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Delivered Feb. 10, 2026

In the midst of the Cold War, President John F. Kennedy recorded a message for the opening of a new short wave radio transmission facility.

The powerful facility was a major technological advancement, allowing the U.S. to occasionally reach listeners behind the Iron Curtain.

In his remarks, Kennedy offered a powerful endorsement of optimism and resolve in the face of an unknown future — a case for looking forward with hope and self-reliance.

“A man may die,” he said. “Nations may rise and fall. But an idea lives on. Ideas have endurance without death.”

63 years and two days after that broadcast, Kennedy’s words remind us of the powerful impact of a potent idea.

2,500 years ago, the Greeks theorized that democracy, or “rule by the people,” could be an effective and equitable form of governance.

For millennia, humans around the globe dreamt of flying — across land, across oceans, to the moon and beyond — and then made it happen.

We imagined we could prevent and cure disease, and then developed the tools, methods and practices to observe and treat the microscopic worlds inside our bodies.

In developments that would have astounded Kennedy’s contemporaries, we combined our understanding of sound and technology to make music fully portable, bringing cultures together.

As we navigate today’s challenges, our ability to generate ideas will allow us to endure and prevail.

Good morning! Thank you for being here.

The University of Colorado celebrates its 150th year in 2026. Each of you here today is helping to build and sustain the legacy of this great university through your teaching, your learning, your research, your creative work, outreach and service.

Thank you for sharing your ideas and energy in support of our amazing campus mission.

Thank you my friend Dr. Reiland Rabaka, also known as Professor Hip Hop, for your kind introduction;

And thank you to Staff Council Tri-Chairs Crystal Cyr and Leah McDaniel Parvez for doing the emcee’ing today;

And thank you to our awesome Tri-Executives, Gianna Guido, John Masulit and Camden Sharkey, for grounding us in our Land Acknowledgement and for your constant reminder of why we are here.

Weren’t they amazing?

I also want to recognize ���� President Todd Saliman, his outstanding leadership team, as well as our Board of Regents, for their enduring commitment to our university and to the people of Colorado.

And please also join me in welcoming the new campus leaders who have joined us since the last State of the Campus address. Please rise to be recognized when I call your name:

Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Ann Stevens

Senior Vice Chancellor for Operations Janel Forde

Our wonderful new Police Chief Ashley Griffin

Next to her, the newest of our Buff leadership, Athletic Director Fernando Lovo

and Vice Chancellor and Managing Associate University Counsel Esther Henry.

And the ones who I suspect may be the most popular. You may have seen our newest police dogs, Harlo and Dax! Hard at work and being friendly out in the hall.

So, it was around the 1950s, when public and philanthropic investment in universities was beginning a forward march that would last for decades, expanding access while powering America’s economy, innovation and our global competitiveness.

Universities across the United States became the destination of choice for students from around the globe, bringing together individuals to create, nurture, debate and disseminate ideas.

With unyielding devotion to free speech and academic freedom — commitments that remain alive today at С���� Boulder – universities began to drive progress in ways that no other enterprise could.

Today, higher education is in flux, and at times, even under attack. We are witnessing dramatic evolutions in student expectations, U.S. demographics, geopolitics, artificial intelligence, political pressures, and the business of athletics.

Perhaps most concerning is an erosion of public trust.

This past year has created instability for many institutions receiving federal funding. I remain deeply sympathetic to the hardworking researchers whose grants were paused or terminated, and to those whose work, and whose identities, have been downplayed or denigrated.

This is not the first time that higher ed has faced shifting landscapes. But the speed and scope of uncertainty this past year has truly felt overwhelming.

As a result, many of our peer institutions are slowing their new initiatives or displaying an uncharacteristic hesitancy. Some of them remain uncertain on how or whether to evolve.

Yet, while we all understand the challenging situations in the U.S. and around the globe, I firmly believe that today is our chance not to pause, but to evolve from within.

To evaluate our strengths, to define our future, and leap ahead of our peers.

So today, I’m asking you for your ideas to help shape our vision for our future.

So where do we begin?

In times of tension, we can find commonality in our shared values. Toward that end, we launched a grassroots effort to define and articulate our campus values. I wanted to thank all of you who have already participated. This process will continue in the coming months before we formalize our shared values this spring, anchoring our strategies for the coming years.

