Association in the Best Social Justice or Equity Reporting category.