[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 117 (Tuesday, September 11, 2001)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1632-E1634]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      TRIBUTE TO ELIZABETH HOFFMAN

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. MARK UDALL

                              of colorado

                    in the house of representatives

                      Tuesday, September 11, 2001

  Mr. UDALL of Colorado. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to 
Elizabeth Hoffman, President of the University of Colorado. As Betsy 
enters her second year on the job, I can proudly say that CU is well on 
its way to fulfilling her vision of becoming one of the top three 
public research universities in the country.
  During her first year in office, CU has set records in private gift 
giving, federal research income and state capitol construction funding. 
One of these gifts, a $250 million donation, is the largest gift ever 
to a public university. This donation allowed for the creation of a CU 
institute that will help twenty million Americans with cognitive 
disabilities.
  In addition to her drive to make CU a world class university, Betsy 
Hoffman knows that the University of Colorado is also a school for the 
people of Colorado. She travels tirelessly around the state to ``bring 
CU back to the people of Colorado.'' She has quickly gained the support 
of the people of our state in her endeavors. Governor Owens says, 
``She's been very good at representing the university around the state. 
I give her an A plus.'' She is also supported by state legislators on 
both sides of the aisle and by members of the Colorado congressional 
delegation.
  Under Betsy's leadership, I have no doubt that CU will become the 
world class university she is steering it toward. I am including an 
article about her that was recently published in the Denver Post. Mr. 
Speaker, I ask for my colleagues to join me in praising the work of a 
visionary and an educator.

               [From the Denver Post, September 2, 2001]

                    CU Chief Earns Fans, High Marks


      HOFFMAN'S FIRST YEAR BRINGS RECORD FUNDRAISING, LOFTY GOALS

                            (By Dave Curtin)

       The glow of a 10-inch TV illuminates the darkened office of 
     University of Colorado President Betsy Hoffman at 8:15 on a 
     rainy Thursday morning. She's trying to decide which of four 
     infomercials she likes best to tout CU before 35 million 
     football viewers.
       As Hoffman enters her second year as CU's president, she's 
     looking for a commercial that sets the tone for the CU she 
     dreams of--a school that is among the top three public 
     universities in the nation.
       Hoffman's first year was record-setting for CU in private 
     gift-giving, federal research income and state capital 
     construction funding.
       She's worked to improve faculty salaries. She's received 
     bipartisan support in the legislature--a feat skeptics said a 
     rookie president would struggle mightily to accomplish.
       ``There's no way I could have ended up in a better place 
     than here,'' she says. ``This is the luck of the draw and I 
     came out on top. To be the president of CU is one of the 
     greatest opportunities in this country.''
       Every school in the Big 12 Conference gets a free 30-second 
     spot to promote themselves during televised sporting events.
       Hoffman wanted something other than the usual students in 
     labs with test tubes. So the infomercial features a technical 
     climber on a rock wall. A creek rushes below. The first 
     version proudly brags of CU's Fulbright and Rhodes scholars 
     and Nobel Prize winner. Hoffman balks.
       ``We want to recruit students and their parents--not 
     scholars--in this spot,'' she says.
       In one version Hoffman concludes by saying, ``Come join 
     us.'' But when it was test-marketed on employees some 
     complained that ``it sounds like she's asking you to join a 
     cult,'' an aide offers. Hoffman laughs. ``Oh, give me a 
     break!'' she says. It's the first 10 minutes of an 11-hour 
     day.
     8:30-10 a.m.
       Vice presidents' meeting, president's office: Seven people, 
     including four vice presidents and the treasurer, gather 
     around a conference table in Hoffman's quaint cottage office 
     in Boulder.
       Hoffman runs a cordial meeting. She pokes fun at one 
     person's microscopic handwriting. ``Students at the 
     California Institute of Technology compete to see who can get 
     an entire semester's notes on one page,'' she says. ``They 
     write bigger than this.'' She's ribbing chief of staff J.D. 
     Beatty, one of a handful of her new recruits this year.
       That light-heartedness is typical of Hoffman. Recently 
     before a regent's meeting, the 6-foot president doffed her 
     high heels and

