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Building a digital home for Arapaho, one sentence at a time

Rachel Sauer — Mon, 13 Oct 2025 15:54:34 +0000

Building a digital home for Arapaho, one sentence at a time Rachel Sauer Mon, 10/13/2025 - 09:54

Cody DeBos

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ linguistics scholar Andrew Cowell helps Arapaho stories find new life online

The Arapaho words beteen, meaning “sacred,” and beteneyooo, “one’s body,” have a special connection for those who speak the language. Their linguistic similarity isn’t a coincidence.

Andrew Cowell, a University of Colorado Boulder professor of linguistics and faculty director of the Center for Native American and Indigenous Studies (CNAIS), says the Arapaho see it as a lesson encoded in the language. “It indicates that the body is sacred and therefore we have to protect it,” he says.

Such examples of cultural knowledge don’t always survive translation. That’s exactly why Cowell’s belief in the importance of preserving Indigenous languages led him to redirect the entire trajectory of his career.

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ linguist Andrew Cowell, faculty director of the Center for Native American and Indigenous Studies (CNAIS), has partnered with a host of collaborators including CU students, community partners and native speakers to build digital tools to protect and revitalize the Arapaho language.

It’s also why, for the past two decades, he and a host of collaborators including ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ students, community partners and native speakers, have been building digital tools to protect and revitalize the Arapaho language.

Cowell didn’t originally come to ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ to work on Arapaho, but he has long been curious about Indigenous languages, in part thanks to his personal connection to Native Hawaiian culture through his wife.

“Arapaho was the native language of Boulder, so when I got hired at CU I decided, well, I’ll look into Arapaho,” he recalls. “I started looking into Arapaho more and more and doing more work on the side and eventually decided to switch departments into linguistics so I could focus all my energy on indigenous languages.”

Two databases, one goal

Today, Cowell’s work on Arapaho takes two forms: one, an online lexical database; the other, an unpublished, in-depth text database of natural language conversation and narratives.

The lexical database, freely accessible online, functions like a living dictionary. With more than 20,000 entries and a searchable interface, it’s often used by learners across the Arapaho-speaking world in place of print dictionaries, according to Cowell.

But a larger effort has quietly been taking shape behind the scenes.

The text database, which is not publicly released, contains more than 100,000 sentences of spoken Arapaho. Among them are natural conversations and stories recorded over decades.

“At this point, I’ve got over a hundred thousand sentences of natural speaking that I have not only recorded, but also transcribed into written Arapaho, translated into English, and then it has linguistic analysis attached as well,” Cowell explains.

The database is the backbone of several major projects, all with the goal of making learning Arapaho more accessible and preserving it for future generations. One effort is a student grammar dictionary that focuses on the most useful and common words.

“We’ve gotten a list of the frequency of all the nouns in the language and all the verbs," Cowell says. "We ranked those, and it allowed us to produce a really small student dictionary where we only included words that occurred around 40 times or more.

“It means (students) don’t have to flip through rare and uncommon words they’re unlikely to be really interested in as initial learners.”

A pathway for new learners

Beyond the student dictionary, Cowell and his team are working on developing a scaled curriculum for teaching Arapaho. It guides learners from basics to more complex concepts across sequential levels based on real-world language use patterns.

Young Arapaho dancers (Photo courtesy the Wind River Casino)

“We’ve developed 44 steps of knowledge, and even within that there's 23a and 23b and so forth,” he says. “It’s all based on looking at the text we've collected and looking at the frequency of certain kinds of grammatical features that occur.”

Unlike French or Spanish, Arapaho wasn’t historically taught in a classroom but passed down through families at home. Cowell’s team has had to build an instructional framework from the ground up.

“With Arapaho, no one’s really ever tried to teach it as a second language. Now we’re trying to learn it and teach it, and the databases have allowed us to really produce that scaled curriculum,” Cowell says.

Generations of trust

Ensuring that his work isn’t just academic has been a priority for Cowell since the start. The database project is built on decades of trust between himself and the Arapaho community.

“The one thing Native American communities have often had problems with in the past is someone comes in, does their research, then disappears. Then the community is left wondering what they are getting out of it. In some cases, nothing,” Cowell says. “I worked hard to establish that I really want to learn the language and ensure my work is something that will feed back into the community and help out.”

That commitment has led to rich partnerships, sometimes spanning generations.

“We’re close to having 100 different native speakers represented in our data. At this point we’ve got grandparents and now their kids are working on it,” Cowell says.

A worthy effort

From a linguist’s perspective, Cowell explains, Indigenous languages expand our understanding of what language, and indeed human cognition, can do.

“We’re close to having 100 different native speakers represented in our data. At this point we’ve got grandparents and now their kids are working on it.”

“There are many cases in the history of linguistics where people have made a claim like ‘no language could possibly do this,’ and then someone goes to the Amazon and discovers a language that does it,” he says.

More importantly, the motivating force that has kept Cowell working for over twenty years comes from the Arapaho speakers themselves.

He says, “In my experience, Native American communities are very invested in their language. They see it as really crucial, central to their identity.”

That’s why the full text database hasn’t been released publicly, especially with growing concerns about how the data might be used or exploited by artificial intelligence. Still, Cowell and his team are taking steps toward broader access.

A grant from the National Science Foundation will support the release of 5,000 carefully selected sentences from the text database for public use. The snippets, which have been approved by native Arapaho speakers, will be available online with additional computational linguistic labeling.

As for Cowell, he says that even after 20 years, he never tires of seeing the work evolve. He hopes it shows CU students what’s possible when you follow your curiosity.

“You never know where you’re going to end up and what results are going to come out of something. You just have to trust that research is going to turn out to be interesting. You can’t necessarily predict when or where.”

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��ý�Ļ��Ʒ linguistics scholar Andrew Cowell helps Arapaho stories find new life online.

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Top image: "Two Riders Leading Horses" by Arapaho artist Frank Henderson, ca. 1882 (Photo: Metropolitan Museum of Art)

Long live the King in modern music

Rachel Sauer — Wed, 01 Oct 2025 00:51:19 +0000

Long live the King in modern music Rachel Sauer Tue, 09/30/2025 - 18:51

Rachel Sauer

In what would have been B.B. King’s 100^th birthday month, ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ music scholar Shawn O’Neal considers how the legends of blues can be heard in even the fizziest pop of 2025

B.B. King was born to sharecroppers on a cotton plantation in Leflore County, Mississippi, and began his musical career in the church choir, teaching himself to play guitar while listening to the “King Biscuit Time” radio show.

Sabrina Carpenter was born in Quakertown, Pennsylvania, and began posting videos of herself singing Adele and Christina Aguilera songs on YouTube around age 10. As a teenager, she starred in the Disney Channel series “Girl Meets World.”

Culturally and musically, they’re about as different as two artists can be. But if the roots of rock ‘n’ roll and even pop grow from blues—which they do—then it should be possible to hear B.B. King and other legends of blues in the sly pop confections of Sabrina Carpenter.

Shawn O'Neal is a ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ assistant teaching professor of ethnic studies and Center for African and African American Studies executive committee member.

So, Shawn O’Neal, a University of Colorado Boulder musicologist and assistant teaching professor of ethnic studies, cues up Carpenter’s song “Manchild,” currently No. 6 on the Billboard Top 100: “Right away, the first thing I hear is that call and response of where she’s singing something and then answering her own question or statement back to herself,” he notes. “Call and response is such a foundation of blues music—whether Sabrina Carpenter knows that or thinks about it, or even has to, she got that from somewhere.”

Further, he asks, who were some of the first to sing about taking care of business—working all day, making a home at night—while a no-good partner is off catting around? The women of blues.

“They were the first to talk about sexuality, to talk about the issues they were having with their partners, even sometimes to talk about the fact that they were having love interests of the same sex,” O’Neal says. “All of those tropes are very defined in (Carpenter’s) music, and then there’s just that drumbeat, that very four-on-the-floor beat that’s a hallmark of blues. I think you could take that Sabrina Carpenter song and turn it into a blues song very easily.”

And it’s not just Carpenter. Even on current Top 40 lists that seem to owe more to computers and electronics than to the sawdust floors of Delta juke joints, blues touchpoints are audible. B.B. King, who died in May 2015 but would have turned 100 this month, and other legends of blues live in the music of 2025.

