CU Boulder and the (APLU) announced last month that the university is among eight universities selected to participate in an APLU initiative aimed at attracting, retaining and supporting faculty while addressing historical barriers to their success.
“We are honored to be a part of APLU’s Aspire Institutional Change Network,” said Provost Russell Moore. “Our goal is, within the next decade, to be known as the place where underrepresented STEM faculty want to build their careers because of our affirming, supportive environment.”
What it is
The Aspire Alliance Institutional Change Initiative, part of the National Science Foundation Eddie Bernice Johnson , focuses on helping campuses identify growth opportunities around faculty recruitment, hiring, retention and culture, and developing action plans to achieve that growth.
Why it matters
While CU Boulder has made strides in recruiting Underrepresented Group (URG) STEM faculty in recent years, data from CU Boulder’s Institutional Research Office show the university has room to improve its retention rates among these faculty.
How we’re doing it
CU Boulder’s focus is to retain our URG STEM faculty by:Ěý
- Examining our current approach toward URG STEM faculty retention and developing better mechanisms to raise their retention rate until we meet or exceed the retention rate for non-URG faculty, consistent with our campus goals and the CU system strategic plan
- Working with department chairs on faculty recruitment and retention as part of fostering a positive departmental and institutional culture and environment
- Assessing data structures to better identify what data we should be collecting to better understand our retention challenge
- Learning from the best practices of our fellow APLU cohort members
“This effort will be in partnership with the leadership of the College of Arts and Sciences, the leadership of the College of Engineering and Applied Science, the Research and Innovation Office, and the Office of Institutional Research,” said Michele Moses, vice provost for faculty affairs. “We hope that creating the campus conditions to better understand and support our STEM faculty will help us retain these key faculty and at the same time be a turning point in improving the experience for all URG faculty at CU Boulder.”ĚýĚý
State of play
The APLU participation builds upon ongoing efforts of the provost’s office to hire diverse faculty members who meet critical teaching and research needs.Ěý
- The provost has committed to providing a minimum of $1 million per year for additional tenure-track lines over the next three years.Ěý
- Hiring guidelines have been revamped to promote equitable access to faculty positions and to advance effective and inclusive faculty search and hiring processes.Ěý
- Overall we are seeing meaningful progress: the College of Engineering and Applied Science has conducted 3 college-wide searches, which resulted in 10 new URG faculty.Ěý
What’s next
We will begin efforts immediately.
Your involvement is key: CU Boulder is participating in the APLU Aspire Institutional Change Network via a partnership with the leadership of the College of Arts and Sciences, the leadership of the College of Engineering and Applied Science, the Research and Innovation Office, and the Office of Institutional Research. Other partners—the Office of the Senior Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and the Graduate School—will continue to be updated on our progress.
Join the club
CU Boulder is one of eight universities joining the Aspire Alliance this fall and is the first from Colorado to do so. There are 54 universities already involved in the alliance, and our working group will collaborate and share with other campuses in the region involved to develop and implement our action plan.
“These institutions are laser-focused on supporting faculty so they can advance the public interest through their education, research and engagement missions,” said Howard Gobstein, senior vice president for STEM education and research policy and director of Aspire Alliance.