Another key element of understanding who we are is celebrating, reflecting on, and reckoning with our past.

Throughout our 150th year, we will recognize and honor those who shaped us through events, memorials and film.

And as we think about Buffs who deserve the spotlight, we recognize that, too often, we have neglected many of our communities and ignored valuable perspectives. We want to uncover the forgotten people and truths of our past — and I truly hope all of you will join us in that effort.

Advancing diversity and equity, and inclusion remain core institutional priorities. We must be intentional about creating a campus culture where our differences — across languages, across foods, across music, culture and ideas — are embraced and celebrated — every day, in every corner of our campus.

So guided by our past, rooted in our shared values and mission, and with an appreciation for one another, we are focused now on our future.

At last year’s State of the Campus, I announced four areas of focus, which have been further refined this year through conversations across our campus.

Of course we begin with our people. We are committed to fostering the success of all students, all faculty and all staff.

I don’t mean success in generic terms. I want the absolute best … for Leah and for Crystal. For Reiland. For Giana, John and Camden. And for all of you.

I care about our collective success, and I care about your individual well-being.

So how do we measure the success of our students? In the fall, we were excited to announce record undergraduate retention for the second year in a row, while our six-year graduation rate again rose slightly, to 74.3%.

We should be proud of our progress, yet we also know we have more to do.

In the next phase of our student success work, we will expand high-impact initiatives that improve retention and graduation rates and enhance the student experience, because student success is much more than obtaining a degree.

In spring 2023, ���� Boulder approved a new Common Curriculum focused on sustainable futures; a set of shared themes, skills and outcomes to be woven into the education of all undergraduate students, regardless of major.

The time has come now to launch this curriculum.

We must also improve the wraparound support for students, beginning the moment they become Buffs, helping connect our academics to student curiosities, interests, and careers.

We plan on expanding access to First-Year Seminars, career development, global learning, and digital portfolios, and more.

I’m also calling on all of the colleges and schools to engage and hold themselves accountable for a seamless experience as students pursue their degrees in their second year and beyond — because retention isn’t finished after year one.

We know that living on or close to campus is another key driver of student success, as it allows students to build peer-relationships and engage in activities that help them feel belonging.

I am really proud to share that we are making plans to offer a first-year Residential Learning Community experiences to all incoming undergraduate students — at no extra charge — as soon as fall of 2027.

Through a public-private partnership, we are also moving forward with a new student housing project on Colorado Avenue, right across the street from campus. This creative solution will house at least 1,650 students without financing or funding from ���� Boulder. We look forward to a fall 2028 opening of the first phase.

We are also investing in modernizing the toolsets that support our students. We are launching a new degree audit platform that will allow students to self-check their academic progress which will free up advisors’ time for more in-depth and substantive academic planning.

And soon, a new Constituent Relationship Management system, or CRM, will help students plug into co-curricular experiences more easily, enhance their access to information, and help us track which programs are most effective at closing gaps in retention and graduation. I appreciate the so many voices from our faculty and staff whose ongoing contributions are critical to the success of this initiative.

And the success of our graduate students is equally important.

Building on a successful grant from the Sloan Centers for Systemic Change, additional funding will now allow the Graduate School to launch the Sloan Scholars program to recruit and support promising doctoral students in STEM.

This grant will also support systemic changes to the graduate student experience at ���� Boulder, improving the lives of students all across our university.

We are also continuing to emphasize the mental and emotional health of students through our Student Flourishing Initiative. This initiative has been intentional about drawing ideas from students themselves and from almost every unit on campus, as well as external experts like the JED Foundation.

The group is developing recommendations for how we can best help students thrive and determining how to measure the efficacy of our efforts. We aim to be the national leaders in student wellness.

We also must be honest about the financial well-being of our students and families, understanding that far too often, the financial obstacle is not tuition but housing, food, transportation. We have begun approaching donors not only for traditional scholarship gifts, but for gifts to support student housing, meal plans and the things that make attendance possible.

���� Boulder will also continue to support the Basic Needs Center, which last year served nearly 2000 students with food, housing placements, emergency funds and other essential resources. I am so grateful to our Tri-Executives for their commitment and support of the center, and the generous financial contribution from the ���� System, which was matched by my office. And truly grateful for all the hard working staff and volunteers at the Basic Needs Center. They deserve our appreciation and a round of applause.

