Phil DiStefano: A Look at the Past 50 Years on Campus

By Dave Curtin • Published: July 16, 2024

Chancellor Phil DiStefano has always had a passion for education. As an undergraduate at Ohio State, he spent summers shoveling asphalt in his hometown of Steubenville, Ohio — where many of his fellow workers had elementary-level literacy. During lunch, DiStefano would break out the newspaper, offering reading lessons to his peers. “They liked sports, so I brought the sports section,” he said.

In 1960s Steubenville, young men typically found work in local steel mills — but CU Boulder’s 11th chancellor chose a different path, becoming the first in his family to attend college. From that summer job on the paving crew, he went on to earn the first of three degrees at The Ohio State University and began his career as a high school teacher in Wintersville, Ohio. As a new teacher, he quickly learned the town culture — no tests or homework on the first day of hunting season. When the town fire alarm blared, the students got up to leave. They were all volunteer firefighters.

DiStefano learned to respect the culture and read the room. It was the beginning of his evolution as a quiet and unpretentious leader, an approach that has guided him throughout his CU career as an educator, dean, provost and chancellor.

In DiStefano’s term at CU Boulder, the university has grown from a 20,000-student regional teaching campus to a 37,000-student research and learning powerhouse — a world leader in climate, health, quantum science, engineering and physics, to name a few.

As chancellor, he’s seen the campus through record fundraising and the doubling of research grants. He’s championed diversity and inclusion. Last academic year, half of the first-year students are women and a third are students of color. Applications for this fall’s class reached a record high.

DiStefano believes higher education is about more than career preparation and earnings. “It has the benefit of producing civil leaders who support and sustain a diverse democracy,” he said.

Now, as he prepares for this next transition, he reflects on the disciplines that have guided him throughout his career: listening carefully, learning from the community and practicing self-reflection.

As chancellor, he has worked with stakeholders at every university level and partnered with industry, business and community leaders. He’s advocated for CU in the legislature and on the national stage and has connected with people of all ages, demographics, interests and agendas.

But it hasn’t always been smooth sailing. Navigating the pandemic, rallying the campus through the devastating flood of 2013, and guiding CU through free speech issues — these moments kept him up at night.

In the fall of 2020, after much consultation with his leadership team, Chancellor DiStefano decided to open CU Boulder’s campus for in-person learning. Three months later, he reversed the decision as COVID cases spiked. “It was the wrong decision and the one I regret the most,” reflects DiStefano four years later. “We learned a lot from our mistakes during that time.”

It is a reminder that leadership carries hard lessons, even in the final quarter of a 15-year chancellorship — the longest in CU Boulder history.

DiStefano will draw upon those lessons to uplift future leaders in his new role as senior executive director at the Center for Leadership, a multidisciplinary program preparing tomorrow’s leaders to address complex issues. This July, he returns to the School of Education faculty where he began his CU career in 1974.

“What I want to be remembered for is that the decisions I made were always in the best interests of the university, never personal,” DiStefano says. “I want the campus to be better than when I started — high-quality education for students, research improving the lives of more people, and creating a better world through our teaching, research and service.”

Chancellor Phil DiStefano has spent 50 years on campus; Here’s what he’s seen over the years.

1974: DiStefano joins CU Boulder as assistant professor in the School of Education, embarking on his 50-year career on campus.
1976: CU Boulder establishes the nation's first student-led campus recycling program, foretelling CU's national leadership in sustainability.
1986: DiStefano begins his 10-year appointment as dean of the School of Education. He later became the campus’s first provost and executive vice chancellor.
2008: Folsom Field becomes first zero-waste football stadium, igniting a nationwide stadium sustainability trend.
2009: DiStefano appointed chancellor on May 5, the beginning of a 15-year tenure as the campus’s longest-serving chancellor.
2012: CU wins fifth Nobel Prize, all in a 23-year stretch: four in physics, one in chemistry.
2013: Historic flood closes campus and roads: 515 people evacuated, 120 buildings damaged, rare art collections and valuable research saved.
2016: CU Boulder Tuition Guarantee launches, allowing students and families to accurately predict the total, four-year cost of attendance.
2021: Annexation of CU Boulder South to protect lives and property through flood mitigation, creating newly designated open space and providing new housing to relieve pressure on the Boulder community.
2023: Groundbreaking of an on-campus conference center and hotel, the result of years of collaboration between the city and university to strengthen the campus-community connection.
Today: Record-high retention and graduation rates, donor and research funding; largest and most diverse incoming class.