Amy Parsons' tenure as Colorado State University's 16th president begins
PUEBLO — Although Wednesday, Feb. 1, was Amy Parsons’ official first day as the new president of Colorado State University, she has essentially been on the job for more than a month now.
Parsons, 48, was formally hired as CSU’s 16th president Dec. 16, agreeing to a five-year contract that began Feb. 1 and runs through Jan. 31, 2028.
She spent most of January working on the university’s main campus in Fort Collins, meeting with top administrators who report directly to the president, meeting with faculty representatives, getting her office in the administration building set up and attending numerous public events, including the Martin Luther King Jr. Day march.
On Tuesday, she represented CSU at the Mountain West Conference Board of Governors meetings, held remotely, where she had the opportunity to meet the presidents of the other 10 universities and superintendent of the Air Force Academy, as well as new conference commissioner Gloria Nevarez.
Later that day, she attended Fort Collins’ annual State of the City address, where she listened to presentations from Mayor Jeni Arndt and City Manager Kelly DiMartino. And Tuesday night, she and her husband, Jeff, were in the stands and introduced to the crowd at Moby Arena during a CSU men’s basketball game against UNLV. She sat down for a live interview at halftime on the CSU Radio Network.
“It was just a great atmosphere,” Parsons said Thursday. “The students were really energized, so that was a lot of fun.”
So, spending her first two official days on the job at the new Spur campus in Denver for CSU’s Agricultural Experiment Station Conference and at CSU System Board of Governors meetings and events on the Pueblo campus didn’t really faze Parsons.
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“It really felt fitting to actually spend my first day focused on agriculture, which is really the roots of CSU and to be able to meet dozens of people who represented our ag experimentations from all over the state of Colorado,” said Parsons, a Loveland native who grew up just across the border in Cheyenne, Wyoming, and is just the third CSU graduate to become president of her alma mater.
Day 2 was spent at the Board of Governors’ meetings at CSU-Pueblo’s Occhiato Student Center, where she and Rick Miranda, who served as interim president from July 1 through Jan. 31, jointly presented financial and campus reports for the university’s main campus in Fort Collins. Miranda is staying on the university's leadership team for the next year, Parsons said, as the executive vice president.
“CSU, in general, is so much more than the Fort Collins campus, and it includes all the people in agriculture out around the state, so I think it was actually very fitting to spend part of my day with them yesterday focused on their work around the state.”
Parsons will remain in Pueblo for the second day of the Board of Governors' meetings Friday before returning to Fort Collins to attend the CSU volleyball team's postseason banquet, the last for retiring coach Tom Hilbert, the winningest coach in school history in any sport. She'll also move into Magnolia House, the president's residence in Fort Collins, on Friday and plans to attend both the CSU women's and men's basketball games Saturday at Moby Arena.
Parsons is no stranger to the Board of Governors, who identified her as the sole finalist to become the university’s next president during a national search over a four-month span that included a consulting firm and search committee of 31 people representing various constituencies connected to CSU.
Parsons, who earned her doctorate at the University of Colorado’s law school, served as CSU’s deputy general counsel and associate legal counsel, vice president of university operations on the Fort Collins campus and as executive vice chancellor of the CSU System out of its Denver office.
“I’ve been attending these meetings for about 17 years in different seats around the table, so while part of it seems really familiar, I’ve been here thinking about the different role that I have now and the responsibilities and the opportunities. It’s amazing. It’s really exciting.”
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Reporter Kelly Lyell covers education and other topics of interest for the Coloradoan. Contact him at kellylyell@coloradoan.com, twitter.com/KellyLyell or facebook.com/KellyLyell.news.
This article originally appeared on Fort Collins Coloradoan: Amy Parsons' role as Colorado State University's 16th president begins
