Visioning FAQ

Provost Moore: Over the last month, during a variety of meetings, including with chairs, deans, Kelly Fox, members of the Arts and Sciences Strategic Planning Committee and others, we have had an ongoing dialogue about the scope of the process we proposed in those columns. After those discussions, it was clear that this is not simply an Arts and Sciences visioning process. We cannot pass up the opportunity to engage in a much larger visioning process about the core mission of the university, which is teaching and scholarly work. First, how do we teach our students and help them to learn—to make them the leaders, creators, movers of our future? What are our students going to be like in five years, 10 years, 20? Second, how do we discover new knowledge—from understanding the stars to reading Shakespeare—and create new things—from nanotechnologies that can heal bodies to new art that can heal the soul. Where are our research trajectories headed in the future? All of us—students, staff, and faculty—are engaged in continual learning and continual creation. That is why we exist as an institution, and I want us to think about how we want to do this in the future.

At the same time, this most definitely is an effort that will involve faculty, staff and students from all of our units on campus, including the College of Arts and Sciences, in a combined and comprehensive effort. For example, Arts and Sciences, or any college, alone cannot address concerns related to our budgetary model, space allocation, information technology, or how to ensure we promote and incentivize interdisciplinary teaching and scholarship. That said, for matters related to the ideals, aspirations and values held within the College of Arts and Sciences, Arts and Sciences faculty, staff and students should determine for themselves how they see and describe the future of their work. We need to honor local initiatives while we also need to recognize that our strength lies in the fact that we are a flagship university encompassing a wide range of educational and scholarly activities.

To more fully answer your question, I hope that people from all over campus, from all colleges and school, academic and administrative units volunteer to participate in this process in any way they see fit. I see this as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to step back and to think deeply about our core mission of teaching and discovery. I believe we can do something quite extraordinary if we do it together in the spirit of open inquiry.

SVC Fox: I am excited because I look forward to listening to what our faculty, staff and students develop for their visions, aspirations and ideals for our university. I believe that this conversation, and the openness and transparency with which it will be conducted, will serve as an example to higher education across the nation. I appreciate Russ taking the lead on the initial series of discussions and am very excited about building the services and processes that will support the work of, not only students and staff, but most importantly, our faculty.

Provost Moore: Most of our schools and colleges have just completed strategic plans and have developed visions of where they want to go. With the process around the Academic Futures initiative, we’ll be factoring in those strategic plans in creating conversations about research and teaching, and graduate and undergraduate education, and we will invite everyone to the table for the conversation. I have asked Vice Provost and Associate Vice Chancellor Jeff Cox to convene the campus conversation.  As an active faculty member, as the chair of the Vice Chancellor’s Advisory Committee (VCAC), and as the manager of our academic program review process, Jeff knows the entire campus, and he has extensive experience in overseeing academic planning discussions. I expect Jeff to ensure that everyone in our community feels valued and heard in this process.

For example, Jeff has been in constant and close contact with the Arts and Sciences Strategic Planning Committee chaired by Professor David Brown. I believe that by continuing to work with him, his committee and as many people as possible in an open and collaborative way, we can really engage this topic and process to move forward by drawing on the experiences of our faculty, staff and students.

The strategic imperatives, as always, will help guide the ultimate recommendations regarding our vision. As faculty and staff, we are committed to shaping the leaders of tomorrow, becoming the top university for innovation and positively impacting humanity. This process will allow us to free ourselves from our current real or perceived impediments to shape our goals, visions and aspirations to more fully and freely achieve those imperatives.

Provost Moore: Because this is a campus-wide conversation, all faculty, staff and students who choose to have a voice will have one. Whether they volunteer as listeners or committee members, schedule or attend meetings, or draft white papers, we hope everyone uses their talents to provide input to the process.

