For Faculty & Staff: A New Strategic Plan for CU Denver

Sent: June 17, 2021

Dear Colleagues,

When we first met last year, you told me that you are ready to build on our momentum and shape the future of CU Denver, this place we all love. This afternoon, I was honored to represent our collective voice when I presented our new strategic plan to the CU Board of Regents. Now I want to take a moment to thank you, because this plan would not exist without you.

It represents the work since January of 3,000 members of our community: faculty, staff, students, alumni, and friends. I challenged you to dream big and imagine a future that capitalized upon CU Denver’s strengths to differentiate our university in pursuit of a brighter world, and you did just that—all in the middle of a pandemic. We started by defining, together, our vision for 2030, as well as our purpose and values. Next, our steering committee and vision teams of 130 people channeled the very best ideas from our community to develop a set of goals and strategies for achieving our ambitions, which we tested and refined further with the community. My heartfelt thanks goes to Dean Marty Dunn for his stellar leading of the process for us.

The end result is a bold and visionary plan that capitalizes on our strengths to reimagine the role of our urban public research university to work for all: learners from all backgrounds and at all stages of life, industries and employers that need talent ready to hit the ground running, and communities requiring new solutions and discoveries. We’ll rely on the plan to tell the world who we are and where we’re headed in the long run, and to adjust our planning and investments accordingly.

Having created our vision and goals, in August we’ll be holding a series of planning meetings as we shift to the implementation phase. In the fall semester we’ll hold an event—in person!—to commemorate our new direction and begin working toward our future as a Lynx community. A nicely designed report, website, and supporting materials will come with the formal rollout of the plan in August. Be on the lookout for more information later in the summer.

I can’t wait to work with you to bring our collective vision to life.

Michelle Marks
Chancellor
@MarksMichelleA