“B.B. King, Robert Johnson, Ma Rainey—I hear them in all this pop music,” O’Neal says. “I can’t not hear it, because it’s there; it’s in the DNA.”

‘What they call rock ‘n’ roll’

In 1957, a Hearst interviewer asked rock ‘n’ roll pioneer Fats Domino, “Fats, how did this rock ‘n’ roll all get started, anyway?” and Domino replied, “Well, what they call rock ’n’ roll now is rhythm and blues. I’ve been playing it for 15 years in New Orleans.”

It was an acknowledgment that what felt revolutionary and sonically groundbreaking was actually a long time coming—the latest brick in a long- and well-established foundation.

It’s a direct lineage, O’Neal says: Pop grew from rock ‘n’ roll; rock grew from blues, jazz and gospel; which grew from spirituals and field hollers; and those were first-generation descendants of African musical and narrative traditions brought to North America by enslaved people.

“Spirituals were sung in the cotton fields on the plantations,” O’Neal explains. “People were creating this music as subliminal communication, and the enslavement masters didn’t understand what they were talking about. They had to create a new language, and so much of it was speaking to spirituality—save us, help us, let me find some solace. It comes from pain and struggle and being completely removed from who you are, and we can sugarcoat it and syrup it up, but foundationally that’s where American music is coming from.”

Though the roots of American music are twisting and complex—and also woven of European folk and classical traditions—there’s a through line of African American musical tradition, O’Neal says. Gospel evolved from spirituals and give birth to its lyrically secular offspring of blues, which birthed jazz, rock and pop, as well as the direct descendants that are rap and hip-hop.

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ music scholar Shawn O'Neal notes that blues legends like B.B. King stood on the shoulders of musical giants such as Sister Rosetta Tharpe (pictured above), Lead Belly and Robert Johnson. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

The earliest blues artists began developing a distinctive sound that became known for 12-bar chord progressions—a form based on the I, IV and V chords in a musical key—that are fundamental to the blues genre and are prominent in rock ‘n’ roll, O’Neal says. Classic blues music also followed a pattern of one line being repeated four times in a verse, which 20th-century artists evolved the AAB pattern that became the blues standard: a three-line verse structure in blues music where the first line (A) is repeated, and the third line (B) offers a conclusion or response, often using a "question-question-answer" pattern within a 12-bar blues progression.

Blues legends like B.B. King, who stood on the shoulders of musical giants such as Lead Belly and Robert Johnson and Sister Rosetta Tharpe, experimented with the foundational elements of blues, which also included the “walking bass” rhythms and pitch-flattened “blue notes,” and broadened the sound and scope of the genre. Rock and pop, as well as myriad blues subgenres, were natural progressions, O’Neal says.

Drenched in the blues

Even now, as cross-pollinated and subdivided as music is, O’Neal says, listeners hear the blues regardless of whether they recognize it: “For example, when you think about the foundations of electronic music or EDM, we’re talking about house music, and those DJs were originally playing rhythm and blues records. And in pop, you hear that foundation of disco, and they were also playing soul and rhythm and blues in the clubs.

“None of this music being played today was conjured out of thin air; it’s based on musical traditions that go back 100, 200 years.”

He adds that in hip-hop culture, B.B. King has been sampled from the earliest days of the genre “because those were the records in our parents’ record collections. And obviously it’s never been just Black artists who’ve sampled and built on the blues. If you start at a place like Led Zeppelin, they obviously were heavily influenced by B.B. King and just drenched in blues, Jimmy Page especially. You take songs like ‘Since I’ve Been Loving You’ or ‘The Song Remains the Same’ and slow them down to that really draggy riff—that’s blues.”

When O’Neal has taught students to hear these influences in Reiland Rabaka's Introduction to Hip Hop Studies classes and Critical Survey of African American music, “they come up to me after almost every class saying, ‘I never knew that was in there.’”

The challenge, he says, is respecting the artistic quest for newness and innovation while acknowledging and honoring the foundation on which it lives.

“As an artist, you have to understand that even if you want to think it’s your own original song, it’s still based off things that already happened,” says O’Neal, who also is a renowned DJ and musician. “Taylor Swift? Well, that’s Motown, that’s what she’s doing—three chords, simple progressions, prominent melodies, emotional lyrics. Whether artists now want to acknowledge it or not, the sounds they’re playing started a long time ago.”

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In what would have been B.B. King’s 100th birthday month, ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ music scholar Shawn O’Neal considers how the legends of blues can be heard in even the fizziest pop of 2025.

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Top image: B.B. King playing at the University of Hamburg in November 1971. (Photo: Heinrich Klaffs/Wikimedia Commons)

We Are Art Buffs building an arts community

Rachel Sauer — Thu, 25 Sep 2025 19:40:21 +0000

We Are Art Buffs building an arts community Rachel Sauer Thu, 09/25/2025 - 13:40

Rachel Sauer

At Sept. 17 gathering, representatives of the arts at ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ, in Boulder and across the Front Range built connections in the nascent We Are Art Buffs initiative

First, the question: What is an art buff?

“There is a journey within this question that speaks to the heart of what we are trying to curate,” said John-Michael Rivera, dean of arts and humanities in the University of Colorado Boulder College of Arts and Sciences. “We’re fostering not simply an appreciation of the arts but cultivating a lived and embodied inquiry into the creative. To engage the arts is a trait that all should appreciate in daily life.”

Then the idea: What if ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ was the heart of the arts in Boulder, on the Front Range and in Colorado—a place where every student is supported in creative inquiry; where partnerships are made and strengthened between the university, artists and arts organizations in communities across Colorado and, someday, the nation; where there are infinite paths to the infinite ways of engaging with the arts?

John-Michael Rivera (at podium), dean of arts and humanities, speaks at the Sept. 17 We Are Art Buffs gathering.

So, dozens gathered Sept. 17 in Norlin Library, representing the arts at ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ, in the broader Boulder community and across the Front Range—taking steps and building connections in an initiative called We Are Art Buffs.

“From the very beginning—18 months ago, 19 months ago—we said, ‘Let’s really start talking about the arts at CU and have more pathways and connections with the community around us,’” Rivera said, addressing leaders from organizations including the Museum of Boulder, the Clyfford Still Museum, the City of Boulder Office of Arts and Culture, the Arvada Center, the Dairy Arts Center and many others.

“Right now is a tough time to be an artist, but it’s also a wonderful time to be an artist because the arts are really going to be the place that interprets this world we’re living in right now.”

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ Chancellor Justin Schwartz noted the importance of the arts in “connecting us as people to one another and to ourselves. The arts not only provide richness to our lives, they provide unique and different types of connection to people. The fact that we are such a vibrant arts community is what makes us such a strong community in general.”

A key outcome of the partnerships that will grow through the We Are Art Buffs initiative is strengthening student success, Schwartz added: “We know successful learning experiences outside the classroom are vital to student success. We talk about student success internally, and we’re also going to be looking to our community to help us advance the success of our students.”

With community partnerships, Rivera said, “we can guarantee that our students find their way or, better yet, create new paths as they walk them; whether in the arts or arts-adjacent fields or any profession, our students will show employers what we already know: that creative inquiry transforms every career, transforms every life.

“We owe students a vision of their future, a future with all of us in it.”

“We know successful learning experiences outside the classroom are vital to student success," said ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ Chancellor Justin Schwartz. "We talk about student success internally, and we’re also going to be looking to our community to help us advance the success of our students.”

We Are Art Buffs, Rivera added, also is about creating venues for coming together to create pathways and break down barriers between the university and the community. For those in attendance Wednesday, that could include many things, from the practical to the philosophical—from clearer information about parking on campus to broader access to venues on and off campus, expanded work-study opportunities for students and interdisciplinary research projects.

“We have space that’s available to rent—it’s kind of small but let us know if that’s something you’d be interested in,” said Tracy Travis with The New Local in Boulder. “Or if you’re interested in getting students involved in seeing how a nonprofit runs, seeing how a gallery runs, seeing how you can get the community involved.”

“We would love to open pathways between our student bodies,” said Erin Hauger, professor and chair of visual arts at CU Denver. “We have a great film program; we have a thriving visual arts program that I think has different majors than ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ and we would love to infoshare and love to create different opportunities for students between downtown Boulder and downtown Denver.”

