(03-11-2017 12:15 PM)lew240z Wrote: The University of Colorado Denver has an enrollment of 33,707. That is only 18 students less than CU Boulder. But the Lynx have no athletic department.
I attended UC-D for a year and Metro State for the rest of my undergraduate time. (They, along with the Community College of Denver) occupy a single campus just outside of downtown Denver.
You need to know something about the history of all three institutions, which stems from the 1960's... They were intended to form a singular unit; in theory, one could start at CCD and get their GED and Associate's level degree. They could then either proceed into the field or continue on with their Bachelor's level degree at Metro (MSC, then MSCD, and now MSU-D). CU was looking to get into the Denver market and was worried that the new Metro State would lock them out, so they agreed to open up UC-D, which was supposed to offer Masters and Doctoral studies. UC-D students were part of the University of Colorado system and could transfer with full credits up to the main Boulder campus. UC-D originally offered degrees that were more "Professionally Oriented"...MBA's, Psychology, etc...that professionals in Denver could take while working.
As time went on, Metro State impinged a little on CCD, offering more classes for non-traditional students. UC-D started offering undergrad courses (I studied EE there for a year...). Now Metro State is also a full "University," offering Graduate and post-grad studies. Metro State competes on the NCAA-Div 2 level, but by charter is prohibited from offering football. (They have won an NCAA D2 men's BB national championship, and when I was a student, they studied going D1...) It was never intended that UC-D would ever offer scholarship, varsity sports.
Over the years there have been various schemes to merge all three schools into a single institution. One name bantered about in the late 90's was "Denver State." But these have never gained traction...in particular, the UC Board of Regents...who really drive the Colorado State Higher Education Commission...have always opposed it because they would lose UC-D AND would have another major competitor to UC in one moment. Metro has something like 28.000 students, UC-D another 30k or so...including part-time, on-line, and graduate programs...so you'd have a pretty massive school right there. But also a key part of Metro's mission was to provide a track for students who would not otherwise have access to Higher Ed. either because of economic reasons, academic reasons, or other reasons. So to become yet another, residential, "typical" university just doesn't work there either...