CU Connections

Dear Members of the University of Colorado Community, As we approach the end of the academic year and commencement, I want to thank each of you for all your efforts. Even though we face fiscal challenges, your dedication and hard work allow CU to continue to provide a high-quality education for our students and substantial [...]

I am writing to congratulate Dr. (Alexander) Bracken on his new assignment as the Quigg and Virginia S. Newton Endowed Chair in Leadership (CU Connections, Feb. 2). Dr. Bracken was “Sandy” to me as a young employee at Anderson College, now Anderson University in 1978. It was a pleasure to work with him, even for a [...]

Many people believe perception is reality. If that is the case, then Chancellor Phil DiStefano and the CU administration didn’t do itself or CU employees any good by not being transparent in regards to administrative rehires or pay raises. Several of the retired administrators who were rehired are good friends of mine and I believe [...]

Dear “Leadership” of the University of Colorado-Boulder, I do not disagree with the philosophy that in order to retain good employees that care about the greater good of the institution you need to pay them a fair wage. What I have a problem with is the fact that instead of giving a non-base-building bonus to [...]

I write to affirm the point made by the author of the Feb. 16 letter “Salary talk detracts from greater budget concern.” The author correctly notes that rather than blaming salary, “you actually should blame every person who says ‘taxes for education are a burden,’ rather than ‘taxes for education are an investment in the [...]

The Letter to the editor (CU Connections, Feb. 9) complaining about administrator raises misses a much larger and more important point than it makes. Yes, the Boulder chancellor now makes $389,000 per year. The chancellor also runs an organization with 14,700 employees, with an annual budget of $580 million. In the private sector he would [...]

The CU Connections news story “Tuition benefit likely to be expanded in April” (Feb. 2) discusses how an expansion of the tuition waiver benefit for CU employees is “on track.” It outlines how the “expansion” will permit employees to transfer their nine-credit tuition waiver benefit to their dependent child, spouse or domestic partner. A fact [...]

The powers that be have given themselves some hefty raises and have left the rest of us lowly workers out in the cold. I wonder where the value of ethics comes into play here? We are asked time and time again to do more with less, a cut here a cut there, but don’t cut [...]

Dear President Benson: I read the article in the Daily Camera in which you defended the raises awarded to the top administrators at CU. I’ve been an employee of the university for 10 years now. My take-home pay is currently $400 less than it was four years ago. The 3 percent one-time non-base-building “raise” I received last year [...]

While I am in favor of a wellness approach to health insurance (a healthy population is cheaper to insure), CU’s Wellness Initiative, highlighted in the Dec. 22, 2011, issue of CU Connections, raises concerns. While the role of UBAB is undergoing clarification, I have never felt that input about our medical plans has been invited [...]