“We’re a giant building, so we have lots of possibilities for partnerships,” said Jen Clements, deputy director of the Dairy Arts Center. “One of the programs we have is our co-production program, which is a mechanism for early-career artists, for emerging artists to get their foot in a venue without the financial risk that is usually associated with getting your foot in a venue… and we also have ample volunteer opportunities always.”

Erika Randall, interim dean and vice provost of undergraduate education, also emphasized the importance of building connections between students and the arts outside of campus: “I have so many folks who are artists at heart or artists in major or art curious, and they only see it as way to extend the time to graduation and a way to disappoint their parents. We need help changing that story, and we need all of you to help in that because we know that the soft skills are not soft, they are hard-won and they are hard-fought.”

While the We Are Art Buffs initiative is in its nascent days, Rivera said that a foundational element is already in place, which is creating venues for coming together “in very perilous times. What is it we want to be as a collective? What is it we want to do for the arts? How are we going to create pathways and break down barriers between the university and the community? I hope this is the beginning of all of us getting together and thinking what we want for the future of Boulder, the future of Colorado, and then becoming a national model.”

Cindy Sepucha (holding microphone), artists and venues program manager for the City of Boulder Office of Arts and Culture.

Collin Parson (laughing), Arvada Center director of galleries and curator, talks with Chris Taylor, executive director of Museum of Boulder.

Jim Walker, ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ Norlin Scholars teaching faculty member

A participant takes notes at the We Are Art Buffs gathering Sept. 17.

Attendees at the Sept. 17 We Are Art Buffs gathering responded to the question "What can we learn from your career experience about how to affect students?"

Did you enjoy this article? Subscribe to our newsletter. Passionate about the arts at ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ? Show your support.

At Sept. 17 gathering, representatives of the arts at ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ, in Boulder and across the Front Range built connections in the nascent We Are Art Buffs initiative.

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Sometimes ‘building back better’ doesn’t include everyone

Rachel Sauer — Mon, 22 Sep 2025 23:14:40 +0000

Sometimes ‘building back better’ doesn’t include everyone Rachel Sauer Mon, 09/22/2025 - 17:14

Cody DeBos

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ researcher Mary Angelica Painter finds that in post-disaster recovery, equity isn’t guaranteed

In the mountains of Colorado outside Boulder, a tight-knit community once made up of mobile homes and modest living has all but disappeared. Now, visitors will find the hills dominated by sprawling new homes and residents of a different tax bracket.

“We were driving through, and it was all these multi-million-dollar homes. A lot of talk about this community having more dogs than people,” Mary Angelica Painter recalls after a recent trip to the town. “It’s a very wealthy, affluent community.”

Painter, a research associate at the University of Colorado Boulder’s Natural Hazards Center, knows the history of this town from the work of scholars in the hazards and disaster field. It was a place where lower-income, often elderly residents leaned on each other for care and social support. But after a devastating flood in 2013, everything changed.

Mary Angelica Painter, a research associate in the ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ Natural Hazards Center, co-authored a paper defining “hazard gentrification” as the process that unfolds when natural hazards destroy a large portion of a community and residents are displaced by wealthier newcomers during recovery and rebuilding.

“After this event, most of the residents were dispersed and displaced. We saw one area where there was supposedly low-income housing, and we were told rent was ‘only’ $1,800 a month. I was like, ‘Wow.’ I had no other term to define it than hazard gentrification,” Painter says.

It’s a familiar pattern she has seen while studying natural hazards and the subsequent recovery efforts of the affected communities.

In an effort to better describe the trend, she recently co-authored a paper defining “hazard gentrification” as the process that unfolds when natural hazards destroy a large portion of a community and residents are displaced by wealthier newcomers during recovery and rebuilding.

Unlike slower-moving forms of gentrification, such as those related to climate change, Painter says hazard gentrification is more rapid and has devastating repercussions.

Defining a new kind of gentrification

The term coined by Painter and her co-authors builds on years of disaster capitalism research—the idea that public and private entities exploit disasters to consolidate power and wealth.

“We often hear the term ‘build back better,’ which leads to the question of ‘build back better for whom?’” she says.

Sustainability gentrification, a similar but unique concept, has been coined recently as well. However, those takeovers tend to happen gradually.

“Hazard gentrification is much faster than other forms of sustainability gentrification,” Painter explains, “so that’s why we really felt the urge to write this short paper and punctuate this specific type of gentrification.”

She also warns that it isn’t a theoretical concern. From New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina to the aftermath of wildfires in Lahaina, Hawaii, the pattern has played out repeatedly.

“We needed to name this phenomenon as its own thing so we can start identifying solutions,” Painter says.

The forces at play

So, what turns a disaster into a reality-altering event for a local community? Painter says the answer is political as much as environmental.

“Disasters stem from social, economic and political choices that leave people in devastation. So, in my mind, disasters are very political.”

After a natural hazard hits, local governments often face pressure to restore services quickly and begin the rebuilding efforts. Much of that push comes from the loudest and most affluent voices in the community.

Structures and infrastructure in Jamestown, Colorado, were significantly damaged by 2013 floods (Photo: Steve Zumwalt/FEMA)

“There is a huge push to build back faster,” Painter says, “and because of that, there are fewer opportunities to involve local community members in the process of making decisions of how it happens.”

When participation is limited, she points out, redevelopment favors those with more money, time and connections. The dynamic also benefits outside investors and developers who are eager to move in where disaster presents an opportunity.

Who gets left behind

For many long-time, even lifelong, residents, rebuilding after a hazard hits simply isn’t an option.

“These populations that are more socially vulnerable tend to either be underinsured or not insured at all against hazards and disasters. They might be living paycheck to paycheck and don’t have the extra income or time to find secondary housing,” Painter says.

“We actually know from research that white affluent people post natural hazard are actually better off after the disaster. They are able to get large insurance payouts, and if their house needs to be rebuilt or refurbished, the value can go up and they can sell it for a profit,” she adds.

Those benefits aren’t present for people who live in mobile homes or manufactured housing, let alone renters. Painter explains that rental assistance is often insubstantial, and renters do not receive the same high priority as homeowners.

The loss of social safety nets, both formal and informal, compounds the trauma for local residents who rely on them.

“They lose their networks of support. There are just so many factors that come together that make it slower or impossible for them to recover,” Painter says.

As a result, many residents find themselves priced out of the place they called home and are left to watch as the area is redeveloped without them.

How some communities push back

Despite the powerful forces at work, hazard gentrification isn’t inevitable. Painter points to a few examples, including Joplin, Missouri; Coffey Park in California; and Seattle’s Duwamish Valley. Here, early and meaningful community engagement helped limit displacement after natural hazards wreaked devastation.

People evacuate West Glenwood Springs, Colorado, in the face of spreading wildfires in 2002. (Photo: Bryan Dahlberg/FEMA)

She notes that Joplin’s story, one close to home, is especially striking. After an EF5 tornado nearly leveled the town in 2011, local leaders mobilized quickly.

“They really self-organized effectively. They were very engaging with the community in the rebuilding process and prioritized not leaving anyone behind,” Painter says.

“Not every community is able to do that in that way, but it was something that really jumpstarted their recovery into a positive life.”

Painter notes that these engagement efforts helped preserve community bonds and gave residents a sense of ownership over the recovery.

“There seems to be much more cohesion and democratization when it comes to rebuilding like that,” she says. “The idea is that you need to bring communities together and let them share their voices. It’s so important.”

What needs to change

The question going forward, Painter posits, is whether policymakers will make bold choices to prevent displacement before the next hazard strikes.

“You can’t be prioritizing the stuff you’ve been prioritizing. If in the past it was something like economic development at the harm of lower-income and marginalized residents, that can’t be the way you go forward,” she says.

In other words, more equitable recovery efforts must start with a cultural shift in how communities allocate resources. New policies promoting rent control, expanded insurance and better disaster assistance for renters can all help lower the burden in the wake of a hazard.

“People need to understand the idea of sacrifice for their neighbors,” she says.

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ’s Natural Hazards Center is working to bridge the gap between research and real-world solutions.

“We aren’t just a research apparatus,” Painter says. “We’re also a connecting body. It’s important that we as researchers connect with policymakers and decision makers and are solution oriented.”

