Colorado State University AAUP is a member of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP). The mission of the AAUP is to advance academic freedom and shared governance; to define fundamental professional values and standards for higher education; to promote the economic security of faculty, academic professionals, graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and all those engaged in teaching and research in higher education; to help the higher education community organize to make our goals a reality; and to ensure higher education’s contribution to the common good.
For more information about the National AAUP please visit https://www.aaup.org/about-aaup.
Recent AAUP-CSU Campaigns
The following excerpts describe a few of the many recent activities undertaken by the AAUP-CSU. Please click the links to learn more about what we are doing and how you can help!
AAUP-CSU suggestions for No Kings rally signs
The Oct. 18, No Kings March will likely be the biggest day of protest in US history, and the AAUP-CSU wants to ensure that this includes strong and clear support for higher education. When making your signs, please consider promoting …
AAUP-CSU Postcard Campaign to Protect Free Speech, Academic Freedom, and Student Centers
The AAUP-CSU+ASCSU Postcard Campaign for Free Speech, Academic Freedom, and Student Centers has collected hundreds of postcards to CSU Chancellor Tony Frank and the CSU Board of Governors! The successful campaign continues at the Oct 18 No Kings Rally and …
CSU Withdraws Changes to Freedom of Speech and Peaceful Assembly Policy!
AAUP-CSU is pleased to announce that following discussions with President Parsons at Faculty Council on October 7, 2025, CSU administration has withdrawn their recent changes to the Freedom of Speech and Peaceful Assembly policy.
AAUP-CSU Needs your Help Now!
AAUP-CSU invites all CSU and Fort Collins Community Members to join in the fight to protect academic freedom, free speech, student services, and the sciences, research, and arts at CSU. Please volunteer at upcoming actions and events hosted by AAUP-CSU.
AAUP-CSU Newsletter, October 2025
AAUP-CSU's October 2025 Newsletter is now available (click here!). There is a lot going on, and AAUP-CSU is active in taking a stand for employee rights, academic freedom, free speech and student services.
Act Now to Save Funding for Science, Research, and the Arts
AAUP-CSU asks all members and supporters to call/write their elected officials to urge protection for research funding. The Congressional budget process will eventually resume, and legislators will determine specific levels of funding – if any – for higher education and …
Revised Free Speech Policy Alarms Faculty and Students
The revised free speech policy announced by the CSU administration in September threatens the right to free speech and peaceful assembly on campus. AAUP-CSU calls on all CSU and Fort Collins community members to write to CSU admin and ask …
AAUP-CSU condemns attacks against CSU from the AFL.
A disturbing “civil rights complaint” was filed against CSU by America First Legal (a partisan group founded by Stephen Miller). AFL knows/cares nothing about truth, education, or the Colorado communities. Join AAUP-CSU and help CSU Administration keep their commitments to …
AAUP-CSU at the No Kings march
The CSU chapter of the AAUP showed up for the No Kings march on June 14. AAUP-CSU members Anders Fremstad (Economics) and Brian Munsky (Biomedical and Chemical Engineering) spoke at the event to protest the unconstitutional intimidation against free speech …
AAUP-CSU Advocates for the Establishment of a Mutual Defense Compact for CO Higher Education
The AAUP Resolution to Establish a Mutual Defense Compact for Colorado Institutions of Higher Education was passed at the CSU Faculty Senate on May 6, 2025 with a nearly unanimous vote of 45-1.
ASCSU Unanimously Passes a Resolution for a Mutual Defense Compact for Colorado Institutions of Higher Education
The Associated Students of Colorado State University (ASCSU) joined with AAUP-CSU to pass their own version of the Resolution to Establish a Mutual Defense Compact for Colorado Institutions of Higher Education.
Recent National AAUP Campaigns
Below are a few of the recent campaign and wins by the national AAUP. Click any of the boxes to go to the full stories in the national press, or read more at AAUP in the News.
- The AAUP and AFT strongly defend the academic freedom of Professor Derek Peterson and condemn the escalating campaign of political pressure and public intimidation directed at him following his remarks at the University of Michigan’s commencement ceremony.
- The AAUP urges medical school institutional leaders to resist the DOJ’s demands to hand over private applicant data and prioritize student privacy and academic independence rather than capitulate to federal intimidation.
- On Earth Day, the presidents of the AAUP and the AFT wrote to TIAA to request a meeting regarding TIAA’s continued investments in fossil fuel companies. Todd Wolfson and Randi Weingarten wrote that their memberships include many TIAA participants, who […]
- The AAUP has joined a coalition challenging a new Trump executive order that seeks to undermine efforts designed to promote inclusion and help ensure equal opportunity.
- Starting July 1, 2026, thousands of non-tenure-track faculty across Maryland’s four-year public universities will have the right to bargain collectively for the first time in history.
- Preliminary results from the AAUP’s 2025–26 Faculty Compensation Survey reveal that real wages for full-time faculty fell between fall 2024 and fall 2025, ending two years of postpandemic recovery.
- Instead, at a time when higher education is under constant attack, they are doing the attackers’ work for them by enthusiastically gutting their own institution.
- Kentucky House Bill 490 poses a direct threat to students, faculty, high quality college education, and the prosperity of the people of Kentucky. It would allow political appointees on governing boards to fire teachers for pretextual reasons.
- A new report co-released by the AAUP and the National Center provides the first in-depth, industry-wide examination of how academic freedom has been written into collective bargaining agreements across American higher education.
- AAUP President Todd Wolfson and AFT President Randi Weingarten issued the following statement in response to the decision by the National Institutes of Health to strip research fellows of their right to collective bargaining.
Academe Blog
Want to learn even more, check out the recent editorials on the Academy Blog. Academe Blog is a production of Academe magazine and focuses on issues in higher education. The blog and Academe are published by the American Association of University Professors, but opinions published in them do not necessarily represent the policies of the AAUP.
