Recap: Winter campus update with leadership

President Marlene Tromp kicked off the recent winter town hall by thanking the campus community for their work over the past few years, which has led to highly successful outcomes for Boise State. She cited increased research awards, record enrollment, fundraising and a national recognition for innovation and shared how the university’s leadership team is continually advocating to advance Boise State.

“You are responsible for all of these incredible outcomes,” Tromp said. “I am so proud of all of your work over the past few years. Keep doing the great things you are doing for our state.”

Boise State’s leadership team provided the following additional updates from around campus.

Jeremiah Shinn, Vice President for Student Affairs and Enrollment Management

• Serving every student is at the core of what it means to be a public university. The creation of the Student Connections and Success Center was the result of nearly 10 months of careful research and planning,  – coupled with conversations with campus stakeholders and experts across the nation. Our staff has done  – and will continue to do amazing work as we explore new and innovative ways to help our students be successful. We celebrate the decades of impact that our Gender Equity and Student Equity centers made in the lives of our students, and we embrace this opportunity to focus on the educational mission of the university – to help students get from first year to second year and from second year to graduation. 

• Boise State continues to buck a national trend with our enrollment increases, which is a testament to hard work all over campus – but particularly the work of our admissions and enrollment teams. We are projecting a 4% year-over-year increase in our student body for the spring semester. Students are excited about attending Boise State – and they’re excited about living with us. The new residence hall is being built right in the heart of campus next to the greenbelt. It will ensure that we are able to accommodate every student who wants to live on campus. Living on campus matters because accessing campus resources matter. 
• Our division is committed to making campus easier for our students to navigate and has implemented more than 150 tangible changes, both large and small  – to make things just a little easier for students to be successful on our campus. 

John Buckwalter, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs

• Our goal is to serve every student, and the Student Enrollment and Retention Plan is closing retention gaps for first generation, rural, Hispanic, and low socioeconomic students. Fall 2024 represented Boise State’s largest ever incoming class of Idaho students. In just two years, we have made significant progress toward our goals. Each of us can be mentors of the moment, help a student problem solve, and contribute to the relationship-rich environment that we have and want at Boise State.
• There has been significant progress in modernizing the university’s budget system. Campus committees continue to design and test a model this year and will then seek feedback in April. Fiscal year 2026 will be a shadow model year, with both the existing and new systems operating to allow time for the campus community to adapt. We will continue to update the system as needed with a full launch in FY2027.

Alicia Estey, Chief Financial and Operating Officer and Vice President for Finance and Operations

• Decisions that will impact our budget are before the legislature and governor. The most critical of these include our general fund appropriation and the change in employee compensation, or CEC. In order to maintain a balanced budget, the university must fully fund CEC before considering new investments in strategic initiatives. Because only a third of the university’s salary expense is funded with general funds, the university self-funds the remaining two-thirds of our CEC expense. It is only after our general fund appropriation is set, and the State Board of Education approves our tuition and fee request in April, that we can determine what funding is available for strategic initiatives and decide how to allocate those funds based on university priorities. 
• This year, the university has made significant investments in furtherance of our Blueprint for Success goals including:
  • A $2.7M investment in veteran services, upgrades to our student financial aid system, Student Enrollment and Retention initiatives, and student facing support services. 
  • $1.7M in academic programs and facilities including the Neuroscience program, CS and Biomedical faculty lines, a Norco classroom remodel, as well as additional support for the Math Learning Center and Graduate college.
  • $1.9M in Research and Economic development initiatives
  • $2M to support critical needs in Athletics, and $1M in campus security upgrades.
• Late this spring, Campus Operations will kick off the construction phase of the Capital Renewal Project. This $90M multi-year, state-funded deferred maintenance project will address many of our campus’ most critical infrastructure needs. These projects will impact various buildings as well as pedestrian and bike paths on campus. Thank you for your support as we complete these critical projects, and for your understanding during temporary relocations and detours around campus. For more information about this project, please visit the Projects Hub page on Campus Operations website.  

Nancy Glenn, Vice President for Research and Economic Development

• Our campus has been very busy supporting our Road to R1. Thank you to all who provide research and creative activity opportunities to our students, faculty and staff, or support research and creative activity across campus. Research and creative activity touches all corners of campus and it takes a team to do what we all do so well together.
• In FY25, the university has invested in the Vertically Integrated Projects, VIP, program, which is run through Jim Fredrickson’s group in IFITS. This past fall alone, we had over 150 undergraduate students enrolled in VIPs. I encourage you to reach out to IFITS if you are interested in working with undergraduate or graduate students in a VIP as part of your research program.
• The university has committed to investing over $1M in graduate research assistantships in FY26 and 27 for doctoral programs across campus. This means that programs can recruit students now for next year with these funds. I would like to thank the President’s Office, Budget Office, and the Graduate College along with the graduate program directors for helping make this happen. 
• Investments have been made in the Office of Sponsored Programs to support contracting and post-award. I acknowledge that some of you have experienced contracting delays and we expect to be fully staffed within the next month. OSP is also recruiting an additional Sponsored Projects Administrator in Post-Award. These actions will support award negotiations and setups. These opportunities have been made possible through investments by the university, recognizing that our sponsored projects are becoming more complex. Speaking of enhancing our sophistication in research and creative activity, if you haven’t heard already, the university has newer master agreements with Micron, City of Boise, St. Alphonsus, and ICOM that will facilitate working with these entities.  