Of course, faculty will have control of and lead the discussion related to teaching and discovery. As a faculty member myself, I fully recognize the prerogative that faculty have over how and what to teach, how and what to study and the foundational rights that come with their status. However, that doesn’t mean that our staff and students are not invited to participate. Every member our campus community shares in the responsibility to support the core mission of the university. These voices bring additional critical perspective, experience and inspired ideas. We absolutely need everyone to participate in this process; otherwise we will not accomplish our goals of clearly identifying our shared goals and aspirations and then building a structure and operation to support those ideals. 

SVC Fox: It’s important to note that the first phase of the Academic Futures initiative is about visioning “what” we want for the future of learning and scholarship at CU Boulder. This is not yet a “how” conversation, nor should it be focused on the nuts and bolts of organization or structure. Instead, Russ has set forward a path that first concentrates on developing high-level sets of visions, aspirations and ideals about our scholarly/creative/professional work and student learning within the framework of the chancellor’s strategic imperatives, and involving ongoing planning conversations on campus.

Provost Moore: I would like things to go quickly but I imagine this will take several years. The first phase is what we are talking about now: a free, open conversation about what we want for our work of learning and discovery. We will then need to have a conversation about how we implement our aspirations and ideas—and here, in particular, our staff colleagues will be highly important strategic partners. Then, we have to put things in place. I want to emphasize over and over again that in this first phase of this process we are talking about whatwe want to do, not how we do it. 

SVC Fox: Let me reinforce what Russ is saying here. We are talking about our hopes for the future, independent of constraints of, say, money, time and space, before we decide what we can do within the limits of our institution. Let’s think largely. Then we can plan smartly. I know that sounds funny coming from the campus’s CFO, but I think it is absolutely vital that we have an unencumbered visioning process that really encourages people to come forward with the best and most exciting elements of their thinking.

Provost Moore: I would respectfully request of everyone to leave cynicism and fixations on campus politics, bureaucracies and processes at the door. We want to capture our highest aspirations, to build goals around them, and then to create roadmaps to meet those goals. We’re going to engage with faculty, staff and students in a spirit of open exchange. We will put all ideas on the table; all goals and aspirations are worthy of discussion, as are all concerns as well. We will engage people directly: in meetings, in one-on-ones, digitally, via submitted white papers, etc. We really intend to meet with and engage people where they are. 

This is a process that will embrace inclusive excellence at every step. It’s a process that is both transparent and extensive, which is as it should be. I encourage everyone to visit our website for information related to the process; we are, for example, posting a calendar, reporting out from ongoing conversations, and keeping track of questions people have. This site not only will be updated with information to the community, it will serve as a place where the campus-level visioning committee can receive feedback from the community. For now, the website serves also as a place where any member of our community can volunteer or nominate someone else to serve on the visioning committee or as a listener. Additional descriptions for both of those can be found there.

Provost Moore: There is no pretext for anything here except for having one of the boldest conversations we’ve ever had as a campus. Let us be clear, however. There are many faculty within Arts and Sciences who believe their futures would be better suited if the college structure was radically changed. I would argue that we can have that conversation only once we know what we want to do around our missions of education and discovery. We’re not ready yet for a conversation about how we reach our aspirations or about what specific structures and units we might change, expand, break apart or anything like that. What we’re doing in our initial phase is identifying the what – what we can become, what we will need to become, to reach our highest aspirations – and the barriers that keep us from attaining these heights. That’s got to be an open, honest and unrestricted visioning process with no pretext of any kind: everything on the table, nothing predetermined.

SVC Fox: I’d like to add, this is not about eliminating staff positions or in response to any current or impending budget reductions. We are in a position of budgetary and operational strength, and while we do face challenges, CU Boulder is in very good financial shape. I’d suggest that because of our positive financial outlook, we are in a great position to undertake this type of campus conversation without the threat of budget cuts.