As climate change fuels more frequent and intense natural events, hazard gentrification will become more common. Naming the problem is just a first step, but also a necessary one. From there, Painter hopes society collectively adopts an action mindset.

“We need to find ways to be equitable and to provide for and support our communities, and to have plans for if there’s devastation, too. Academics are really good at identifying problems. However, we need to focus on how we actually solve these problems and how we can use our positions to vocalize and advocate for those solutions.”

Justin Stoler, Ethan Sharygin and Sameer Shah also contributed to this paper.

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��ý�Ļ��Ʒ researcher Mary Angelica Painter finds that in post-disaster recovery, equity isn’t guaranteed.

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Top image: Lahaina, Hawaii, was devastated by August 2023 wildfires. (Photo: State Farm/Wikimedia Commons)

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ scholar helps unite Navajo culture and modern science

Rachel Sauer — Tue, 26 Aug 2025 22:43:38 +0000

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ scholar helps unite Navajo culture and modern science Rachel Sauer Tue, 08/26/2025 - 16:43

Cody DeBos

Kelsey John’s Navajo-centered Horses Connecting Communities initiative offers culturally relevant, practical education about horses

When Kelsey John left Oklahoma to pursue her PhD in New York, she quickly started missing a central piece of her lifestyle: horses. Raised in an environment rooted in horse culture, John’s life is deeply intertwined with the animals.

“I am a citizen of the Navajo Nation, and I am a lifelong horse person,” she says. “Both sides of my family had horses in their background, so I grew up with a lot of exposure to them and education about them.”

As she studied away from home, Kelsey John, a ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ assistant professor of ethnic studies, felt a strong pull to return home and rediscover the close relationship with horses she once had.

As she studied away from home, John, a University of Colorado Boulder assistant professor of ethnic studies and Center of the American West affiliate, felt a strong pull to return home and rediscover the close relationship with horses she once had. That realization inspired her doctoral research and gave birth to a community organization centered on the profound bonds between humans, horses and the environment. Ultimately, it led her back to her community to spearhead a unique initiative called Horses Connecting Communities.

Blending cultural traditions and modern science

Originally started as a one-day conference, Horses Connecting Communities quickly became a cherished gathering, providing Navajo people with culturally relevant and practical education about horses.

“The goal was to kind of braid those things together and just make it a really Navajo-centered event for the needs of the Navajo people and their horses. That’s where it all started, and it’s grown since then,” John says.

Events hosted by the organization typically include speakers, demonstrations, and hands-on workshops on horse care, training and veterinary skills. They are often led by Navajo experts like John, who return to their community to share their specialized knowledge.

“We’ve also partnered with a different camp that’s been happening on the Navajo Nation for over 10 years now called Song of the Horse Camp, which is organized by the folks at the University of Arizona,” says John.

“Since we partnered with them, we’ve been able to introduce more equine facilitated learning, which helps either youth or adults with academic skills, life skills, personal communication, confidence building, body language awareness … all these different interpersonal and personal skills in a new and different way,” she adds.

Horses, land and Navajo identity

At the heart of Horses Connecting Communities is the understanding that horses, land and Navajo cultural identity are inseparable.

“Something really unique about horses is that, in order to have a relationship with them, you’re kind of inevitably having a relationship with the land as well,” says John. “Because we are an indigenous community, we have a deep relationship with our ancestral land.”

She also emphasizes how Navajo traditions and modern equine science are not opposing ideas, but natural complements to each other.

“There is a great effort among the horse community in the Navajo Nation to understand and integrate our cultural beliefs with the best and most current science,” John explains. “I’ve had the huge privilege of being able to work with lots of professionals who are also tribal members so they can personally and in a communal way integrate tradition with relevant science.”

“There is a great effort among the horse community in the Navajo Nation to understand and integrate our cultural beliefs with the best and most current science,” says ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ scholar Kelsey John. (Photo: Kelsey John)

Working ‘with,’ not ‘on’

John’s approach to relationship building through Horses Connecting Communities emphasizes the ethical necessity of working hand-in-hand with indigenous communities rather than just researching them. Her organization exemplifies this with a collaborative and sustained partnership that is directly shaped by the Navajo people’s needs and aspirations.

“The idea is making your research relevant and useful to the community and keeping that ongoing relationship and ongoing presence,” she says.

But community partnerships can still be complex, John acknowledges.

“There’s always going to be a power differential between a university—even a university researcher such as myself—and a community. You’re always dealing with power and access to resources and sometimes even conflicting ideas of what’s beneficial.”

Yet, despite these challenges, the rewards of genuine community-based collaboration inspire John to keep coming back for more.

“It’s been almost nine years now since I started my research, but I still work with a lot of the same people that I worked with for the first Horses Connecting Communities event. We’ve brought in new people and changed our programming and are always evaluating if what we’re doing is relevant,” she says.

John adds, “But it always goes back to what I learned in that initial research about what the horse means to the people, what they want, and what are the challenges they’re facing, then finding ways to support that.”

Looking ahead

Thanks to recent support in the form of a ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ PACES Grant, Horses Connecting Communities will further explore equine facilitated learning tailored to the Navajo community.

“We want to understand what the needs of the tribe are and if they can be met through this unique educational approach,” John says.

She is also excited about organizing specialized events for Navajo women that recognize culturally significant beliefs about their relationships with animals and the land.

John’s ultimate aspiration, however, goes beyond education and research. She hopes her initiative will inspire a deeper appreciation for horses, their care and the Navajo people’s enduring relationship with these animals.

“The big thing is to really be aware of the legacy and the significance of the horse and the people’s relationship with the horse—and the land, too,” she concludes. “There’s such a long history there, and I’m so glad to be a part of the larger narrative about horses.”

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Kelsey John’s Navajo-centered Horses Connecting Communities initiative offers culturally relevant, practical education about horses.

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Couple helps send cyclists on a ride to remember

Rachel Sauer — Thu, 21 Aug 2025 18:29:14 +0000

Couple helps send cyclists on a ride to remember Rachel Sauer Thu, 08/21/2025 - 12:29

Bradley Worrell

The Buffalo Bicycle Classic’s Little Buff ride is a family-friendly excursion that is notable for its aid station hosted by longtime volunteers Tyler and Marcia Forman

Just past the halfway mark on the 10-mile Buffalo Bicycle Classic Little Buff ride, as cyclists pass through a quiet residential neighborhood and turn a corner that leads to the next stage in the ride—this one running along South Boulder Creek—riders first catch a glimpse of the event’s aid station.

Marcia and Tyler Forman have sponsored the Little Buff ride aid station since the family-friendly route of the Buffalo Bicycle Classic ride debuted in 2007. The aid station is located next to the Forman’s home, which is at about the halfway point on the 10-mile ride.

But it quickly becomes apparent that this is not just any ride aid station. There is a parked Kona Ice van with helpers offering a dozen flavors of shaved ice to delighted young (and adult) riders, there is a face painter creating colorful works of art and there is a balloon artist festooning young riders with inflatable swords, oversized hats, giant butterflies or whatever creations riders can imagine.

“We decided that if we were going to do it, we wanted to make it memorable for kids and their families,” says Tyler Forman, who along with his wife, Marcia, has overseen the Little Buff ride aid station since the family-friendly ride was added to the Buffalo Bicycle Classic (BBC) lineup in 2007.

Although neither of the Formans attended the University of Colorado Boulder or work for the university, they say they were happy to help support an event that provides scholarships for CU students when their longtime friend and BBC organizer, Henry “Woody” Eaton, asked if they would consider volunteering. As it happens, their home in Boulder is strategically located near the halfway point for the Little Buff ride and relatively close to the campus, so the area behind their home worked as the perfect location for a rest stop, the couple says.

About the Buffalo Bicycle Classic

Year founded: 2003

Number of course rides offered: 7 road cycling courses; 2 gravel cycling courses

Courses offered: Little Buff: 10 miles; Mary’s Loop: 35 miles; Half Century: 50 miles; Carter Lake: 70 miles; Epic 75: 75 miles; Buff Epic: 100 miles; Century Foothills: 100 miles; Gravel Buff: 44.5 miles; and Gravel Epic: 53.1 miles or 59.2 miles

This year’s event: Sept. 7

Amount raised for scholarships since 2003: $3.9 million

BBC scholarships funded since start: More than 450 students

BBC scholarships: $4,000 to students, renewable if they maintain full-time status and a 3.0 GPA. Additionally, an endowment provides $10,000 annually to three third- or fourth-year students in the College of Arts and Sciences, also renewable under the same conditions.

