University of Colorado President Todd Saliman spoke in person to the Boulder Faculty Assembly (BFA) on Sept. 5, telling the group that the recent legislative compromise on property taxes, which he supported, while significantly reducing the impact on the state budget of Proposition 108 and Initiative 50, will still have “a multi-billion dollar impact over the next 10 years,” even with a projected 5% growth in state revenues. 

“It will be a tough year for higher education and anything that relies on state funding,” Saliman said. “The good news is that the state has already increased funding for higher education by quite a bit over the last few years, and we’ve been clawing our way up on that state ranking chart relative to state funding, but we’re not going to be making any progress next year.”

At the BFA’s request, Saliman also addressed diversity and inclusion, how CU can make progress on climate change, and freedom of expression issues. 

On diversity, Saliman reassured the assembly that Colorado’s political environment and specifically its legislature have “demonstrated time and time again their dedication to diversity as a priority.”

“You all are doing some good work here at CU Boulder,” he said. “It doesn’t mean that we’re even close to where we want to be, but kudos to people who are doing good work here on this campus to make progress on diversity and our DEI goals.”

On climate change, Saliman said the CU system “had articulated in our strategic plan metrics on greenhouse gas emissions and energy use on the campuses and we’ve been tracking that, and we do a sustainability report that is on our website,” but that “the real work is happening on the campuses.

“And I applaud the (CU Boulder) campus for embracing sustainability—through the work of the Sustainability Council…but the biggest challenge is just money: paying for things that work to help us make progress. The reality here is that this is a beautiful but old campus with incredibly old buildings that are incredibly hard to update.” 

Money from the state for sustainability upgrades “is not even close to what we need,” Saliman said, “but (Chancellor) Justin (Schwartz) and I have talked, and he is deeply committed to this as well.” 

Closing out on freedom of speech, Saliman noted it had been an “incredibly challenging time” for higher education over the last year, a reference to national campus protests tied to the Israel-Hamas war. 

He said the system and campus leadership conversation begins with a baseline commitment “to the importance of free speech—it’s fundamental to who we are and why we exist,” alongside the fact that “we also expect people to follow our rules,” citing the enforced ban on camping at the Auraria campus last year as an example. 

He also said challenges occur when “people have a right to say something but what they say may be incredibly offensive to some members of our community.” 

“It’s the job of the campuses to share with those folks the impact their speech is having (on individuals). I’m grateful for the good work being done here by Student Affairs to make sure students know what their rights and responsibilities are,” Saliman said.  

Saliman thanked the Board of Regents for reiterating last year “who has the authority to speak on behalf of the university.” 

“They reiterated current policy, which says only the board has a right to speak on behalf of the university, unless that is specifically delegated. When the board has not taken a position, they have delegated that authority to me, and I have delegated aspects to the chancellors,” Saliman said. “We want to make sure things aren’t said as representing the university when they don’t—it was a sticky wicket last year, but I appreciate the clarification the regents provided.”

In other BFA action 

Faculty Review of Vice Provost Michele Moses 

Every year, the BFA committee evaluates senior administrators, this time being Vice Provost and Associate Vice Chancellor of Faculty Affairs Michele Moses. The faculty rated Moses highly across the board and lauded in particular her work building collegiality and community.

Committee changes

• The Budget & Planning Committee is pausing so that the BFA may reshape and rethink the committee’s role.
• Faculty are filling seats on the new Campus Operations & Resources Committee, which was formed to foster better partnership and communication between faculty and strategic resources and support (SRS), managed by Chief Operating Officer Pat O'Rourke.
• The BFA is partnering with the Center for Teaching and Learning to form an AI Working Group to provide better guidance for faculty and the use of AI in their classrooms. Interested faculty are asked to contact bfa@colorado.edu.

In closing

• The BFA representative survey about the academic year 2024–25 goals and priorities closes on Friday.
• Last year, the BFA passed a resolution to review the campus faculty course questionnaire (FCQ) process. A number of issues came up related to that tool, and they decided it was time to look at it and are forming a task force accordingly.
• Internal elections for BFA close on Sept. 5, and external election nominations will take place Sept. 9–18.

Learn more about the BFA and previous actions on the BFA website.