[[Page E1633]]

     challenged the veeps and regents to a pick-up basketball game 
     at the Coors Events Center. Today, she's left her shoes on. 
     The brain trust meets routinely to review the discussion at 
     the regents' meeting a week earlier. This time there had been 
     a tense discussion among regents about offering health 
     benefits to partners of gay employees. The debate has been 
     ongoing for 15 years, but regents will vote on it again 
     Thursday.
       Hoffman keeps the meeting moving as talk turns to Gov. Bill 
     Owens' new panel to study reorganizing state higher 
     education. It's the third state-ordered study remapping 
     Colorado's higher-ed system in two years and Hoffman takes it 
     very seriously.
       ``It's extremely important that CU speaks in a single voice 
     so the task force hears the same message from us,'' Hoffman 
     says.
       At the east end of her office is a mahogany desk. But she 
     rarely uses it. Most of her work is done outside the office. 
     A gold-plated plaque on the corner of the desk is etched with 
     the names of all CU presidents since 1963, with the exception 
     of CU's 17th president, Judith Albino, who brought her own 
     desk. ``Not me,'' Hoffman says. ``I wanted my name on that 
     plaque.''
       A 3-foot replica of a $250 million check is displayed on 
     top of a book case. It marks Hoffman's crowning moment in her 
     first year: the largest gift ever to a public university.
       The gift from software entrepreneurs Bill and Claudia 
     Coleman created a CU institute to help 20 million Americans 
     with cognitive disabilities.
       Hoffman boldly asked the California couple, who are not CU 
     alums, for the record gift, and it put CU in the national 
     spotlight. In hindsight, she says, it was a risk. They could 
     have taken their money somewhere else.
       ``You have to take risks to be excellent. If you take the 
     safe route, you'll remain mediocre,'' Hoffman says. ``I had 
     done my homework. I knew Bill liked bold approaches. That's 
     his M.O. And I knew they had a desire to make a big impact.'' 
     Just before that, Hoffman had surprised everyone at a CU 
     Foundation dinner when she and her husband announced they 
     were donating $100,000 to CU. She's the first president to 
     make a six-figure donation, which represented more than a 
     third of her first-year salary of $285,000. She recently 
     received a 15 percent raise, bumping her salary to $327,750.
       ``I can't ask anyone to make a significant contribution to 
     this university unless I've done so myself,'' she said at the 
     time.
       Rarely does she take a day off--and that includes weekends, 
     her colleagues say. Most mornings she leaves the president's 
     residence in Boulder at 7-6 if she has a breakfast meeting in 
     Denver. And she has a late-night event nearly every night. 
     She had one evening off earlier in the week. She went grocery 
     shopping. And bought a rain cover for a Sunday trail ride 
     organized by Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell to show support for 
     a Continental Divide transnational trail.
       On football Saturdays she'll host a brunch at her house and 
     then a breakfast on campus. On Sundays she finds herself at 
     the State Fair in Pueblo or departing for Monday morning 
     speeches in the far corners of the state.
       ``It's a very intense schedule,'' she says. ``Of all the 
     job requirements, no one ever tells you about the stamina. 
     That's the No. 1 criteria for this job.''
     10:30-11:45 a.m.
       Videotaping at Folsom Field: Hoffman is hustled over to 
     Folsom for another video shoot as an aide holds a People 
     magazine umbrella over her head in pouring rain. They scamper 
     from office to car. Car to stadium.
       Hoffman will film a 15-second welcoming video splashed 
     across the 96-foot-wide screen at the new Mile High stadium 
     that was to be played during Saturday's game against Colorado 
     State. She'll also film a 30-second spot for home games at 
     Folsom. The filming must be done today rain or shine, so 
     they've set up inside the athlete's dining hall. ``Her 
     schedule is so wall-to-wall this has to be done now,'' says 
     Bob Nero, an assistant vice president who oversees Hoffman's 
     external relations.
       Hoffman has a film wardrobe of black and gold hanging in 
     the back seat of her Cadillac STS donated by a Boulder 
     dealership.
       ``I hope Rachel likes my outfit because I don't feel like 
     dragging all my clothes in,'' she says.
       Rachel Dee is a contract stylist hired to coordinate the 
     president's clothes, hair and makeup for the camera.
       On Hoffman's short ride to the stadium, a call is broadcast 
     over her car phone. It's CU's director of federal relations, 
     Tanya Mares Kelly, who splits time between Washington, D.C., 
     and Denver. ``I want to make sure you heard that Bush will 
     make his stem-cell announcement today. I'm guessing you'll be 
     asked to comment,'' Mares Kelly says.
       Hoffman splashes into the dining hall damp but not 
     drenched. ``Can you restore me?'' Hoffman asks Dee, as the 
     stylist plops a pink beauty bib over her shoulders and dabs 
     at a tray of makeup.
       A 280-pound lineman fresh off of lunch comes over to 
     introduce himself. Then the president spies star running back 
     Marcus Houston. ``He better be fast because he's not that 
     big,'' Hoffman says.
       Houston, wearing a T-shirt that reads ``The Competition 
