Nov 20, 2025

Tanya Heikkila, PhD, longtime public policy leader and SPA professor, has been named a 2025 National Academy of Public Administration fellow.”

Nov 13, 2025

CU Denver’s Bachelor of Arts in Public Administration (BAPA) program empowers students to create meaningful change in their communities. Whether advocating for social justice, managing nonprofit organizations, or working in government, graduates are equipped to lead with purpose.

Nov 3, 2025

Luke Gorka, a student pursuing a master’s degree in Public Administration at CU Denver’s School of Public Affairs, is proving that flexibility and connection can go hand-in-hand. Balancing a full-time nonprofit job and an active lifestyle, Gorka credits SPA’s hybrid learning model—offering both online and in-person options—for helping him stay on track academically while remaining engaged with faculty and classmates.

Oct 24, 2025 by Laura McHugh

PhD candidate Hope Yohn’s short film Bright Future, which explores the ripple effects of sexual assault trauma, has been selected for the Austin Film Festival, showcasing her creative and academic contributions to the School of Public Affairs.

Jun 27, 2025 by Dee Dee Flynn

The University of Colorado Denver School of Public Affairs is pleased to announce the appointment of Distinguished Professor Chris Weible, PhD as Interim Dean, effective July 1, 2025.

Jun 16, 2025 by Nora Scanlon

In this School of Public Affairs interview, recent graduate and transfer student Jan Arismendy Valderrama '25 shares his journey from Caracas, Venezuela, to CU Denver, where he pursued a Bachelor of Arts in Criminal Justice with a concentration in Law Enforcement and a minor in Public Administration. He discusses how his background in law enforcement, passion for public service, and drive for leadership in policy reform led him to CU Denver, and how faculty support and flexible programming helped him thrive. He also reflects on favorite professors, landing a full-time role with the CU Boulder Police Department, and advice for future students navigating nontraditional academic paths.

Feb 25, 2025 by Dr. Deserai Crow

As the recent crisis in Los Angles demonstrates, disaster preparedness and recovery are more salient issues than ever, and they are also more politicized. On January 30, 2025, Congressman Jason Crow (CO-6) joined Center for Community Safety and Resilience (CCSR) and CU Denver’s School of Public Affairs to discuss the unprecedented level of politicization regarding disaster relief funding in Congress.

Dec 2, 2024 by Ellen Patterson

Jeff Lamontagne is the Executive Director of Dinosaur Ridge, where he has served since 2017. Over the past 22 years, Jeff has led three nonprofit organizations in the Denver Metro area, beginning with Second Wind Fund, which he co-founded in response to a local high school suicide crisis. He also served as Executive Director of Bluff Lake Nature Center and has been involved with five boards during his career.

Dec 2, 2024

Bachelor of Arts in Criminal Justice major Lindsay Abramson shares experience as a student at CU Denver and as an intern with Auraria Police Department.

Oct 24, 2024 by Dr. Sheila Huss

The Center for Community Safety and Resilience (CCSR) and the School of Public Affairs presented a panel discussion on intimate partner violence on October 22, 2024. The panel addressed many facets of intimate partner violence, including language and definitions related to the term, contributing factors, effective interventions, and ways that people and communities can be involved to prevent the problem and support survivors. The event took place in October because October is Domestic Violence Awareness month, a designation begun by Congress in 1989.

Mar 21, 2022

We often assume the ideal about our governments: they should act proportionately to the problems at hand. Governments should respond to minor issues with minor policy changes and major issues with major policy changes. This assumption of proportionality cumbers the effectiveness of solutions found across literatures, including adaptive management, sustainable development, and direct and deliberative democracy.

Feb 7, 2023

Professor Tanya Heikkila, Co-Director of the Center for Policy and Democracy at the School of Public Affairs, and co-author Andrea Gerlak, offer their perspective on navigating the Colorado River crisis.

Mar 18, 2021 by Dr. Serena Kim

The Texas winter storm in February 2021 and the ensuing blackout exposed problems of the unregulated power market, aging electricity infrastructure, and the lack of preparedness for frequent extreme weather events. But it also revealed social inequities in such problems. Dr. Serena Kim discusses the lessons that Coloradans can learn from Texans.

Mar 29, 2021 by Dr. Jane Hansberry

Dr. Jane Hansberry writes about the impact of COVID-19 on jobs in the arts and cultural sector and encourages individuals to do help with its resurgence through donations and ticket purchases.

Nov 8, 2020 by Dr. Wendy Bolyard

Failure to recognize and appreciate that Americans are not all of the same culture undermines public service values and service delivery, something that the COVID-19 pandemic highlights. While federal agencies and contractors were recently banned by a presidential executive order from offering “divisive” and “un-American” anti-racism training, it is difficult not to see the value of learning to understand and adapt to cultural contexts. Cultural intelligence, or CQ, manifests respect and dignity for all while fostering fairness and equity. Thus, public administrators must seek opportunities for themselves and their teams to develop capabilities to function and manage in culturally diverse settings. Recognizing United States public administrators and the constituents they serve indeed reflect cultural diversity, and should, is paramount.

Mar 1, 2022

If a pandemic isn’t enough to accelerate the energy transition, then what is? Professors Tanya Heikkila and Chris Weible take on this question, along with PhD in Public Affairs alumnus Dr. Alex Osei-Kojo and Dr. Amy Pickle from Duke University.

Oct 14, 2020 by Professor Christopher Weible

Professor Chris Weible and PhD student Jill Yordy discuss a faltering U.S. democracy in the face of a calamitous combination of crises in the pandemic, economy, climate change, and social inequities. They offer four guiding principles for bringing political equality into societal discourse, developing tools and techniques for its assessments, and fostering better theories of our understandings and practices for its emergence, realization, and maintenance.

Oct 13, 2020 by Dr. Geoffrey Propheter

Dr. Geoff Propheter discusses the impact of government-subsidized sports venues on local wages, employment, and property prices, and whether they can help the local property tax base recover from recessions.

Jan 19, 2021 by Dr. William L. Swann

Before the arrival of COVID-19, the United States was amid one of its worst public health crises in decades: the opioid epidemic. To those experiencing, treating, and supporting someone with opioid use disorder (OUD), the deadliest pandemic since 1918 couldn’t have come at a crueler time. Dr. William Swann describes his recent research on the opioid pandemic.

Dec 8, 2020

This op-ed was written by the Risk & Social Policy Working Group, an interdisciplinary team of scholars formed to study risk messaging and public policy during the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. Deserai Crow of the CU Denver School of Public Affairs is part of the working group.