Faculty and students highlighted processes and initiatives that include the third aspect of the 2030 Strategic Plan, organizational excellence, and addressed concerns about transparency following the projected $27.7 budget deficit.
Organization excellence focuses on improving efficiency, transparency and resource allocation by making data-driven decisions.
According to Chancellor Jennifer Sobanet, organizational excellence will help UCCS close the expense-revenue gap and emphasize cross-campus collaboration.
SGA’s Budget Advisory Committee
Director of Finance Josh Mattias and SGA President Aidan Burke explained that SGA is working to increase the Budget Advisory Committee’s (BAC) accuracy, transparency and efficiency.
BAC manages the use of student activity fees by voting on SGA budgets and funding requests from clubs and other student organizations.
According to Mattias, SGA has made Mountain Lion Connect (MLC) more accessible to clubs and organizations submitting a funding proposal. Students can expect a response from BAC within 14 to 20 days after submission.
This academic year, BAC has approved 80 out of 120 proposals. According to Mattias, the student event to student attendance ratio is 2.29 percent, which indicates the funds are being used efficiently.
“We’re actually trying to keep track of the utilization rate of the funds, so we know if you’re only using like 50 percent of your funds that you asked for, we can take those funds and then shift them over to another organization that needs more money,” Mattias said.
Faculty Resource Center Digital Accessibility Initiative
Associate Professor Dave Anderson and Digital Accessibility Specialist MK Naughton presented the Digital Accessibility Initiative, which aims to reduce digital barriers when accessing UCCS materials to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act and Colorado law.
To do so, the faculty resource center will focus on flexibility, simplicity, access, proactive planning and safety.
The initiative includes adding captioned media accommodations to Disability Services. From spring 2025 to spring 2026, 15 to 18 students required captioned media accommodations, which is approximately 24 classes per student and 1,923 minutes of video content.
“When digital content is made accessible from the start, faculty spends less time remediating, and students spend less time waiting for something to be fixed. We’re positioning UCCS to meet the future with preparedness by building a foundation that meets students, staff and faculty in a rapidly changing digital landscape,” Naughton said.
Financial Stewardship Project
The Financial Stewardship Project, presented by Assistant Vice Chancellor of Accounting- Controller’s Office Xochil Herrera, focuses on UCCS’ new financial procedure — developing a consistent plan to allocate temporary financial resources by analyzing how UCCS spends reserves and one-time funds.
This includes required spending plans, accurate budget entries, multi-year planning and budget deficit prevention to provide data for long-term financial decisions and prevent reserves and temporary funds from being used for ongoing or permanent expenses.
“[Distinguishing ongoing funds versus temporary funds] at work is going to allow us to have better forecasting of our funding commitments… We’re going to have better reporting and transparency in our budget,” Herrera said.
Compensation Strategy Project
Compensation Manager and Talent Acquisitioner Andrew Archuleta and Compensation Program Director Willow Meyers presented the Compensation Strategy Project.
The project is designed to support faculty and staff to ensure fair and competitive compensation. Objectives include maintaining equity, managing financial responsibility and motivating and engaging employees.
“Over a long-term, set period of time we’re going to be looking at compensation, evaluating the data and trying to put [the data] into practice with new strategies,” Archuleta said.
Students can view all projects that involve organizational excellence here.
The final strategic spotlight will cover the fourth part of the 2030 Strategic Plan, a culture of care, and takes place on April 22 from 2-3 p.m. in University Center 303.
Photo from the Scribe archives