     Starts Here,'' comes over to greet Hoffman. She tell him 
     she's just read an article in Reader's Digest about his 
     foundation for inner-city school kids, ``Just Say Know.'' And 
     Campbell has offered help with the foundation, which puts a 
     smile on Houston's face.
       ``Are you shooting some ``Go Buffs'' video?'' he asks. 
     ``I'll let you go back to being presidential.''
       Dee wipes a spot off Hoffman's black jacket. ``Is there 
     lipstick on my teeth?'' Hoffman asks.
       No.
       ``Action! Camera!'' says videographer Shane Anthony.
       Hoffman, smiling on camera: ``''Everyone in the CU family 
     is delighted that you can join us for the 2001 Rocky Mountain 
     Showdown!''
     11:45 a.m.-l p.m.
       Meet with Athletic Director Dick Tharp at Folsom Stadium: 
     Hoffman heads downstairs to Tharp's office for an update on 
     CU's $45 million stadium expansion--28 new luxury boxes and 
     1,950 club seats with views of the Flatirons and scheduled to 
     be ready for the 2003 season. All but eight are sold for 
     $50,000 each. But there's one piece of business that takes 
     her aback. Associate athletic director John Meadows asks the 
     president if she would accept a stadium box on the 20-yard 
     line. Presently the president's box is on the 30. Meadows is 
     trying to place corporate buyers. ``All the seats are good 
     between the zeros,'' Tharp says.
       But Hoffman is starting a new fundraising program on 
     football Saturdays. She's invited 200 potential donors to be 
     her guests in her box throughout the season, followed by 
     dinner after the game.
       ``What does that tell them?'' Hoffman worries. ``That 
     they're no more important than the 20? 1 think there's a big 
     difference between the 20 and the 30.''
       During football games Hoffman splits her time hosting 
     guests, visiting donors seated in the exclusive Flatirons 
     Club, chatting with legislators, mingling with regents' 
     guests and doing radio in the third quarter. ``And I would 
     like to see the game,'' she says. ``It happens that I like 
     football.''
     1-2 p.m.
       Lunch in her office: Three catered salade nicoise costing 
     $22.50 await the president and two guests. Hoffman talks 
     excitedly about her 10-year plan to catapult CU into the 
     nation's top three public research universities.
       ``When people talk about Michigan, Wisconsin or Berkeley, I 
     want them to talk about CU,'' she says. ``Colorado is an 
     afterthought on the national scene. We need to be at the 
     top.''
       But is it realistic?
       ``Absolutely,'' says Gov. Owens. ``Even if she fails we 
     might have the fourth or fifth best research university in 
     the country. You have to strive mightily. And she does.'' 
     What will it take for CU to be among the nation's top three?
       It will take each of CU's four campuses in Denver, Colorado 
     Springs, Boulder and the Health Sciences Center at Fitzsimons 
     to be nationally ranked on their strengths, Hoffman says.
       It will require CU to amass a $5 billion endowment by 2010 
     (its current endowment is $500 million) and $1 billion 
     annually in federally sponsored research, and to collect more 
     than $1 billion by 2004 in a revamped private-gifts campaign 
     she'll announce in November.
       In 10 years, all CU colleges and programs should be named 
     for donors who pay $25 million to $50 million, Hoffman says.
       ``Ten years from now,'' she says, ``I want people to think 
     of the CU Hospital like they think of the Mayo Clinic or 
     Johns Hopkins.''
     2-3:30 p.m.
       Speech writing: Hoffman will give five speeches in four 
     days in Gunnison, Alamosa and Denver.
       She doesn't have jokes written into her speeches. ``I don't 
     read jokes well,'' she says. Instead she spontaneously spices 
     her talks with personal anecdotes.
       She'll come off the trail ride near Keystone on Sunday to 
     give a noon speech to a community group in Gunnison on 
     Monday. That's followed by three talks in Alamosa on Tuesday 
     and Wednesday. She'll be in Denver on Thursday to speak at 
     the CUDenver convocation.
       The three-day San Luis Valley trip is one in a series of 
     rural Colorado ``community tours'' Hoffman initiated. When 
     she became president she vowed to ``bring CU back to the 
     people of Colorado.''
       ``She comes over to the Western Slope and that's played 
     very well over here,'' says state Rep. Gayle Berry, R-Grand 
     Junction.
       Hoffman's goal when she took office was to meet Colorado's 
     federal delegation and all 101 state lawmakers before the 
     legislature convened in 2001. She came within five.
       Still, some skeptics wondered how a rookie president could 
     pull purse strings in the legislature.
       ``I think she's been a refreshing breath of fresh air,'' 
     says Berry, a member of the powerful Joint Budget Committee. 
     ``She has a very engaging personality and she's worked very 
     hard in the legislature.''
       While the rural tours are equal doses student recruitment 
     and PR, Hoffman sees them on a higher plane. ``Getting out 
     there and being part of all the communities is extremely 
     important,'' she says.
       On the tours she hosts ``mini-colleges''--a lecture by top 
     professors such as anthropologist Dennis Van Gerven talking 
     about mummies in the Nile Valley. ``People can see what a 
     student gets to experience,'' Hoffman says. ``It erases the 
     myths about Boulder and the image of the ``People's Republic 
     of Boulder.'''

