ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ

April 24, 2024

Dear colleagues,

What an academic year it’s been.

Since we came together in August, CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ has continued to not only bounce back from the challenges of the pandemic but has also emerged as one of the healthiest major public research universities in the U.S. in terms of enrollment, research, scholarship and creative work, and in confronting the realities faced by higher education. Specifically, within our academic mission this year, we have achieved the following:

• Continued to set first-year retention rate records. Second-fall retention, which measures students retained from their first to their second fall term, hit 89.1% in 2023 for the fall 2022 entry first-year cohort. The previous record was 87.8% set by the fall 2021 cohort. Third-fall retention is at an all-time high of 81.7% set by the fall 2021 entry cohort, besting the previous high of 81.3% set by the fall 2017 and 2020 cohorts. We capped this off with a record for our six-year graduation rate of 74.9% for the fall 2017 entry cohort, surpassing 74.7% achieved by the fall 2016 cohort.
• Saw a 7.3% increase in our resident first-year students in fall 2023—from fall 2022—to 4,035 students.
• Continued multi-year trends in diversity. The fall 2023 resident first-year cohort set all-time highs in the number of students identifying as Black or African American (172 students), American Indian or Alaska Native (72 students) and Asian American (588 students). While these data are encouraging, we need to continue to make great improvements in these areas.
• Announced an all-time record for sponsored research of $684.2 million for fiscal year 2022–23—a 4% increase over the prior year—with about 71% of that funding coming from federal agencies including NASA, the National Science Foundation, the Department of Commerce, the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Defense and the Department of Energy.
• Began the renovation of the Hellems building, which houses the English, history, linguistics and philosophy departments, as well as the Anderson Language and Technology Center (ALTEC) and the Colorado Shakespeare Festival. Four out of every five students have taken or will take a course in Hellems during their time at CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ.
• Announced in March a new effort aimed at transformation and fiscal resilience to position CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ to operate more holistically and strategically to support student success over the near and longer-term horizons.
• Welcomed late last week the new CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ Chancellor Justin Schwartz. I want to thank the CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ faculty, staff and students who served on , as well as our community members who turned out for campus visits. I am impressed with Justin’s vision, experience and leadership, and I’m looking forward to working closely with him to shape our academic mission.

These are but a few of the collective achievements of our faculty, staff and campus community. Each of them represents untold hours of teamwork, individual effort, coordination and alignment, and innovation. These achievements also took courage and commitment in a time when higher education is undergoing a crisis of public confidence—finding itself bracketed by our nation’s ongoing culture wars, resource and funding challenges, and the challenges of international events.

Against that backdrop, you have engaged in your work amid your deep commitments to family, community and to your own mental health. For the precious time you’ve devoted to our academic mission, you have my heartfelt thanks. As our academic year draws to a close and commencement approaches, please continue to take good care of yourselves, your families and your colleagues, and know that you have my eternal gratitude—and that of our entire community—for the myriad ways you make the ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ the amazing place that it is.

Warmly,

Russ

Russell Moore
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