Provost Moore: Similar to the other campus initiatives underway, these are complementary efforts. The college-level process is looking, among other things, at the interconnection between research and teaching and what it will take to strengthen both of them. I’ve asked Interim Dean Jim White and committee chair David Brown to proceed with the same commitment to a broad visioning process that we are seeking at the campus; in other words, I have asked his group not simply to have a conversation that assumes today’s baseline realities within Arts and Sciences and that seeks to work only within those boundaries. And David has agreed that a broader, more open-ended conversation is what’s needed in the ASC planning process. We will integrate the findings and recommendations of the ASC planning effort into the larger work of the Academic Futures initiative and that process, as it develops, will help the Arts and Sciences committee to see what new options are available to it.

Provost Moore: I’m glad you asked that. While our governance structures put faculty in the driver’s seat with respect to informing and shaping the academic mission of the university, I want to make it clear that staff and students are crucial partners in this endeavor. It’s students—both graduates and undergraduates—who can tell us many key things about learning, about involvement in the research process, and about how their worlds inside and outside the university are changing. That input will help us develop the structures and processes to serve them.

Staff, who play vital roles all over the university, can provide recommendations from the front lines regarding how to create new or modify our current processes to help our faculty reach their goals. So, again, this is a full community visioning process, and we would be remiss if we did not take full advantage of all of the talented people we have on our campus. The Academic Futures initiative affects everyone, challenges everyone, and involves everyone at CU Boulder. There may be portions of the initiative when one element of our community is more involved than another, but in the end, it’s about the entire university. And that makes it exciting.

For Listeners, we are looking for a broad range of folks from across campus, including instructors, lecturers and students.  Listeners are really the ambassadors for the AF effort.  They will be receiving direct updates on the effort and bring that information out to their community.  In addition, they hear what their community is saying and bring that information to the AF team.

For the Committee, this will be a relatively small group of folks charged with developing recommendations for the Provost, based on all of the input we are receiving.  It will be mainly faculty with some staff and student participation.  It will likely include a wide range of backgrounds and expertise, with an emphasis on people who can bring institutional knowledge, innovative ideas, and outside perspectives.

In addition, there are other ways to get involved with AF.  We are beginning to reach out to Departments and Colleges about setting up meetings with faculty, staff, and students.  It’s the beginning of engagement, where we can hear what they are thinking, start getting ideas of themes they would like to have discussed as part of the campus conversation, etc. In addition, we will be talking about how to provide input throughout the process.  

The Provost says he wants to have this conversation to proceed without constraints; in particular, he does not want to take up questions of time, space, and money.  While we recognize that there are real limits to what we can do, we don’t see our current situation as a zero sum game.  If you develop a vision that may require a hundred million dollars and/or new space on campus, then we want to engage that vision to build our support services, both long and short term, to satisfy it. The real point is that this is not now about nuts and bolts questions or allowing time, money, or space to constrain those aspirations.  It’s about our practices (for teaching and discovery).  How do our practices change to meet the future?  How do we want to do our work?

The white papers are meant to give people a chance to lay out an idea in more detail than might be done in a meeting or open forum.  They can be short or long, done by one person or a group.  They need to be submitted by December 15 for the Committee to consider, but we encourage early submissions.  We can use white papers to convene a themed session.  In addition, many themed sessions will likely result in white papers for the Committee to consider.

This effort is a follow on to Flagship 2030, many aspects of which have been achieved while others have evolved into the Chancellor’s Strategic Imperatives.  In talking about our core mission of learning and discovery, we want to explore how what we do can help us achieve those imperatives.  For example, how can our teaching and scholarship help us to positively impact humanity, be the innovation university, and/or develop the leaders of tomorrow.

The Provost wants us to envision what we want to be, thinking of our university in 10 and 20 years.  We anticipate from this process that not only a vision emerges that moves the campus forward, but there will be several initiatives that we can undertake and implement in the next 3 years. Once you tell us your vision, aspirations, or ideals, we’ll then work together to develop “how” we best can implement those. Finally, we’ll move forward with that implementation. I’m sure some ideas will be simple to enact while others may take a fairly significant amount of time, money, or effort.