Notes of Impact | Fall 2019

IMPACT NOTES OF

YOUR LIFELONG LEARNING PARTNER The latest news from the University of Denver’s University College.

The University of Denver Welcomes 19th Chancellor pg. 4 University College Alumnus Named Colorado Poet Laureate pg. 6

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WHAT TO EXPECT IN THIS ISSUE

UNIVERSITY COLLEGE NOTES OF IMPACT VOLUME 3 ISSUE 5 | FALL 2019

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Share Your News! universitycollege.du.edu/notesofimpact

NOTES FROM THE DEAN To Our University College Community, Each fall, there are signs that it’s “back to school” season. But for students at University College, going back to school can happen anytime throughout the year, or in a student’s lifetime. As the University of Denver’s college of professional and continuing studies, we welcome adult learners who decide to further their education and make an impact.

We welcome managers who want to take the next step in their career progression and finish the bachelor’s degree they started years ago. We welcome practitioners who need to learn a new technical skill and sign up for a boot camp to learn it. We welcome emerging leaders who want to enhance their industry knowledge while cultivating management skills through a master’s degree. At University College, all are welcome to take part in lifelong learning.

I invite you to find ways to engage in learning, whether it be on campus at the University of Denver or online at your own pace. As a member of our community we know you’re already invested in education and the far-reaching impact it can have on your work, your family, and your community. Workshops, boot camps, graduate-level courses, one-night lectures are all available to you through University College, and we’re here to support you.

Wherever you find yourself in your learning journey or in the world, thank you for being part of our community.

Sincerely, Michael McGuire, Dean

@DUucoldean

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UNIVERSITY OF DENVER UPDATES

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DU WELCOMES ITS

CHANCELLOR The University of Denver is pleased to welcome its 19th chancellor as of July 2019: Dr. Jeremy Haefner. Before taking on the role, Chancellor Haefner served as DU’s provost and executive vice chancellor and prior to that, he served as provost at the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York for 10 years.

“The University of Denver is an extraordinary private university known for its mission to serve the public good,” Haefner said.

“It is a place where students receive an excellent, holistic education that prepares them

for life and careers in the 21st century.”

The appointment comes after Chancellor Rebecca Chopp stepped down due to health concerns after serving five years in the role.

In a letter to the DU community, board chair Denise O’Leary said Chancellor Haefner is “a national thought leader in student and faculty success, a great communicator, and an individual personally committed to advancing the university and further expanding our diverse and inclusive community and shared values.”

TA K E NOTE university college news After 11 years with University College, Dr. Pat Greer, academic director and assistant teaching professor, has retired. Leading the Strategic Human Resources and Organizational Leadership programs, Pat helped craft and deliver exceptional programming to our students.

In order to meet the demands of the dynamic healthcare industry, University College now offers a major in Healthcare Administration through the Bachelor of Arts Completion Program.

Welcome to Cathie Wilson, new assistant academic director for the Information and Communications Technology program.

Cathie brings more than 15 years of IT consulting experience.

We are pleased to welcome the new assistant academic director for Healthcare Management, Rachel Rogers. Rachel comes to University College from Denver Health, where she worked as an RN informatics specialist.

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ALUMNI: MAKING AN IMPACT

MEET COLORADO’S NEW

poet laureate UNIVERSITY COLLEGE ALUMNUS BOBBY LEFEBRE Story by Tamara Chapman | Photo by Amanda Piela

As his email signature will tell you, Bobby LeFebre is many things — word architect, performer and cultural worker, to name just a few.

And as of July, he’s Colorado’s eighth poet laureate. But he’s certainly not a literary eminence out of central casting.

You won’t find his works splayed on a page inside a bound volume lost on a shelf. And he’s not a wordsmith who versifies between hushed readings before small circles of aficionados.

Instead, he’s a spoken-word artist whose works you’ll hear and feel as they pulsate around a packed auditorium. He’s a University College alumnus whose YouTube clips and social media posts you’ll populate with expressive emojis. And at 37, he’s the state’s youngest poet laureate ever — not to mention its first poet laureate of color.

“I was pretty excited that the governor and the selection team decided to do something different,” Bobby says. “I think poets laureate of the past — not only here but in cities all over the nation — have traditionally been [drawn from] a small representation of what constitutes poetry and what poetry can mean. To take it from this heady academic tradition to a newer aesthetic and approach, I thought was very bold.”

Bobby is still figuring out just how he wants his four-year term as laureate to unfold, but his plans all hinge on inclusivity.

“I want to center, elevate and amplify marginalized voices — voices that have traditionally been left out of this position, voices that have not been reached, stories that have been undertold,” he says.

By the time Bobby enrolled at DU in the Arts and Culture Management program, he had emerged as a driving force in Denver’s alternative poetry scene, winning major slam poetry awards and founding Café Cultura, a nonprofit cultivating the creative voices of youths from Latino and indigenous populations.

