At our in-person meeting on October 18, Amy Parsons, the new President of Colorado State University, gave us an overview of her history at CSU and some of her vision/plans for the future of the university. Although she spent much of her childhood living in Cheyenne, she received her bachelor’s degree (political science with recently-deceased club member Bob Lawrence as her mentor) from CSU and her Juris Doctorate from the University of Colorado. She has served in numerous high-level administrative positions at CSU, including Vice Chancellor of the CSU system. These positions were bookended by her positions as a litigation attorney for a Denver law firm (1999 – 2004) and as CEO of Mozzafiato, LLC (2020 – 2022). Currently one of her daughters is a sophomore at CSU.
In her current position leading CSU, she is focused on development of students. To set the stage for that focus, she is in the process of hiring a staff team including a new provost and several VPs. That process is near completion. She commented on the scale of the events of the last three weeks, the early part of the Fall Semester. Although those events included homecoming (with a thrilling football victory) and a large on-campus concert (some 12,000 attendees), the most important, at least from the point of view of communicating her vision for the future of the school, was her installation. In her presentation at that event, she focused on aspects of the university that reflect current student success and provide a framework for continued and improved success. The new class that just started is the most diverse in CSU history, with the highest number of racially minoritized and first-generation students ever. The level of retention of students from one year to the next and the percentage of incoming students who ultimately graduate has been continuously increasing. CSU is a research university with a focus on both academics and research. The university currently enjoys the highest level of research expenditures which testifies to the quality of the research being done and generates a high reputational impact. The vet school is currently #2 in the country and the coming expansion of the school will probably push it to #1. The Atmospheric Science program is currently #1 in the country. One of her areas of focus will be on institutional competitiveness, working on pay, especially for junior/young faculty, and work environment. She also wants to focus on rural Colorado with outreach to rural communities, creating a pipeline for students to CSU and assuring rural students that they are welcome at CSU. Partly this will be achieved by increased rural extension and assistance to local 4H Clubs.
President Parsons discussed for a long time the role of CSU in democracy, not only in the past (the Land Grant schools were authorized some 153 years ago to make higher education accessible to all, not just the rich and well-connected). That goal is as important today as it was then, the school takes that Land-Grant mission seriously, and the school is getting better at it. She is instituting a “Thematic Year of Democracy”, part of which will focus on learning to disagree respectfully and to find common ground for moving forward. This will include bringing Republican and Democratic governors to campus for debate. This whole program will be open to the public. Focusing on next year’s election, she wants the university to get students motivated to register and vote. And she wants the university to continue to improve its relations with the surrounding town – “town and gown” working together.
She concluded by returning to the sports programs, emphasizing that there should be no more late-night football games this year, men’s and women’s basketball starts soon, and the womens’ volleyball and soccer teams are still in season.
Questions:
Would President Parsons express a wish-list for her ideal team to lead the university forward? She is looking to hire for a decade of vision, looking for great skills and potential for personal and university growth.
A plug for our Rotary Club fellowship meetings led President Parsons to talk about the exciting development of creation of a $150 million laser building at the foothills campus for research on short-pulse lasers with a focus on potential nuclear fusion applications. This is leading to some exciting interaction and cooperation with private companies.
There was a comment about the danger of academic silos vs. interdisciplinary discussions and integration. She commented that she expected the new provost and at least one of the new VPs to focus on that issue. She specifically commented on fund raising without silos as well as the impact on students of this cooperation.
How much impact has the Covid disconnect had on students and faculty? Her experience both with her own two kids and with the students and staff is that most, although familiar with and appreciative of remote learning, are ready to go back to face-to-face. Some of the students are a little less prepared so some remedial education will probably be necessary.
What about the thought that a college degree may not be worth it? Research shows that, on average, a degree is beneficial to life, financial success, and social satisfaction. Half of the students who graduate from CSU have no academic debt. Those with debt are generally in the $20,000 to $30,000 range, which is generally worth it.
Any thoughts on the level of financial support from the state resulting in a focus on getting out-of-state and foreign students who pay full freight? She didn’t have any good answer for that. Colorado is 49th in the country on that statistic. She is looking hopefully to the future. The student government is hiring a lobby team to address the legislature on this subject.
She is engaged in a lot of management by wandering around; she is at virtually every event on campus. What has she learned from that? She focused on conversations with CSU alums back on campus for events and the generational impact of the school. She commented on one family that she met in which 100 members of the family are CSU alumni.