Audio By Carbonatix
Graduates of the University of Colorado Boulder were promised email addresses that last a lifetime. That lifetime is set to end this summer.
CU Boulder plans to terminate its “Email for Life” program on August 31, deleting alumni colorado.edu accounts. The university attributed the decision to rising licensing costs, declining usage and security risks. “Maintaining alumni email accounts is no longer sustainable for the university,” the February announcement reads.
But some Buffs aren’t letting go of their emails without a fight. Alumnus Rex Boge filed a class action lawsuit against the CU Board of Regents on Monday, June 15, arguing that the university is breaching its contract with former students.
“‘Email for Life’ served as an explicit promise to alumni that they would retain access to their colorado.edu email accounts for their lives,” reads the lawsuit filed in Denver County District Court.
The “Email For Life” program was launched in 2005. Once it ends, new graduates will only get to keep their colorado.edu email for one year after they walk the stage.
“The main reason CU Boulder decided to sunset the alumni email program is to protect our digital infrastructure amid a rapidly changing and increasingly volatile digital environment,” says Nicole Cousins, a spokesperson for the university. “This decision is not unique to CU Boulder, as many of our peer institutions have already shifted away from similar alumni email programs.”
Other universities within the University of Colorado system still have “Email for Life” programs, including the University of Colorado Denver, University of Colorado Colorado Springs and University of Colorado Anschutz.
But of 320,000 living CU Boulder alumni, only 7.5% logged on to colorado.edu in 2025, Colorado Public Radio reported in February. CU Boulder officials argue that the use rate doesn’t justify the costs.
Fees paid by former students
The lawsuit argues that CU Boulder students paid for perpetual access to “Email for Life” via a mandatory $67.24 per semester “Student Computing Fee,” which in part covered email-related expenses.
“Generations of graduates paid their computing fees under the explicit promise of ‘Email for Life,'” the lawsuit reads. “The university has offered no refunds for any portion of the computing fees paid. … Had [CU] made clear that it could or intended to eliminate ‘Email for Life’ at its discretion, [Boge] and the other class members would have paid substantially less than the amounts they paid for the computing fees.”
The lawsuit asks the court to order that CU Boulder fulfill its promise of lifetime email access, or to award damages to impacted alumni for breach of contract.
Cousins declined to comment on the lawsuit, saying the university has not yet been served.
Boge, who now lives in Utah, holds two degrees from CU Boulder: a bachelor’s degree from 2020 and a Juris Doctor degree from 2023.
Before bringing legal action, Boge contacted CU Boulder leadership and members of the Board of Regents in an attempt to resolve the matter informally, the lawsuit alleges. His efforts were unfruitful. Boge is pursuing the lawsuit “reluctantly,” it says, adding that he “continues to hold CU Boulder in high regard … but believes that enforcement of the promises at issue is important.”
He’s not the first graduate to push back against CU over the decision. Another alumnus created a petition demanding recourse from the university. As of June 16, the petition has accumulated over 1,300 signatures.
“I organized my digital life around the understanding that this address was permanent,” the petition reads. “Many alumni have used their CU email addresses continuously for 10 to 20 years or more. Pulling that identity away now is not a neutral technical change. It is a breach of trust.”
One signer wrote, “Alumni shouldn’t bear the cost of the university’s lack of foresight.” Another added, “For over $100,000 in tuition as an in-state student, keeping the servers active for my email shouldn’t be what breaks the bank.”
