Oct. 24, 2017
How can CU Boulder engage more completely with communities?
This is the subject of three upcoming sessions offered through Academic Futures: Rethinking the university – the futures of learning and discovery, a campus conversation that is focused on listening to the interests and concerns of faculty, staff and students to make sure that CU Boulder’s central mission—teaching and learning, discovery and creation—shapes the campus’ collective efforts.
Emily CoBabe-Ammann, director of strategic projects for the Research and Innovation Office and facilitator of Academic Futures campus conversations, will moderate the sessions titled CU and the Community: How do we engage more completely? Faculty, staff and students are invited to these sessions:
Wednesday, Oct. 25 from 12 to 1:45 p.m. – Room 4-5, University Club
Wednesday, Nov. 1 from 12 to 1:45 p.m – Room 4-5, University Club
Thursday, Nov. 2 from 12 to 2:00 p.m. – Clark Conference Room, Engineering Administration (ECAD 150)
These three sessions will build on the work of the campus’ civic action planning group, composed of deans and representatives from the CU Boulder Faculty Assembly, the Office for Outreach and Engagement, and CU Engage. For the past year, the group has focused on fully understanding the scope of campuswide civic work and identifying strategies to highlight and broaden its impact.
Further dialogues on civic engagement are planned for 2018 and will be facilitated by CU Dialogues, a program housed in CU Engage. These will extend the themes generated during the Academic Futures discussions, focusing in particular on how CU Boulder can broaden its commitment to civic engagement and recommend concrete ways to support and publicize exemplary civic work.
CU Boulder’s effort to examine its role in supporting the health of our democracy through educating effective leaders, nurturing a civic culture and supporting intelligent political debate is being done in connection with Campus Compact, a coalition of more than 1,100 colleges and universities. Campus Compact was founded in 1985 by university presidents and education policy leaders who were concerned about the ongoing health and strength of democracy in the United States.
In August 2016, Chancellor Phil DiStefano signed the coalition’s 30th Anniversary Action Statement of Presidents and Chancellors, which recommitted the campus to the public purposes of higher education and sought to create a concrete civic action plan.
Started in September, the Academic Futures conversations seek to identify and to prioritize key themes and to put forth more specific projects and action items for the campus to consider as it seeks to carry out strategic imperatives: shaping tomorrow’s leaders, positively impacting humanity and being the top university for innovation.
Topics have included comprehensive campus-level approaches to distance learning, interdisciplinary education, the role of arts and humanities, inclusive excellence and more.