I arrived at CU Boulder, as a recent story in A&S Magazine portrays, as a California dude by way of Penn State University. I came to help transform a little program—then called kinesiology—into a research-centered, world-class integrative physiology department. With the help of dedicated faculty partners, some visionary administrators and a lot of hard work, we did just that.
As I prepare to end my term as provost and welcome my successor, Ann Huff Stevens, next month, I’m struck by all that has been forged before and during my time as provost: new programs, a new college (CMDI) and new buildings, a new and better reputation for our academic mission, and, most importantly, new relationships among our faculty, staff and leaders.
It is these relationships that have been the true driving force behind the success of our mission—its soul and its connective tissue. I am asking each of you to sustain and invest in these relationships—to cultivate them with care, compassion and concern. Â
I further ask that you give your full support to Provost Stevens and Chancellor Schwartz, your deans and your department chairs as they partner with you to take our mission to all new heights of success.
That support is particularly vital at this time. We have to work together if we want to restore public faith in our mission of creating and disseminating new knowledge and transformationally supporting our students. That trust is the linchpin to building the new relationships we’ll need to extend the impact of that mission and to securing the resources that we’ll need to fuel it.
Alongside that support, I’m asking you to reinvest in trust as a guiding value in our mission. We have work to do here in this regard.
We are an institution committed to the search for truth, built on research and anchored in facts. We must remember that we can’t carry out our work in an environment dominated by rumor, premature consensus, assumptions about motives and impatience with each other.
I’ve committed my office to openness and transparency, to partnership and mutual respect, and to teamwork. I know that Provost Stevens will, with your commitment and trust, build on those values, add to them and improve on what we’ve built together during these past 15 years.
I can’t leave without thanking the members of my marvelous cabinet, my valued partners in campus operations, our amazing and incomparable faculty and staff, and the three decades of students I’ve been privileged to teach and mentor. To have been a CU Boulder faculty member is an honor I could not begin to describe here.
And now to the business at hand. To catch up on the work we’re doing together, in this summer edition of the Provost’s Post, check out the great stories, including:
All my best, always.
Russ
Russell Moore
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