Learn more about the BBC

“As Woody explained it to us, the aid station would include portalets and a water station, and it would be a place where the kids and their families could stop to rest and refresh,” Tyler says. “So, I said, ‘Woody, let Marcia and I noodle on this and see if we can come up with a way to make it more fun for the little kids.’ That’s truly how the thing started; it was just: ‘Let’s see if we can make more of it than just water and portalets.’”

All in for the Little Buff ride

The Formans immediately threw themselves into the endeavor: They engaged the services of a friend who does face painting; Tyler hired a balloon artist who he met by chance on the Pearl Street Mall, where the man was crafting balloon creations for mall pedestrians; and in the early days of the event, the Formans rented a small snow cone machine the day before the ride and stocked up with several bags of ice.

“In the early years, we made the snow cones ourselves, and it was fun, but it was a bit chaotic because it was just the two of us with one small snow cone machine and—having never made a snow cone in our lives—it probably wasn’t the best quality,” Tyler says with a laugh. “We’ve since found a commercial snow cone truck that shows up the day of the event, and they do a much better job. They have something like 12 flavors, and it’s great for the kids because they know what they’re doing.”

Why snow cones?

“With the event being in early September, it’s not always hot, but it’s warm enough, so we wanted to offer a nice treat, and it needed to be something we could pull off ourselves,” Tyler says. “It just seemed like a kid-friendly thing to do, along with having a balloon maker and face painter.”

Although the couple will miss this year’s Sept. 7 ride, because they will be celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary in Europe, they have already made arrangements for the aid station to be staffed. Historically, the couple have been on-hand each year to oversee the aid station, which typically draws between 125 and 150 riders, the couple estimates.

“Each year, we get a mix of riders; some brand new and some returning,” Marcia says. “Many times, the returning riders will say, ‘We’re so glad you’re here again,’ which is always nice to hear.”

The balloon artist is a favorite with small children, who eagerly ask him to create inflatable swords, oversized hats, giant butterflies or whatever other creations they can imagine. (Photo: Tyler and Marcia Forman)

“I’m out there taking pictures every year, and Marcia and I like to talk with the riders,” Tyler adds. “And while we probably don’t need to promote it any more than we do, I’m out there yelling, ‘Free snow cones!’ and encouraging people to stop.

“I get a kick out of the fact that the parents are often a little embarrassed to get a snow cone. I always try to encourage them. I’ll say, ‘When’s the last time you had a snow cone?’ and a lot of times they say, ‘Oh, it’s probably been at least 20 years.’”

The riding trail next to their house is also a popular walking trail, so Tyler says he makes it clear to any passersby that they are welcome to the hospitality offered by the aid station.

“Anyone who comes by is always welcome to help themselves,” he says. “I’m not going to try to monitor who helps grabs to a cool drink or a snow cone. Who cares?”

Aid station largely unchanged since inception

Other than upgrading from a snow cone machine they operated themselves to the one operated by Kona Ice, the Formans says their aid station has remained virtually unchanged over the years.

“It’s been so well received by the riders, so I don’t know what else we would add or change,” Marcia says.

The Formans say they enjoy talking with riders on the day of the event. In addition to expressing thanks for sponsoring the aid station, some cyclists will ask about the giant, 100-year-old cottonwood tree in the couple’s backyard, while others with knowledge of the area will inquire if they lived in the home several years ago when a 100-year flood overfilled the banks of the South Boulder Creek, swamping nearby homes. (They did live there at the time; they say the flood waters made their house uninhabitable for about six months until they could get the damage remediated.)

On occasion, the couple also get requests for Neosporin or Band-Aids from riders who took a tumble during the ride, so they always stock up on first aid supplies in advance of the ride.

Prior to each year’s Little Buff ride, Tyler says he typically spends a few hours coordinating with the Little Buff organizers to confirm details of the ride route and when to expect riders, while Marcia Forman spends about as much time making arrangements with the vendors who run the face painting, balloon making and Kona Ice truck operations.

The Formans pay for the services of the painter, balloon maker and Kona Ice truck themselves, but say it is small price to pay to support the event.

In addition to the aid station services offered by the Formans, students from the CU President’s Leadership Class staff a table at the ride station that provides other snacks, including breakfast bars, fruit and sports drinks.

Todd Gleason, ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ College of Arts and Sciences dean emeritus and a BBC founding director, praises the Forman’s dedicated service to operating the Little Buff Ride aid station every year.

“Tyler and Marcia Forman have financially and logistically sponsored the Little Buff aid station adjacent to their home on Gapter Road since the addition of the Little Buff route in 2007,” he says. “Buffalo Bicycle Classic co-founder and A&S alum Henry ‘Woody’ Eaton developed the route and collaborated with fellow cyclist Tyler Forman to create what has become the most creative and family-friendly aid station of any bike ride that I know of.”

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The Buffalo Bicycle Classic’s Little Buff ride is a family-friendly excursion that is notable for its aid station hosted by longtime volunteers Tyler and Marcia Forman.

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Telling the stories of loss and healing

Rachel Sauer — Wed, 13 Aug 2025 21:52:08 +0000

Telling the stories of loss and healing Rachel Sauer Wed, 08/13/2025 - 15:52

Kathryn E. Goldfarb and Lucas Rozell

Colorado’s Marshall Fire survivors find healing and meaning through oral history project

The Colorado Marshall Fire killed two people and destroyed over 1,000 structures on Dec. 30, 2021.

The news cycle has long since moved on, but people impacted by the fire are still recovering. Part of that process is through storytelling.

The Louisville Historical Museum, which is located 10 miles east of Boulder, later joined by collaborators from the University of Colorado Boulder Anthropology Department, initiated the Marshall Fire Story Project to preserve the stories of people affected.

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ researcher Kathryn Goldfarb is an associate professor of anthropology.

“This is the first time we’ve actually sat down and taken this long to talk about it,” said Lisa Clark, one contributor to the project. “’Cause we’re always like, ‘(people) have better things to do. You don’t wanna hear our pain. You don’t wanna hear our stories,’ you know. But yeah, it’s been nice to do it.”

All project contributors are quoted using their real names.

We are a cultural anthropologist and qualitative researcher who are collaborating with the Louisville Historical Museum on the Marshall Fire Story Project. Broadly, we are each involved with research that explores the importance of personal and community narratives for well-being.

However, the Marshall Fire Story Project is not a research project. We have no research questions. Contributors are simply invited to share what they would like about the fire.

While this project embraces the specificity of individual experiences, recent destructive fires in Maui, Hawaii, and Southern California show that the work we are doing is needed in many other locations.

Why oral history?

Recounting personal experiences is critical to the historical record.

Oral history has also become recognized as a powerful method for healing after trauma, both for individuals and larger community groups. Talking about traumatic events may be painful. However, narrative also facilitates meaning-making, strengthens ties within communities, and contributes to social justice efforts.

By telling their own stories in their own words, participants in the Marshall Fire Story Project shape what is remembered and how it is remembered.

Contributors to the project had diverse objectives in sharing their stories. Many welcomed the opportunity to contribute to the historical record, which Jessica Rossi-Katz described as “a record of experience.” Another contributor wanted to share their perspective as a lower-income person. Others mentioned the relevance of local stories as they apply to a global context of climate change.

As wildfires become ever more common, the themes that came up in the oral histories are increasingly relevant to community members, policymakers and scholars alike.

Stories of loss

Two people lost their lives in the fire, along with over 1,000 pets.

“I’d take losing my stuff over losing them,” said Anna Kramer, when describing the loss of her neighbor’s dogs. Kramer, an artist, did lose her stuff, including the majority of her artistic works.

Remediation workers clean the garage of Gigi Yang, a collaborator for the Marshall Fire Story Project. Due to concerns about toxins from smoke and ash residue in their homes, many residents opted for smoke remediation and deep cleaning of their homes. (Photo: Gigi Yang)

Abby McClelland’s family was away from their house when it burned.

“For a while I was really upset that we weren’t there and didn’t get a chance to take anything,” McClelland said. “And the more I think about what we would’ve taken, the more I’m like, that stuff is dumb.”