I am confident that we all have a shared belief that no ���� Boulder student, employee or family member should lack the most basic resources.

And while ���� Boulder exists to serve our students, we also care deeply about the success and retention of our staff and faculty.
The results from the recent Faculty and Staff Engagement Survey highlighted a clear desire for stronger support of well-being. So we established the Division of Employee Health and Well-Being to help faculty and staff thrive personally and professionally.

Our aim is simply to serve every employee, regardless of job title, regardless of type, regardless of unit.

I am so appreciative of the leadership of Associate Vice Chancellor Jess Doty, she doesn’t know I’m going to do this, but make her stand up. Where is she? I know she’s here. Jess and her incredible team have launched a new Well-being Innovators Network to champion wellness initiatives. They’ve also developed С���� Recharge, a new, inclusive program offering strength‑training sessions through the EGYM fitness hub. The technology in the EGYM fitness hub is the first of its kind in the United States.

And Jess and her team aren’t done yet. In the coming months, we will be expanding mental health services to include couples’ and family therapy, health coaching and a mental health cohort series.

We will be launching financial wellness initiatives, planning new events and meetups to improve employees’ sense of belonging, and deepening our public health and campus safety offerings,

Investing these resources is the start. Making it easier to integrate well-being into our workday and life is truly a team effort. I expect all of our supervisors, including myself, to create a culture of care and well-being by creating space for everyone to use the services and resources we’ve provided. Together we will establish С���� Boulder as an employer of choice where faculty and staff experience holistic support.

Meanwhile, in this past year campus leaders have worked closely with the Boulder Faculty Assembly on a Faculty Salary Task Force, illustrating shared governance at its best. The task force issued recommendations to improve the competitiveness of faculty salaries, address serious salary compression, and increase the transparency and effectiveness of our promotion, tenure and retention processes. We are currently prioritizing the recommendations and we are going to announce the next steps soon.

In another great example of shared governance at work, I am excited to announce the launch of four new ���� Boulder Community Belonging Awards. This was Initiated by ���� Student Government and endorsed by all our shared governance groups, these awards will recognize exceptional individuals who are fostering belonging within and across our campus. Thank you to our shared governance for bringing this idea forward.

At ���� Boulder we support our people as individuals, and we also support what everyone does to meet our mission.

С���� Boulder again celebrated a super strong year of impactful research and creative work across the entire campus — earning more research funding in 2025 than any previous year.

The recognition and visibility of innovative Buffs is also important.

One week from today, mark your calendars, Professor Dan Doak of Environmental Sciences will deliver С���� Boulder’s 127th Distinguished Research Lecture, presenting his work of over 30 years on rare species conservation. Many species of conservation concern, including condors, spotted owls, and Rocky Mountain plants have benefited from the amazing work of Professor Doak and his collaborators.

Our faculty are also focused on the survival of democracy and higher education, recently earning a three-year grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to explore how administrators and humanities faculty can work together to foster free and open conversations about divisive issues and rebuild trust in higher education.

Congratulations to Elias Sacks, Terri Wilson, Jennifer Ho and Michele Moses! I am so excited to see С���� Boulder leading in this critical area — it’s a strength for our campus and a critical area of focus and need across American society.

The development of new research, scholarly and creative work is worthy of so much recognition on its own merits. But we are also excited to see when our research and creative work translates to discoveries into marketable and impactful products and activities.

We are right now eagerly awaiting the initial public offering of Infleqtion, the quantum technologies brainchild of Professor and JILA Fellow Dana Anderson. It now holds the title of С���� Boulder’s 10th unicorn spinout, which refers to companies valued over $1 billion, with a “B,” dollars.

And entrepreneurship is not the only way we translate our creative work to practice.

Last fall, Governor Jared Polis appointed Colorado Law Professor Margot Kaminski and Associate Professor Vivek Krishnamurthy to the state’s AI Impact Task Force. In addition, Professor Kaminski and adjunct faculty Julia Martinez and Thomas Ward joined the Colorado Supreme Court’s new Legal Technology Advisory Committee, recognizing their pioneering scholarship on law, policy and artificial intelligence.