Bobby credits a lot of his occupational dexterity — “I am a rare mix of artist, arts administrator and culture worker,” he says — to University College. For one thing, he studied with outgoing poet laureate Joseph Hutchison, who also serves as the academic director for the Professional Creative Writing and Arts and Culture Management programs. For another, he embraced opportunities to hone his skills in arts administration and promotion. By the time he graduated in 2013, he had learned to be a better wordsmith and a better advocate and activist.

“I wear many hats in culture, and the program was designed in a way in which I was able to further my education in all those different areas,” Bobby said. “I want to use this position to bring others along on this crazy journey.”

Learn more about our arts and writing programs at universitycollege.du.edu.

ALUMNI: MAKING AN IMPACT

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FACULTY: MAKING AN IMPACT

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FACULTY: MAKING AN IMPACT

the shifting

MARKETING

landscape

/////////////////////////////////////// ////////// Cindy Cragg joins University College as an assistant teaching professor and the academic director of the Communication Management program. With 20 years of experience in marketing communication, Cindy brings a high level of real-life experience to her work. We asked Cindy to share her insights about the shifting marketing landscape and how the Communication Management program is preparing MarCom pros...

The landscape of marketing and communication has changed significantly in recent years, what have been the most exciting shifts you’ve seen?

We know communication is a power skill for professionals, how do you approach instilling this skillset in students pursuing the program?

It’s been a noisy decade riddled with steep learning curves and constantly changing best practices for a seemingly endless number of new online marketing tools and communication platforms. During this time tactics were forced into the forefront and strategy often left by the wayside.

Strategic thinking, especially through collaboration, is here in a big way. MarCom professionals are the keepers of the strategic vision and therefore the glue that holds these collaborations together. This is an exciting shift and an opportunity for professionals at all levels to rise up and show strategic leadership.

We recently revised our core courses for the Communication Management program to include a course called Storytelling through Research and Measurement.

This move defines not only where we see gaps in the industry but also our commitment to equip every single student that enrolls for a credential with strong competencies in using a research-based approach to auditing communications efforts. Our students are positioned to tell compelling, data-driven stories that add value and make an impact.

What are you looking forward to as the “next big thing” in marketing and PR? As we put more emphasis on being smart and strategic with communication efforts, keeping the user top of mind is a natural evolutionary step for PR and marketing.

Not only are we refining our messaging to be more useful, relevant, and personalized to the audience but, at the same time, we’re getting more sophisticated with the user data to create communication programs that have value and are measurable. To be able to show how our work moves users and contributes to the bottom line is game changing.

What excites you the most about teaching in the Communication Management program?

Our students want to hit the ground running. Not just after they have their degree but after every week of every course. With every new concept learned our students find ways to apply that knowledge immediately in their professional lives. With a 20 year background in digital marketing, keeping my finger on the pulse of what is needed to ensure students are industry relevant is practically in my DNA. Not much is more exciting or rewarding than seeing the results when students are able to take direct action to enhance their careers and their lives.

To learn more about the Communication Management graduate program, visit universitycollege.du.edu/comm.

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STUDENTS: MAKING AN IMPACT

mining for

CHANGE

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STUDENTS: MAKING AN IMPACT Mining may run in the family of University College student Tania Galarce, but to become a mining engineer is a rare occurrence for women in Chile. Mining in Andean countries has been slow to incorporate more women into the field, with less than 15% of women workers in that sector, according to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean. In Chile, that percentage is even smaller, with women accounting for around 7.5% of the mining labor force.

But that didn’t stop Tania, who comes from a long line of miners, including her great-grandfather who died in the “Smoke Tragedy,” where more than 350 miners lost their lives in 1945 because of a fire inside the El Teniente mine in Chile.

“Gender equity is a recurrent aspect, but it was far from discouraging and instead was an incentive to be part of the new generation of women in mining,” she said. “I chose to be a miner because I enjoy the possibility

of having access to broad knowledge.”

In Chile, Tania worked as a project engineer at Mineria y Medio Ambiente, an engineering consultancy office focused on environmental permits for mine projects. Today, Tania looks at the environmental angle of mining while pursuing a master’s degree in Environmental Policy and Management.

“Integrating my engineering background with this environmental management program will help me make this industry a sustainable and responsible activity which can co-exist with the environment and communities.”

The graduate program offered through University College helps students navigate the complex relationships between the environment, management, and policy. Graduates are prepared to solve the many environmental challenges in our local and global communities, and we can expect Tania to do just that.

To learn more about the Environmental Policy and Management program, visit universitycollege.du.edu/epm.