The family was able to replace their vital records and passports within weeks.

“But things like, you know, my grandmother’s rings or the Champagne cork from our wedding reception. Like things that I would’ve thought, oh, that’s so silly to evacuate that, those are the truly irreplaceable things.”

Mary Barry said the “fire was the ultimate downsizer.” She reflected on the objects she had lost – her daughter’s baby pictures, her sewing machines, a collection of books bound in blue and gold.

The fire also took Barry’s pet turtles, one of whom her husband had kept for over twenty years.

“Losing (a) house is like losing a person, where you mourn the loss of your comfort,” Barry said. This was particularly true in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, where people’s homes were their entire environment during quarantine.

Many of those whose homes did not burn suffered a different kind of ambiguous loss. Their homes were damaged by smoke, which carried with it heavy metals, hazardous chemicals and volatile organic compounds.

Shana Sutton’s family stayed in a hotel for six months while their home was being remediated. Like many others, much of the family’s belongings were deemed nonsalvageable.

“In my head,” Sutton recounted, “I was like, okay, I’m just going to pretend that they all burned.”

Concern with health impacts

As she watched the smoke from a distance, Brittany Petrelli told her brother on the phone, “I can smell how devastating this fire is.” Petrelli, a project contributor involved with the recovery effort, recounted that the fire smelled “like things that shouldn’t be burning. Rubber, plastic building materials.”

Residents with concerns about outdoor and indoor air quality as well as soil and water contamination contacted scientists at the University of Colorado Boulder, who, along with scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Chemical Sciences Laboratory, conducted air quality sampling. Ultimately, the publicized data for outdoor air quality showed little difference from other urban areas.

Residents whose homes survived but were affected by smoke continued to note symptoms such as sore throats, coughs and stinging eyes for six months and then one year after the fire.

Like others whose homes were damaged by smoke, Beth Eldridge had difficulty obtaining insurance coverage for mitigation. After she attempted to clean char and ash on her own, she experienced persistent health impacts.

After the Marshall Fire, area residents created notes of support for friends and neighbors at the Louisville Public Library; the notes were displayed in the library windows. (Photo: Louisville Historical Museum)

“Being part of an HOA (Home Owner’s Association) should give you two buckets of insurance,” Eldridge explained, “but in reality, everyone is divided and the system makes individuals fend for themselves. My insurance wouldn’t take any responsibility. The HOA insurance wouldn’t take any responsibility. … I was sick and I couldn’t get better and I needed help.”

Accounts from the project highlight uncertainty that remediated personal items were “really clean” – as Shana Sutton shared, it “makes you crazy.” Many people spoke of dissatisfaction with a lack of standards for remediation. Current standards, not specific to wildfires, do not engage the epidemiological and toxicological effects of fire byproducts, although experts in the field recognize these dangers.

Precarity and community solidarity

Being underinsured was a persistent theme in project stories, and some people recounted how negotiating with their insurance companies literally became a full-time job. After the fire, lower-income community members found themselves in an even more acute state of financial uncertainty.

A number of mutual aid groups sprung up in the aftermath of the fire, and several of those groups shared their stories with the project. Meryl Suissa started the Marshall Fire Community group on Facebook, which worked to help families replace items lost in the fire.

“I think what we’ve learned is like, yes, people are okay and they’re strong and they’re resilient and they’re gonna continue fighting,” Suissa said. “But we still have a long way to go to help them heal.”

Kate Coslett, who ran Operation Hotel Sanity, also highlighted how the community came together to contribute to organizations like hers, which delivered home-cooked meals to displaced residents.

“So many volunteers, hundreds of volunteers,” she said. “It’s September (2022), and there are still people making meals. It’s incredible … their empathy and their love, this community is just, I have goose bumps.”

Yet recovery means different things to different people. As Abby McClelland noted, there is a difference between “trauma on the individual level and trauma on the collective level.”

“I can rebuild the house,” McClelland said, “but I can’t rebuild all the houses in the neighborhood, and I can’t plant all the trees, and I can’t, you know, reopen all the businesses. I can’t reverse the trauma in the area. I can only control what’s inside my house. It’s hard to know what’s going to happen on that larger level, and how long that’s going to resonate.”

Like others who shared their accounts with the project, McClelland highlighted a necessity for policy change and governmental actions to prevent further climate-related disasters.

“Individuals can’t solve systemic problems,” she said.

Future of the project

For a community historical museum whose motto is “Be a part of the story,” first-person records constitute valuable resources for both the present and the future.

Our team is currently preparing written and oral project contributor submissions for archiving in a publicly accessible platform. In partnership with Marshall Together and the Community Foundation Boulder County, we are documenting recovery and rebuilding experiences as residents return to their homes.

The first storytellers in our project spoke of trauma and despair, but also gratitude for community. What will future stories tell us as neighbors continue to reunite and adjust to how the community has changed after the Marshall Fire?

This article was written in collaboration with Sophia Imperioli, museum associate – Public History & Oral History, and Gigi Yang, museum services supervisor of the Louisville Historical Museum.

Kathryn E. Goldfarb is an associate professor of anthropology at the University of Colorado Boulder. Lucas Rozell (MAnth'24) is a research assistant on the CU Anschutz Medical Campus.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Colorado’s Marshall Fire survivors find healing and meaning through oral history project.

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Top photo courtesy the Louisville Historical Museum

It takes a village of mothers

Rachel Sauer — Wed, 13 Aug 2025 20:56:42 +0000

It takes a village of mothers Rachel Sauer Wed, 08/13/2025 - 14:56

Sona Dimidjian and Anahi Collado

How mothers supporting mothers can help fill the health care worker shortage gap and other barriers to care

For generations, women have relied on informal networks of friends, family and neighbors to navigate the complexities of birth and motherhood. Today, research is finally catching up to what generations of women have known: Peer support can be a lifeline.

Despite growing evidence, the unique wisdom and strength that arise when mothers help mothers has been surprisingly under‑explored in the scientific literature, but that’s beginning to change. Peer-delivered programs are beginning to bring together long-standing community traditions and structured, evidence-based approaches to support the mental health of new and expectant moms.

We are clinical psychologists at the University of Colorado Boulder Renée Crown Wellness Institute. Our work and research weaves together psychological science and the wisdom of mothers supporting mothers. Our program, Alma, supports women in restoring well-being in ways that are community-rooted, evidence-based and scalable.

Through the Alma program, researchers Sona Dimidjian (left) and Anahi Collado (right) aim to support women in restoring well-being in ways that are community-rooted, evidence-based and scalable.

Pressure on parents

Nearly 50% of parents report feeling overwhelmed by stress on most days. An even larger share, about 65%, experience feelings of loneliness, according to a 2024 report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. These feelings hit mothers especially hard, the report says.

In 2025, mothers in the United States continue to shoulder most of the caregiving of children while also managing work, personal health and household responsibilities. The transition to motherhood is often marked by emotional and psychological strain. In fact, 10% to 20% of women experience depression during pregnancy, the postpartum period or both. Depression is one of the most common complications of childbirth. A similar number of women also face significant anxiety.

In many communities, mental health resources are scarce and stigma around mental health issues persists; therefore, many mothers are left to navigate such challenges alone and in silence. Antidepressants are widely prescribed, but research suggests that many women stop using antidepressants during pregnancy – yet they don’t start therapy or an alternative treatment instead.

Psychotherapy is the most preferred care option among new and expectant mothers, but it is often inaccessible or nonexistent. This is due in part to a workforce shortage of mental health providers.

The shortage has contributed to long wait times, geographic disparities and cultural and language barriers between providers and patients. This is especially true for underserved populations. In fact, more than 75% of depressed mothers do not receive the care they need.

Science of peer support

The science of peer support is part of a larger field exploring community health workers as one way to address the shortage of mental health providers. Peer mentors are trusted individuals from the community who share common experiences or challenges with those they serve. Through specialized training, they are equipped to deliver education, offer mental health support and connect people with needed resources.

A study that analyzed 30 randomized clinical trials involving individuals with serious mental illness found that peer support was associated with significant improvements in clinical outcomes and personal recovery. Researchers have proposed that peer support creates space for learning and healing, especially when peers share lived experience, culture and language.