As artificial intelligence continues to shape our world, it is so clear to me that ���� Buffs will be involved in nearly every aspect of its growth.

So let’s ask ourselves: What would it take to lead the pack?

Can we be the ones to make AI truly sustainable?

Because at ���� Boulder, we not only support our people; we support our planet. We have only just begun and must continue to elevate our focus on sustainability.

Nationally, we will play a leadership role across higher education as the host institution for the new Carnegie Elective Classification for Sustainability. In this role we look forward to evaluating and supporting institutions from across the country and beyond in their own sustainability efforts.

Important work is also happening at the center of our campus community. The new SPIKE Center for Sustainability Education, launched just last summer, has helped cultivate strong student-centered partnerships across ����.

And through the Environmental Center, we are reducing waste by implementing reusable systems in campus dining, expanding access to research equipment through the Green Labs Shared Core, and donating thousands of pieces of lab glassware to local school districts, benefiting more than 4,000 high school students.

Now you may recall last year we eliminated single-use beverage plastics on campus.

Now I’ve set my sights on eliminating all of our diesel buses, replacing them with an all-electric fleet. And we are well on our way with 8 electric buses purchased and only 10 more to go!

Together, these efforts reflect a campus fully engaged in shaping a more just, resilient, and sustainable future. Sustainability at ���� Boulder is a shared commitment, woven into how we teach, how we learn, how we research and how we serve.

Our final campus priority is Aligning Our Resources to Our Mission.

We are on pace right now to have another record-breaking fundraising year thanks to the tremendous and dedicated efforts of our Advancement team working with countless partners across our campus.

Most recently, we formed a new partnership with the Reisher Scholars Program, which provides $4.2 million dollars in scholarships to help more Colorado students complete their degrees in less time and with less debt.

And we have set the stage for expansion and improvement in other key areas, including a new strategy for campuswide outreach efforts, recently bolstered by the receiving of the Carnegie Elective Classification for Community Engagement.

And we are now strengthening those efforts through coordinated action. The newly formed Office of Outreach and Community Engagement will allow clearer processes and more robust support for all of you who want to work directly with the amazing communities across Colorado.

Last month, we began a new partnership with Colorado’s Office of Economic Development and International Trade — OEDIT is the easier way to say it –- to support our communities by preparing them for the transition from coal power to clean energy.

Our Masters of the Environment students Norman Kalen, Peter Landis, Alex Rudawsky and Alec Waz are already contributing to this work as part of a capstone project. This is a great example of how we are supporting Colorado communities and carrying the flag of sustainability!

We have also embarked on a new strategy for global engagement — an effort that must go hand-in-hand with our local, state and national outreach efforts. We are now in the middle of searching for our inaugural Vice Chancellor for Global Affairs to develop our first global strategic plan, strengthen our international student enrollment, expand study-abroad opportunities, and develop strategic international partnerships.

These many examples I’ve mentioned today are just a small portion of the truly outstanding progress happening across our campus. Building on this firm foundation, we have the ability to dream — to consider our next big, audacious ideas that need urgent attention.

How do we graduate every student who enrolls — a 100% graduation rate — or provide on-campus housing for every student who wants it?

What will it take to prevent the next pandemic before it starts, or develop new sources of sustenance to address global hunger?

How can we build the safest, most seamless, most tech-savvy campus on the planet?

Some of the greatest ideas in human history have come from asking unbounded questions.

Let’s be the place where such questions are not merely rhetorical.

As we move into lunch, you will hear from Professors Stefanie Johnson and Waleed Abdalati, who are leading a team charged with developing our campuswide process to gather your Next Big Ideas.

This call for ideas is deliberately broad and open-ended.

I refuse to stifle creativity by providing too many parameters.

What is most important is that these ideas be meaningful, ambitious and sourced from throughout our campus.

Where you sit in the organization does not define whether you will come up with a great idea.

As we consider the future of ���� Boulder, I want each of you to ask yourself:

Will we spend our time and energy reacting to change and clinging to the way things were? Or will ���� Boulder be the place that seizes opportunities for the good of humanity?

So as we gather today, in the midst of Black History Month, two days shy of Abraham Lincoln’s birthday, let’s be guided by the words attributed to him:

“The most reliable way to predict the future … is to create it.”

So let’s create.

Thank you so much.