Every now and then a CU Boulder staff member achieves the 50 Years of Service milestone. Staff Council has the honor of celebrating these achievements, but it got us thinking: what will CU Boulder be like in another 50 years? So, we asked Staff Council members and their colleagues to make their guesses. In 50 years, the Staff Council of the future can look back at this and see how close (or far) we were.
Education
- Study Abroad programs to Mars are offered in partnership with SpaceX!
- Online classes aren’t taught online, but in the Metaverse!
- 5 new majors in space science will be added.
- The engineering department will have more machine shops and maker spaces.
- Engineering will have an acceptance rate of 55% women and 55% BIPOC.
- All students will complete one semester of community service.
- All academic departments will have for-credit internship classes.
- There is an ease in remote vs. in-person learning. There is more flexibility in curriculum and less rigidity in areas of major.
Campus
- All squirrels on campus will be robotic.
- CU Boulder has even greater accessibility with more wheelchair ramps and walkways as well as elevator access and attendants.
- Campus will be spread more throughout Boulder.
- CU Boulder will have 100% renewable energy.
- There will be a Chic-fil-a on one end of campus and an In-N-Out on the other, creating intense inter-college rivalries and random bouts of food fights!
- Despite advances in digital mapping and geolocation services, people still cannot find their way around the inside of most campus buildings, especially the Engineering Center and libraries, even on virtual tours.
Transportation
- The light rail from Denver to Boulder will finally be operational. The light rail from Boulder to Longmont projected completion is 2099!
- Highway 36 will still be under construction.
- There will be free hovercraft parking on-campus for faculty, staff, and students.
- Chargers for electric cars will be in every parking spot.
- There will be a train line down to Denver & up to the mountains.
- The Buff Bus still runs between Will Vill, East Campus, and Main Campus, but the buses are now driverless and electric.
- Students will ride Hoverboards rather than skateboards around campus, but they still won't wear helmets.
Staffing
- Thanks to advances in medical science, tenured faculty are now retiring at an average age of 95.
- Ted De Maria will still be working at CIRES.
- Artificial Intelligence will have automated all our jobs and we will all be living lives of leisure.
- Everyone will be enjoying free thinking and high pay.
- All teaching goes remote and the CU campus is converted into a historical park/site/zoo for wildlife!
- A 100% automated onboarding process for new employees, completed with campus tour and virtual Ralphie visits.
Athletics
- In an effort to boost marketing for their Engineering program, CU Boulder will have transitioned to a fully student built robotic Ralphie at football games.
- CU Boulder gives up on football and runs Ralphie around every Saturday since it's what the people want!
- With the perfection of levitation technology, CU will compete for a spot in the Quidditch World Cup.
Everything else…
- People are still having a hard time getting tickets to see Hamilton.
- Email will have been replaced by telepathy and campus processes will be fully automated.
- Rather than build up, the City of Boulder will permit multi-story subterranean apartment buildings as a way to solve the housing shortage.
- What’s old is new again! Four words: Pneumatic. Tube. Food. Delivery.