In 2025, mothers in the United States continue to shoulder most of the caregiving of children while also managing work, personal health and household responsibilities. (Photo: Shutterstock)

As clinical psychologists, we heard from mothers in our work and communities that wanted to help other moms recover from depression, navigate the challenges of motherhood and avoid feeling alone. This insight led us to co-create Alma, a peer-led mental health program based on behavioral activation.

Behavioral activation is a proven method for treating depression based on decades of randomized clinical trials, including in new and expectant mothers. It helps new and expectant mothers reengage in meaningful activities to improve mood and functioning.

The Alma program

Alma is based on the principle that depression must be understood in context and that changing what you do can change how you feel. One strategy we use is to help a mother identify an activity that brings a sense of accomplishment, connection or enjoyment – and then take small steps to schedule that activity. Mothers might also be guided on ways to ask for help and strengthen their support networks. Alma is offered in English and Spanish.

Peer mentors typically meet with moms once a week for six to eight sessions. Sessions can take place in person or virtually, allowing flexibility that honors each family’s needs. Traditionally, peer mentors have been recruited through long-standing relationships with trusted community organizations and word-of-mouth referrals. This approach has helped ensure that mentors are deeply rooted in the communities they serve. Alma peer mentors are compensated for their time, which recognizes the value of their lived expertise, their training and the work involved in providing peer mentoring and support.

“This was the first time I felt like someone understood me, without me having to explain everything,” shared one mother during a post-program interview that all participants complete after finishing Alma.

To date, more than 700 mothers in Colorado have participated in Alma. In one of our studies, we focused on 126 Spanish-speaking Latina mothers who often face significant barriers to care, such as language differences, cost and stigma. For nearly 2 out of 3 mothers, symptoms of depression decreased enough to be considered a true, measurable recovery — not just a small change.

Notably, most of the depression improvement occurred within the first three Alma meetings. We also observed that peer mentors delivered the Alma program consistently and as intended. This suggests the program could be reliably expanded and replicated in other settings with similar positive outcomes.

A second study, conducted through a national survey of Spanish-speaking Latina new and expectant mothers, found that peer-led mental health support was not only perceived as effective, but also highly acceptable and deeply valued. Mothers noted that they were interested in peer-led support because it met them where they were: with language, trust and cultural understanding.

Supporting mothers works

Supporting mothers’ mental health is essential because it directly benefits both mothers and their children. Those improvements foster healthier emotional, cognitive and social development in their children. This interconnected impact highlights why investing in maternal mental health yields lasting benefits for the entire family.

It also makes strong economic sense to address mood and anxiety disorders among new and expectant mothers, which cost an estimated US$32,000 for each mother and child from conception through five years postpartum. More than half of those costs occur within the first year, driven primarily by productivity losses, preterm births and increased maternal health care needs.

Beyond the impact on individual families, the broader economic toll of untreated mood and anxiety disorders among new and expectant mothers is substantial. For example, it’s estimated that $4.7 billion a year are lost to mothers who have to miss work or reduce their job performance because of symptoms like fatigue, anxiety and depression.

Together – as individuals, families, communities and institutions – we can cultivate a world where the challenges of parenting are met with comprehensive support, allowing the joy of parenting to be fully realized. Because no one should have to do this alone.

Sona Dimidjian is director of the Renée Crown Wellness Institute and a professor of psychology and neuroscience at the University of Colorado Boulder. Anahi Collado is a ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ assistant research professor of psychology.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

How mothers supporting mothers can help fill the health care worker shortage gap and other barriers to care.

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'Your love will be your legacy'

Rachel Sauer — Wed, 23 Jul 2025 13:30:00 +0000

'Your love will be your legacy' Rachel Sauer Wed, 07/23/2025 - 07:30

Sarah Kuta

Losing her father to pancreatic cancer inspired ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ undergraduate Giovanna Ruffolo to raise money for cancer research and pursue a career in medicine

Giovanna Ruffolo was a senior in high school when her dad died of pancreatic cancer.

While other students were looking forward to prom and graduation, Ruffolo was navigating a web of tangled emotions—shock, disbelief, sadness, anger, uncertainty.

“Losing a parent is probably the most intense pain someone can feel in their entire life,” she says. “It’s a terrible, terrible pain.”

Giovanna Ruffolo (second from right) with her brothers Leo (left, a 2024 ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ graduate) and Joey (second from left, a CU Denver student) and their mom, Rosanna. (Photo: Giovanna Ruffolo)

Mostly, though, she just felt numb. Heading off to college so soon after her father’s death was the last thing she wanted to do. But she knew education was important to her dad, so she pushed through the pain and enrolled at ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ.

Now a senior studying integrative physiology and psychology, Ruffolo is preparing for a career in medicine so that, someday, she can help support families just like hers. She hopes to work in pediatric oncology, providing compassionate care to children who are fighting cancer.

As a Buff, Ruffolo is also honoring her father’s legacy by raising money and awareness for cancer prevention research, an initiative she started just after her father got his diagnosis.

“I just want people to know they have a support system and a network that hates cancer as much as they do—that they’re not alone,” she says.

Helping others

Life was rolling along for the Ruffolo family when they got the news that would change their lives forever. In 2017, their beloved patriarch, John Ruffolo, was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, a disease that is often fatal.

“It hit us like a bus,” says Ruffolo.

Pancreatic cancer is the third-leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the United States, according to the National Institutes of Health. Between 2015 and 2021, the five-year survival rate was just 13.3 percent—much lower than other types of cancer. In 2025, the American Cancer Society estimates 67,440 people will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and 51,980 people will die from the disease.

“It’s the cancer that really gives cancer its bad name,” Ruffolo says.

Prospect Ridge Academy High School Students participate in a cancer fundraiser organized by Giovanna Ruffolo in 2019. (Photo: Giovanna Ruffolo)

Ruffolo was just 14 at the time, but she felt compelled to take action. As a sophomore at Prospect Ridge Academy High School, she created TeamRuffolo, a student-led initiative to raise money and awareness for cancer research.

In November 2018, her school hosted a “Purple Out”—a one-day event in which students were encouraged to wear purple to show their support for the cancer community and donate whatever they could toward prevention research. Students, teachers and administrators raised more than $1,000 for the American Cancer Society that day, and Ruffolo went home feeling inspired and hopeful.

She organized similar fundraisers at her high school in 2019 and 2020 (though the initiative had to go virtual because of the COVID-19 pandemic).

“It was such a wonderful feeling,” she says. “A lot of these people didn’t even know my dad, but they were still so supportive. Seeing people come together not only for him, but just to say, ‘You’re not alone,’ was tremendous for all of us.”

Balancing act

Meanwhile, despite undergoing various treatments and surgeries, her father’s cancer continued to progress. Four years after his diagnosis, he succumbed to the disease in January 2021 at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Center.

Ruffolo was utterly devastated, but she knew she had to finish high school and get a college degree for her dad. And, wherever she ended up next, she wanted to continue her awareness-raising and fundraising events to support other cancer patients and their families.

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ participants run in the Stronger Together Annual 5K at CU in 2024, the event's most successful year. (Photo: Giovanna Ruffolo)

At ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ, Ruffolo has thrown herself into her studies, with an ultimate goal of working in the medical field. From her father’s experience, Ruffolo learned first-hand that cancer affects more than just the body—it also influences a patient’s mind, spirit and emotions. With that in mind, she’s majoring in integrative physiology and psychology to create her own pre-health pathway.

“My father had trouble grasping being diagnosed with a terminal disease, as anyone rightfully would,” she says. “I want to understand people’s behaviors and thoughts better, so that when someone is going through a hardship, I can better support them.”

To further build her skill set, Ruffolo also completed CU’s emergency medical technician (EMT) program, an online, non-credit specialization that prepares students for national registry testing. She has also worked as a research assistant at ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ and Children's Hospital Colorado.

In addition, Ruffolo has taken on a leadership role with the ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ chapter of the American Medical Student Association, spending three years on the executive board before being elected president for the 2025-26 school year. Through the student group, Ruffolo has carried on her TeamRuffolo efforts—now called Stronger Together—by organizing 5-kilometer run/walk events to raise money for the American Cancer Society.

She is also a journey leader with New Student & Family Programs, where she helps incoming freshmen navigate the ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ experience. Balancing her studies with her extracurricular activities—while also supporting her family and honoring her father’s legacy—has been challenging. But, for Ruffolo, it all comes back to staying true to herself.

