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In their March meeting, the Boulder Faculty Assembly (BFA)��heard an update about the Chancellor’s Faculty Salary Task Force’s��. Provost Ann Stevens returned to the April 2 BFA meeting to discuss what the Office of the Provost is doing to address that report.

The Chancellor’s Faculty Salary Task Force began their work in spring 2025 in response to existing BFA concerns that �鶹��Ѱ�����Boulder’s pay for tenured and tenure-track faculty lagged behind that of peer public institutions. Their final report recommended, among other actions, that the university work to remedy that lag.

“I take the task force report as a sign of a very healthy collaboration between shared governance and leadership. That makes all of our work easier when we work together,” Stevens remarked.

Much of the work to address those recommendations is already underway, Stevens said, including:

• A proposed campus investment of $6 million over the next three years to address salary competitiveness of tenured and tenure-track faculty with the intention that schools and colleges will match, totaling up to a $12 million investment in faculty salaries
• Hiring a director of faculty compensation in the Office of the Provost who will provide advice, training and support to deans, associate deans and chairs in competitive hiring, compression and equity issues
• Giving all schools and college leaders, including deans, associate deans and chairs, access to �鶹��Ѱ�����Boulder’s AAU faculty salary comparison dashboard
• Developing a faculty retention dashboard to track retention actions taken by the units

“Over a few years, I think we’ll make progress on all of these (recommendations) and be in a better place,” said Stevens.

Stevens also emphasized to the group that the report made clear that �鶹��Ѱ�����Boulder is not compensating outstanding faculty at a level consistent with its AAU public peer universities. Stevens’s written response to the report will be available soon and posted on the Academic Affairs website.��

During her talk, Stevens also encouraged faculty to attend commencement and��one of the upcoming visioning sessions for �鶹��Ѱ�����Boulder Online, and addressed two resolutions related to collective bargaining, voted on after the meeting. Stevens said, as a member of campus leadership, she’s agnostic on collective bargaining, but she applauds the effort to establish a task force to look into how collective bargaining might interact with shared governance.

“I hope that that (task force) will give us some really clear guidance and fact finding, much like the salary task force, so that we can all make better, informed decisions,” said Stevens.

She encouraged any potential task force that may arise to rely on the work already accomplished thanks to the faculty salary task force, including��a page on the HR website that outlines what the university has already accomplished in recent years related to compensation.

Faculty Report of Professional Activities (FRPA) update

Marin Stanek, vice chancellor for IT, updated the BFA on work in progress by the Office of Faculty Affairs and the Office of Information Technology to replace �鶹��Ѱ�����Boulder’s existing FRPA software. This long process has involved extensive campuswide outreach and a request for proposal (RFP) process that has now resulted in eight promising proposals for new software.

The group is now systematically reviewing the options and has held demo sessions to get faculty feedback. Stanek said the process is on track to roll out a pilot of the new software in the fall 2026 semester, with a full campuswide rollout scheduled for fall 2027.

“No institution has the secret sauce for having this (faculty reporting process) be where faculty love it and it’s really easy or automated. In a way, it’s one of those activities that is a necessary evil that happens,” Stanek said. “We just strongly believe that we can make it much better than it is today, and so that’s what our commitment is.”

In other BFA action

• The BFA voted to approve two different resolutions introduced during the March meeting related to collective bargaining: one calling for a BFA Collective Bargaining Task Force, which would examine the relationship between collective bargaining and shared governance and another in support of collective bargaining, introduced in response to the Board of Regents’ call for faculty feedback regarding a potential expansion of collective bargaining rights to university faculty, staff and student workers.
• The BFA also voted to approve a motion to add more seats to the assembly for the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information after the recent merger with environmental design.��
• The assembly tabled a resolution to postpone the rollout of ChatGPT on campus after the resolution was revised in response to the university’s recent delay for the student version.
• Three different notices of motion were also introduced: an update of the faculty affairs committee charge, a recommendation to establish generative AI-use guidelines and resources, and a change to the BFA bylaws and standing rules.
• The BFA is holding a special assembly meeting on April 16 to discuss AI on campus. The meeting will be hybrid, with an in-person option in the Law School Wittemyer Courtroom, and is open to all members of the faculty senate.
• Faculty are encouraged to attend the��BFA Excellence Awards ceremony on April 7.

Learn more about the BFA and previous actions on��the BFA website.