Jenn White, Special Counsel for Government Relations, Assistant Vice President for Finance & Operations

Peter Risse, Senior Advisor for Government Relations and Director of University Industry Collaborations

• Our key objective is to secure funding for the institution and to protect its educational mission in the state. That means protecting jobs, student services, academic freedom and free speech among top priorities. We spend time telling our institutional story, and monitoring and educating elected officials about proposed legislation and rules that may impact our ability to provide the incredible education we offer to students in this state. We are lucky to have you all as partners in that process and the university is uniquely positioned among higher education in Idaho in terms of the level of collaboration and sharing which makes our job easier. 
• We are at the Capitol every day meeting with legislators, including many of the new legislators and experienced legislators that are new to key committees, of which there are many this year.

Annie Hightower, Interim Chief Human Resources Officer, Senior Associate Vice President for Finance and Operations

• Lauren Griswold will serve as search chair for the CHRO search and Dean Leslie Durham will serve as the search chair for the new dean of the College of Innovation and Design. We are currently working through final details with a search firm to conduct national searches for these positions. Both searches will have an approximate 16-week timeline for completion. When we invite finalists to Boise, there will be scheduled time for campus constituents to meet with and provide feedback on the candidates. Keep an eye out for candidate details and interview dates in Campus Update later this spring. 
• The transition of our health insurance and ORP accounts were major changes this year. We encourage you to reach out to our benefits team if you’re having trouble accessing your benefits or need other assistance such as accessing EAP and finding health, wellness and counseling services. Beyond our state provided benefits plan, we know additional voluntary benefits and services offered on campus support employee retention and make us a more competitive employer. If you are interested in supporting employee wellness programming, services and activities, I encourage you to consider becoming a member of our Wellness Champion Steering Committee. To learn more, reach out to Melissa Jensen or Kip Spittle on our HR team.
• Recognizing that university’s compensation structure and philosophy is a critical component of the employee experience. HR is in the early stages of discussions to modernize our compensation processes for professional staff. We seek to conduct a holistic review of professional position classifications, job structures, total compensation, and pay across campus to develop a more transparent, sustainable, and competitive compensation structure that supports simplified and streamlined processes. While this particular project will be focused on professional staff, we may also explore similar analysis for other groups of employees in the future. This review will require participation from various areas on campus. We look forward to collaborating with departments on this exciting initiative as it proceeds.

Argia Beristain, Interim CEO for the Boise State University Foundation

• Since the last campus town hall, some changes have occurred within University Advancement and the Foundation. In July 2024, the division of University Advancement merged with the Boise State University Foundation with the guidance of the Idaho State Board of Education to institutionalize how University Advancement and the Foundation had been collaborating in recent years. The results of this can be seen in our increased fundraising productivity over the past several years. 
• As part of the Unbridled campaign, in FY24, our alumni and friends created 35 new endowed scholarships and 1 new endowed graduate assistantship. True Blue scholarships comprised almost 20% of all new endowed scholarships created last year. Student athlete Ashton Jeanty has raised over $254,000 for the endowed scholarship he created to support future student-athletes, further cementing his legacy here at Boise State.
• We have raised over $400M toward our $500M goal for the Unbridled Campaign. That would not be possible without the support of all of our campus partners, university leadership, and the Foundation staff. We look forward to continuing to collaborate with you to get us across the finish line. You can join our efforts next month on Bronco Giving Day, which is happening Feb. 26-27. Faculty and staff giving has always been strong here at Boise State. And as an extra thank you for your continued generosity, the faculty or staff member who gives the 500th gift on Bronco Giving Day will receive an additional $750 toward the impact of their choice. 

Jen Schneider, Interim Dean, College of Innovation and Design

• Our college has been helping to coordinate the campuswide Generative AI initiative. Partners in the initiative have conducted over 50 faculty trainings, meetings, and symposia reaching over 600 faculty at Boise State. Boise State faculty and departments from across the university have more than doubled course offerings that explicitly engage AI from a broad range of disciplines and perspectives. This includes a new proposed Computer Science degree specializing in Artificial Intelligence. We’ve also collectively offered dozens of presentations and trainings to external stakeholders and partners in our community, created a robust and engaged governance structure that includes faculty and staff input, and our faculty are producing nationally recognized research in the generative AI space, across disciplines. The School of Computing and School for the Digital Future are collaborating closely to develop broad institutional and community strategies for engagement on AI, and we successfully rolled out 500 ChatGPT.edu licenses and have plans for supporting more platform access into the future. We also have plans to roll out significant opportunities for staff to be trained in the responsible and effective use of generative AI tools.

Jeramiah Dickey, Executive Director of Athletics

• Our goals are epic, and it takes a team. Student-athletes achieved a 3.42 cumulative grade-point average (GPA) for fall 2024, tying an all-time department record. All 18 sport programs achieved 3.0 GPA or higher. Student-athletes also reached a 96% Graduation Success Rate, the highest score in department and conference history.
• The Fiesta Bowl drew 13.8 million TV viewers, Bronco Football Instagram followers doubled, 245,000 people visited the Blue in 2023 and it was named the Best Attraction for Sports Fans for the second consecutive year by USA Today.
• We broke ground this month on the North End Zone project and are in the middle of the sales process as the project is scheduled to be completed prior to the 2026 football season.
• 2,645 community service hours performed by Bronco student-athletes at 388 events, impacting 63 local charities and schools.
• We accepted an invitation to join the Pac-12 Conference in 2026.