[[Page E1634]]

       Now it's time to make her speeches sing with speechwriter 
     Brad Bolander. ``The introduction's too long,'' she says. She 
     suggests condensing three paragraphs into one easy-to-
     understand sentence.
       ``The talking points are too dense,'' she says. ``I'm not 
     going to read all this. I want to keep eye contact.''
       As for her 10-year game plan--she can talk about that from 
     the heart.
       At a dinner party the night before, she was asked to 
     elaborate extemporaneously on her vision after a couple 
     glasses of wine. ``I was afraid I would forget one of the 
     points,'' she says.
       ``It was one of your best speeches ever,'' says husband 
     Brian Binger, an adjunct economics professor, who has stopped 
     in to the office to lend a hand with the speech writing. 
     ``Maybe you should always work that way.''
       Hoffman's the morning person in the family; Binger the 
     night person. He often drives her home from late-night, out-
     of-town dinners while she sleeps. On the way to an engagement 
     in Alamosa last spring, he drove while she did the taxes.
       Binger and Hoffman will head to campus for the Economics 
     Institute graduation dinner, where Hoffman will give the 
     commencement address.
       The institute is a 30-year-old summer-long program in 
     Boulder to prepare non-U.S. citizens to go to business 
     graduate schools in the U.S. For years it's used a textbook 
     co-authored by Hoffman and Binger. Graduates include former 
     Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo, the president of the 
     Central Bank of Buenos Aires, ministers of finance in Mexico 
     and Indonesia and the director of Fuji Bank in Japan.
       The graduation will be preceded by a champagne reception. 
     ``I don't think I better have any champagne,'' Hoffman tells 
     her husband. ``Yeah, it's only 4 p.m.,'' Binger says. ``The 
     day's only half over.''

     

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