College of Music Strategic Plan
UPDATE: SEPTEMBER, 2008
PREFACE
The College of Music at CU-Boulder is a community of faculty, staff, and students
committed to excellence in music. By the very nature of the discipline, excellence is best
achieved by developing one’s talent and ability through disciplined work, intense
concentration, attention to detail, and by placing determination in the service of passion and
dedication. The reward is intrinsic to the creative, interpretive, and research processes; the
goals are to develop the highest possible level of artistry in performance, creativity and
composition, and achievement in scholarly research. College aspirations and achievements
over time have been recognized nationally. In fact, as long as US News and World Reports
was engaged in a rating system for music in higher education, CU ranked in the top twenty.
In the 2008-09 Fiske “Guide to Colleges and Schools,” CU is recognized among a handful of
institutions for having a notably strong program in music (it does not rate programs in any
numerical order).
In fostering a community of excellence, the College faculty places a high value on respectful
and open communications, collaboration, and teamwork. This attitude is reflected in the way
we work together to appoint new faculty and ensure that they are provided the resources and
opportunities to flourish. It is reflected in the enthusiasm with which we recruit gifted
students, and then, in partnership with them, help them reach their utmost potential,
providing individualized instruction and intensive studies aimed at ensuring access to the
broadest possible range of subjects.
The College of Music seeks to celebrate its diversity: of ethnicity, race, gender, and
backgrounds, every bit as much as we embrace a diversity of ideas, teaching strategies and
philosophies, a diversity of scholarly research and creative activity, and a diversity of
performance interpretations, styles, and genres. Our mission statement and our programs
commit us to excellence in a climate of open communications and mutual respect; in
particular, we find these values to be interdependent.
As the faculty and key staff together consider the progress the College of Music has made in
the recent past, and the challenges and opportunities that face us going into the future, we
find ourselves at a crossroad in our history. On the one hand, we congratulate ourselves on
accomplishments and progress towards goals set in the recent past. At the same time, we
must take a hard look at where we are, what it will take to get to the next significant level of
excellence, recognize deficiencies, and set an agenda that may need to be aggressive if we
are to meet challenges that stand in the way of our aspirations. With the clear support of the
CU administration, along with our alumni and friends, we believe that ambitious goals are
within reach. Given an appropriate level of administrative, private, and public support, we
can make strides over the next decade that will take the College of Music to new heights.
The College of Music Strategic Plan and its goals for the upcoming Capital Campaign have
been developed mindful of those embedded in Flagship 2030, and at the same time maintains
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congruency with past and ongoing College objectives and aspirations. As we eagerly look
forward to the opportunities that 2030 and the Capital Campaign present, the College of
Music embraces the following goals:
I. Facilities.
In 2006-2007, two teams of external evaluators, one associated with a National
Association of Schools of Music reaccreditation review, the other with an internal
campus review, independently of one another, confirmed what the faculty, staff, and
students have recognized for many years. The College’s single greatest barrier to
progress is lack of appropriate facilities for teaching and learning, and for rehearsing and
presenting. Our current inventory of faculty offices, applied studios, practice rooms,
rehearsal facilities, classrooms, concert facilities, and administrative office spaces are
either too small, too few, inadequate acoustically, or all of the above. As a result, the
College has difficulty providing for its current program offerings, let alone advancing
their quality.
A Feasibility Study, already developed and approved by the Boulder Campus Planning
Commission in the spring of 2002, that confirmed these critical needs. The faculty reviewed
this study in light of recent developments and economic realities, and in 2006 adopted the
following plan:
A. The College will seek funding from the private sector and a commitment from the central
administration for a performance facility that will fully accommodate ensemble, solo, and
chamber music performances that reflect the total offerings of the College of Music. As
funding makes feasible, the facility shall also include large and chamber ensemble rehearsal
and practice spaces as well.