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ELEVATING TEACHING PRACTICES AND APPLIED LEARNING FOR POST-TRADITIONAL STUDENTS

universitycollege.du.edu/elevated

Unlike a traditional classroom, an online student won’t get lost in the back row in the online environment. At University College, every course is designed to integrate active and varied teaching strategies. From interactive quizzing to dynamic video discussions, technology has made leaps and bounds since launching our first fully online program in 1996.

“We never employ a tool for the sake of using technology,” said Allison Friederichs, associate dean for academic affairs at University College. “Instead, we strategically choose user-friendly technology to meet the learning objectives of the course.”

As an example, interactive quizzing lets students engage with video content and then take built-in quizzes that are seamlessly embedded in the video. This was successfully used in a Children’s Literature course as a way to increase active viewing, enable measurement, and offer an additional method to assess learning outcomes. We also have a dedicated H5P account, which allows us to build dozens of interactive tools—such as drag-and-drop tasks, flashcards, timelines, and more—into our courses.

These tools are designed to enhance learning and ensure each student has a front row seat to their own education, empowering them to make a difference.

As technology evolves, so will the demands of the 21st century workplace, and these tools help students stay technologically savvy as professionals.

“Students feel liberated to take control over their education within the framework of other demands,” explains Maria Creavin, adjunct instructor in the Healthcare Management program.

“Adding new tools within a course gives students resources that they can use in their work life.”

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CURRICULUM UPDATE

COURSES OF INTEREST

at University College

UAV GROUND SCHOOL

Consider this summer camp for adults! Students head to the mountains for a week to become remote pilots in command and gain hands-on experience using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles for the purposes of geographic information systems.

CULTURE, IDENTITY, POWER

In this course, students build their cultural competency skills and learn the approaches to thinking about culture, identity, and power in professional environments.

FUNDAMENTALS OF SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT

Students learn to be problem-solvers using 21st century supply chain knowledge. As supply chain transforms the future, having the end-to-end knowledge will be a game changer.

WRITING TRADITIONAL VERSE AND CONTEMPORARY SONG LYRICS

Meter and rhyme, repetition, verse and stanza...these are the building blocks of traditional formal poetry and contemporary song lyrics.

Students in this course experiment with different forms.

SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGY

Tweets, likes, shares...oh, my! Students learn how to leverage social media as a tool to communicate with potential and current customers, while also becoming certified in the Hootsuite platform, a social media management and analysis tool.

EXPLORE GRADUATE COURSES universitycollege.du.edu/courses 15

IMPACT YOUR WORLD Your Gift to the University of Denver’s University College Supports Student Scholarships, Innovation Efforts, and Leading-Edge Facilities for Learning

University College Scholarship Fund

University College is pleased to offer Graduate Impact Scholarships designed to benefit highly motivated and engaged adult learners who value education as a way to improve lives and communities both locally and globally. There are also scholarships dedicated exclusively to Bachelor of Arts Completion Program students.

Dean’s Innovation Fund

This fund is used to enhance the student experience through technological advances, timely programming, and leading-edge facilities for learning.

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ucollege.du.edu/givetodu

2019 Graduate: In Her Own Words My family immigrated to the U.S. back in 1993 as refugees fleeing war in Ethiopia. Families in my community didn’t have the luxury of getting a higher education because they had to focus on survival. My parents sacrificed their dreams for so long so that I could have mine and until recently have started to live out theirs. This degree is a testament to that resilience and selflessness. I am immensely proud to walk across the stage, carrying that legacy for my family with both my parents who flew in from California and Ethiopia. I am also surrounded by the love of my extended family, friends, and community to celebrate this accomplishment and remind me that I have strong roots to depend on for the rest of my life.

Hanna Tesfay, Organizational Leadership 2019

thank you TO OUR TOP EMPLOYERS OF RECENT UNIVERSITY COLLEGE GRADUATES

Arrow Electronics Charter Communications CenturyLink Charles Schwab Corporation Comcast Denver Health Envirta Technologies General Electric General Motors Global Click LLC Kaiser Permanente Lockheed Martin National Park Service Oracle Raytheon SCL Health UC Health University of Denver U.S. Government Top employers were identified based on 2015-2018 data from the First Destinations Survey conducted by Career and Professional Development at the University of Denver; self-reported data determined who hired the most University College graduates

LOOKING TO CONNECT WITH ALUMNI?

JOIN PIONEER CAREERS AT DU.ALUMNIFIRE.COM 18

FOCUS FORWARD

NAVIGATING PROFESSIONAL TRANSITIONS Focus Forward is an integrated program exclusively and thoughtfully designed for working professionals looking to make a later career transition. Join others just like you— later career professionals looking for a new direction—to navigate the next steps and create an action plan.

Start with the Planning for Change workshop, in which you’ll explore significant life transitions, examine the 10 important considerations for a successful transition, and develop a plan for moving forward. Workshops begin in October and January.

universitycollege.du.edu/focusforward 19

University College 2211 S. Josephine St. Denver, Colorado 80208