Getting Involved

The importance of Mars exploration and how the aerospace industry partners with university researchers to advance one of Colorado’s leading economic sectors will be featured at a free program Monday, Sept. 8, in south Denver.

Nearly 800 incoming students at the University of Colorado Boulder will spend their first Saturday as college students helping others in the community during the “Buff Day of Service” on Aug. 23.

The University of Colorado Boulder and the city of Boulder have been honored with the International Town-Gown Association’s Larry Abernathy Award, recognizing the positive collaboration between the university and city. The university and city were recognized for the comprehensive move-in orientation program they offer for student renters living on the Hill and in Goss Grove, two of the most densely populated student rental areas in Boulder.

The Senior Auditors Program provides Colorado residents, ages 55 and older, the opportunity to attend classes on the University of Colorado Boulder campus. Tuition is free and participants pay just an administrative fee to cover registration, application processing and IT support. The program was established in 1973 and is coordinated through the CU-Boulder Alumni Association. Course availability is dependent upon enrollment limits, with tuition-paying students given priority, and on fire code restrictions, which determine the number of students allowed in a room. Grades are not awarded and auditors do not receive credit toward a degree.

A program designed at the University of Colorado Boulder to teach kids to code using video games is being introduced into New York City public schools as part of an initiative to give every student access to computer science education. Scalable Game Design is a program developed over two decades by CU-Boulder computer science Professor Alexander Repenning to spark an interest in coding among kids by allowing them to design and build their own video games. The idea behind the program, which uses drag-and-drop programming tools, is to combat the widely held notion that computer programming is hard and boring.

For people with doubts about the benefits of sleep, on Monday, July 28, experts from the University of Colorado Boulder and the University of California Berkeley aim to put those to rest. The public is invited to the free community talk, “Cultivating Nourishing Sleep,” from 6-8 p.m. in the Wolf Law Building, Room 204.

The Institute of Education Sciences at the U.S. Department of Education has awarded nearly $5 million to the University of Colorado Boulder, the Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard University and Northwestern University to create a new center that will study how educational leaders—including school district supervisors and principals—use research when making decisions and what can be done to make research findings more useful and relevant for those leaders.

A new educational partnership at the University of Colorado Boulder will provide expanded degree options for working professionals interested in specialized graduate education focused on energy and water. Beginning this fall, qualified students can earn both a Master of Engineering (ME) degree and a Professional Certificate in Renewable and Sustainable Energy or a Professional Certificate in Water Engineering and Management. The degree and certificates can be earned either via distance education or in campus classes and may be pursued either part- or full-time.

The Howard Hughes Medical Institute has awarded the University of Colorado Boulder $1.5 million over five years to continue to transform science education by encouraging more real-world research experiences for undergraduates, ranging from cancer studies to screenings for new antibiotics.

A University of Colorado Boulder professor who developed a clever method to measure snow depth using GPS signals is collaborating with Western Slope officials to make the data freely available to a variety of users on a daily basis.