University of Colorado Boulder community,

As you may know, ongoing budget negotiations have failed to produce a stopgap funding agreement in Congress. The immediate consequence is that the federal government was shut down at 12:01 a.m Eastern time on October 1. 

CU Boulder received $527 million, or 69 percent of last year’s total research funding, from the federal government. This funding drives discovery and innovation of global importance in areas such as aerospace, biosciences, earth and environmental sciences, and more, impacting the lives of people across the world.

In addition to ramifications related to research funding, a shutdown may impact a range of important operations and services, including our staffing through partnerships with local federal labs and a variety of resources that our community depends on, from IRS services related to student loans to federal support of ongoing programs.

Given this close association with the federal government, we are tracking this situation closely and monitoring potential impacts on our students, faculty, staff and research programs. We remain hopeful Congress will reach an agreement very soon.

In the case of a short-term stoppage, we expect impacts to be manageable. Should the stoppage last more than a few weeks, those impacts may expand. We are continuing to develop strategies to minimize impacts should the shutdown remain unresolved.

We are not alone: We are partnering with universities across the nation, lawmakers and policy makers to advocate aggressively for a speedy resolution that will mitigate impacts to our community and those who benefit from our research programs. Additionally, the campus has successfully navigated several federal government shutdowns in recent years and is leveraging prior experience to help mitigate impacts as much as possible.  

We will continue to share updates through our federal funding webpage and CU Boulder Today, as well as direct communications with groups who may be directly affected.

We are hopeful that this stoppage will be brief and the impacts minimal.

Thank you for your continued focus on our important work during this challenging time.

Massimo Ruzzene
Senior Vice Chancellor for Research & Innovation and Dean of the Institutes
Research & Innovation Office
University of Colorado Boulder