B. The College will seek funding from the state to provide for a major renovation and
addition to the Imig Music Building which will address the many other teaching and learning
facilities needs: additional and larger practice rooms, classrooms, graduate student and
faculty offices and studios, and administrative offices, as well as additional space for the
Howard Waltz Music Library and Grusin Music Hall. There is a critical need for current
facilities in Imig to meet modern acoustical standards, as well as standards for appropriate
size.
C. The nationally recognized American Music Research Center needs additional offices,
display space, and especially archival storage space for the study and preservation of its
constantly growing collections, the source of funds to be private donations
D. The College has a central performance agenda, with over 350 presentations throughout the
year. The Concert Office is currently renovating space that will, on an interim basis (until
such time as the new performance facility is available to accommodate this) serve two
purposes. First, it will make possible the implementation of an integrated box office for all of
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the performing arts on campus, thus providing a better focus and spotlight for CU’s many
performing arts events, and opportunities for cross-marketing and cooperative subscription
ticket sales. Second, by moving the Concert Office facility to a different building, the
College will achieve a modest addition of administrative office space in Imig, which will
allow for more convenient and efficient delivery of student services.
E. Although Macky Auditorium is a lovely and historic venue for concerts, convocations, and
college and departmental commencements the support space is inadequate; especially
problematic is rehearsal, reception, storage space and inadequate upper floor and backstage
restroom facilities. Upgrades are estimated at a cost of $5 to $15 million; source of funds:
private donations.
These goals for facilities are all congruent with goals and objectives for campus interaction
with the community: cooperation, collaboration, and particularly, access, all hallmarks of the
2030 Strategic Plan. They also meets most if not all of the 2030 aspirations for a world-class
education for both graduate and undergraduate students.
II. Student Support
Merit-based financial aid will continue to be a high priority for the College; we recognize
that student support remains a continuing interest of donors, and, given the need, we expect
endowments for students in various programs to continue to accumulate, as the College
responds to the ongoing interests of a sector of its alumni and friends. The “Adopt-A-Student
Scholarship” program will increase its membership and benefits to students, the Band
Department will continue to aggressively seek private funds, with the support of the Athletic
Department and the college administration, for students who participate in the Marching
Band and Pep Bands, and the College will continue to seek additional scholarship funding
from all possible sources, both state and private. In the following priority order, the College
seeks to upgrade its scholarship, fellowship, and TA appointment packages:
A. Graduate merit aid. In the recent past, and in keeping with Flagship 2030 goals, the
College has enhanced current graduate offerings, as well as adding new curricula, in
Collaborative Piano, Jazz Studies, and Music Theory, and has created discrete tracks within
Musicology, adding an emphasis in Ethnomusicology. It is essential that the College find a
way to be more competitive with its scholarships and Graduate Assistantship appointments.
With the latter, the College intends improve the stipends by two to three thousand dollars,
and improve the tuition waivers that accompany them from current levels of 5 or 6 credit
hours to 8 to 9 credit hours per semester. These increases are crucial if we are to ensure that
students make timely progress towards completion of their degrees and allow the College to
be as competitive with financial aid as it is with the quality of its graduate programs. This
goal is congruent with Flagship 2030 goals to increase overall the number of graduate
students campus wide. This can be accomplished with both private and Provost-supported
increases over a five-year period.
B. Undergraduate scholarships. The College seeks to improve its capacity to offer more
and larger scholarship packages, to both resident and non-resident undergraduate students. It
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will be increasingly difficult to maintain a quality cohort of 300 undergraduates unless we are
able to provide a higher level of financial merit aid. Part of this disparity is due to the fact
that other Colorado music programs offer non-resident waivers to gifted students as a matter
of institutional policy; the College of Music, on the other hand, relies on a budget that cannot
compete with such policies. We estimate that an additional $250,000 is necessary to improve
the College’s ability to recruit outstanding undergraduates and assure that we remain
competitive with other high-quality programs both within the state of Colorado and beyond.
The source of funds will primarily be private donations.
III. Faculty Support.
The College has made good progress over the past decade in moving faculty salaries towards
the national average among its AAU peer group in music. In fact, current statistics show that
Assistant Professors are at 102% of the AAU average, Associate Professors are at 98%, and
Professors are at 92% of the AAU average. On the other hand, it is important to recognize
that the College of Music is not average. Furthermore, Boulder has a high cost-of-living
index that outpaces many of its peers, such places as Urbana-Champaign, Illinois;
Bloomington, Indiana; and Tallahassee Florida. Moreover, it is not lost on the faculty that the
College remains behind its peers in arts and humanities departments on the CU-Boulder
campus. The goal is to add at least 2 endowed Chairs and several Faculty Fellowships so that
improvements to the College salary structure will continue.
IV. Enhancement of Core Programs
A. Study Abroad. In keeping with Flagship 2030 goals for international engagement, over
the next five years the College of Music will develop exchange programs with distinguished
Conservatories and Universities in Europe and on the Pacific Rim. These programs will
necessarily be small, but there will be sufficient numbers of them to ensure that all students
have opportunities to engage in an international study experience.
B. Undergraduate Honors Program. The College has established a Freshman Honors
Theory course section; it is time to implement an Honors Program that will carry through
with theoretical, historical, and performance studies throughout the undergraduate career, and
which can result in graduation with College Honors.
C. Entrepreneurship Studies. The College of Music established an Entrepreneurship Center
for Music, which offers courses, clinics and workshops, and career counseling. The College
will seek to embed such experiences and opportunities in its professional undergraduate
degree programs, through required courses, an undergraduate or graduate certificate program,
or both. The faculty shall also explore the feasibility of offering a masters degree in arts
management or entrepreneurship studies with the Leeds School of Business.
D. A Residential Academic Program in Music. As the University continues to work on its
plan to renovate each of the dormitories throughout the campus, the College seeks to
establish a Residential Program that will meet the needs of future music majors. The logical
dorm for housing a music RAP would be Cheyenne-Arapahoe, since that dorm has
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historically been the living quarters of choice for music students, given its proximity to the
Imig Music Building. However, any of the nearby dorms would be suitable for consideration
of such a program.
In consideration of the adoption of this Plan, the Appendix, below, provides information
about the most recent additions to programs and to the faculty.
APPENDIX
I. New Programs
The College has added the following programs in the past five years:
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BA in Music with an emphasis in Musicology or Ethnomusicology;
BM in Jazz Piano
BM in Jazz Studies
MM in Music Theory
MM in Collaborative Piano
DMA in Collaborative Piano
DMA in Jazz Studies
Post-Masters Certificate in String Quartet Performance
Post-Masters Certificate in Opera and Vocal Performance
Post-Masters Certificate in Woodwind Performance
Reinstated Applied Guitar degrees, bachelors through doctorate
II. New Faculty Positions
Over the past five years the College has added the following new faculty positions:
1. Full time Theory Instructor
2. Full time Associate Director of Marching Band (Instructor level)
3. Full time Director for Entrepreneurship Center for Music (shift to state-funded
position approved 2007-08, search underway).
4. Full time TT in Music Education
5. Half-time Instructor in Guitar Performance (Applied Guitar re-instated)
6. Increased Oboe Instructor position to 50% of full time (from 33%)
7. Full time TT in Theory-Composition
8. Full time TT in Collaborative Piano (upgrade of Instructor position)
9. Part-time Instructors added to Ethnomusicology World Ensembles: Mariachi, Japan
Ensemble, African Highlife Ensemble;
III. New staff Positions created in past three years:
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1. Half-time Assistant to the Dean for Student Recruitment and Outreach Coordination
(to be expanded to full time 2009-2010)
2. Full time Development Associate
3 Half-time Events Coordinator (search underway)
4. Half-time Opera Production Assistant (search underway)
5. Half-time Web Coordinator (search to be scheduled shortly)
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