“Pretty much my tippy-top value is helping others,” she says.

In class, Ruffolo has never been afraid to ask questions and speak up—even when that means talking about her father’s death in a large lecture hall full of hundreds of students. Jennifer Stratford, a ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ teaching associate professor of psychology and neuroscience, says Ruffolo’s willingness to be vulnerable has opened the door for other students to share their experiences.

John Ruffolo died from pancreatic cancer in 2021. (Photo: Giovanna Ruffolo)

“She just kind of became an ambassador and a face for students who have lost parents,” says Stratford. “I’ve had a lot of feedback from students about how much they appreciated her bravery and how much they identified with some of the struggles she’d been through. It’s a once-in-a-decade or once-in-a-lifetime experience to see a single student have an impact on so many of her classmates.”

‘Your love will be your legacy’

Since high school, Ruffolo estimates she’s helped raise more than $20,000 for the American Cancer Society. And she’s not done yet. She hopes the ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ AMSA chapter will continue organizing the 5K run/walk fundraisers, and that she’ll be able to host similar events during the next phase of her educational journey.

For now, Ruffolo is focused on finishing up her studies so she can graduate in the spring of 2026. From there, she hopes to continue her education in the medical field, likely as a doctor or physician assistant specializing in pediatric oncology.

“I really want to serve that specific community,” she says. “You’re treating little people who have lots of emotions and a little body. They get very scared easily. You really have to be empathetic and treat them and their families with kindness. I love the idea of sitting down with people, holding their hands, talking to them—not just giving them a death sentence, walking out the door and saying, ‘Best of luck.’”

That approach stems directly from her father’s experiences. As he neared the end of his life, Ruffolo remembers him breaking down and talking about how scared he was. She hopes to be the kind of practitioner who will help people like her dad move forward through their pain and fear, while also treating their underlying illness.

“Your love will be your legacy,” she says. “In a world where there’s no cure for cancer, investing your time in others is the only way you can live forever. And loving other people—giving them kindness and empathy—is one of the best ways to help fight any disease.”

Losing her father to pancreatic cancer inspired ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ undergraduate Giovanna Ruffolo to raise money for cancer research and pursue a career in medicine.

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Top image: Giovanna Ruffolo (right) and her late father, John, representing Colorado cancer patients and survivors at Mile High Stadium at an event sponsored by the American Cancer Society in 2019. (Photo: Giovanna Ruffolo)

Baker brings delicious sustainability to the table

Rachel Sauer — Tue, 15 Jul 2025 13:30:00 +0000

Baker brings delicious sustainability to the table Rachel Sauer Tue, 07/15/2025 - 07:30

Cody DeBos

Gregor MacGregor, assistant teaching professor of environmental studies, focuses on local economies and environmental justice in his Vulcan Mine Bakery

On a quiet street in Lafayette, Colorado, the smell of rosemary and fresh bread often drifts from a solar-powered oven just before dawn. It’s where you’ll find Gregor MacGregor, a University of Colorado Boulder assistant teaching professor with the Masters of the Environment Graduate Program in the Department of Environmental Studies and the online Outdoor Recreation Economy program, conducting a carefully orchestrated dance of timers, dough balls and donut boxes.

His micro-bakery is a far cry from the courtroom or a university lecture hall, where he also spends his time. But to MacGregor, there’s a through line to it all: caring for the planet and the people in his community.

Gregor MacGregor, a ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ assistant teaching professor of environmental studies and a water attorney, began baking bread with his daughters during COVID lockdowns and eventually opened Vulcan Mine Bakery. (Photo: Gregor MacGregor)

“During the COVID lockdown, I was looking for activities to do with my daughters. As my wife characterizes it, we baked a loaf of bread and a dozen donuts, then decided to open a bakery,” he says.

That spontaneous project eventually became Vulcan Mine Bakery. The name, a nod to the former coal mine near his home, reflects MacGregor’s dedication to environmental awareness.

Sustainability you can taste

MacGregor brings his experience as a water attorney and former U.S. Army officer to the bakery in many ways. Having extensively researched circular economies, he built Vulcan Mine Bakery as a truly local operation.

“My milk comes from a dairy in Longmont, I use duck eggs from a farm in Lafayette, I purchase Colorado sugar beet sugar and my grain comes from a farm in Hugo that I mill in house,” he says.

Even the energy source is intentional. Vulcan Mine’s singular oven is powered by rooftop solar panels. MacGregor sees these choices as essential not just for sustainability, but for flavor—and education.

He says, “The public imagination hasn’t quite adopted the fresh food, farm-to-table movement for baked goods yet. That changes when you let someone take in a breath of freshly milled flour.”

Operating under Colorado’s Cottage Foods Act (CFA) helps MacGregor keep his overhead low and his connections local.

“The CFA unlocks opportunities for entrepreneurs to experiment, grow their chops and see if moving on to a food truck or brick-and-mortar store makes sense for them,” he says.

MacGregor adds, “We should explore every avenue to help locals succeed so we all have options to spend and keep money in our communities, with people we care about, and with people who care where our food comes from.”

In summer 2025, Gregor MacGregor spent about two weeks in Ukraine baking bread with Kharkiv’s Hell’s Kitchen organization, supplying about 900 meals and 1200 rolls a day to hospitals, refugees and other groups. (Photo: Gregor MacGregor)

Flour and fellowship

For MacGregor, food is also a tool for justice.

“Food justice is absolutely a part of environmental justice—having the basic necessities to survive at the low end and having the opportunity to participate in the system in a culturally and economically significant way at the high end,” he says.

MacGregor embraces the opportunity to live out this philosophy through Vulcan Mine Bakery and regularly donates baked goods to those in need.

In 2021, MacGregor created a special menu of Afghan and American treats for newly arriving families of Afghan refugees.

“I got to visit some of the families with their sponsors to share food and stories. It was an incredible way to meet our new neighbors and help them feel welcome,” he says.

MacGregor’s service work also extends far beyond Colorado’s borders.

“Last summer, I spent about two weeks in Ukraine baking bread with Kharkiv’s ‘Hell’s Kitchen’ organization. We supplied about 900 meals and 1200 rolls a day to hospitals, refugees and other groups. We also drove and delivered food, medicine and clothing out into the countryside to villages in need,” he says.

As someone who has spent years working in environmental law and teaching policy, MacGregor is acutely aware of the systems that shape equity and resilience. Baking has given him a new way to get involved.

“Very few people smile when you show up as an attorney, but almost everyone smiles when you show up as a baker,” he says.

A taste of history

MacGregor’s loaves do more than just nourish. Thanks to his interest in holiday baking, they also spark curiosity and conversations about heritage.

Inspired by an old cookbook titled Celebration Breads, MacGregor often bakes traditional and seasonal recipes that let customers taste the intersection of history, culture and community.

“There’s a recipe for the boozy Hartford Election Cake, which I have not seen baked anywhere else, but which used to be a vital part of early-American democracy,” he explains.

“Like many of our other celebratory breads, it contains a great amount of cultural history within it that relates to the why and when of our consumption.”

Lessons from a loaf

Though Vulcan Mine Bakery is now a part of MacGregor’s daily life, it hasn’t replaced his identity as a champion of the environment. It’s only strengthened his desire to have an impact.

“I love baking because I get to work with my hands, chat with people and see how much they appreciate my bread. I think that last bit, the connection with others and serving them, is what really makes it worthwhile,” he says.

MacGregor sees his bakery as an extension of his environmental teaching, a chance to live out sustainability and connection in a tangible way. He also encourages others to look for similar opportunities in their own lives.

“If you already have a skill, you can probably put it to good use for yourself and others,” he says. “There is great need in the world, but you don’t need great means to have an impact.”

In 2021, Gregor MacGregor created a special menu of Afghan and American treats (shown here) for newly arriving families of Afghan refugees.

For Gregor MacGregor (left, making donuts with his wife, Kelly, and daughter Madeleine), baking is a family affair. He and his daughters began making bread during COVID lockdowns, which eventually led to opening Vulcan Mine Bakery.

Inspired by an old cookbook titled “Celebration Breads,” Gregor MacGregor often bakes traditional and seasonal recipes that let customers taste the intersection of history, culture and community.

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Gregor MacGregor, an assistant teaching professor of environmental studies, focuses on local economies and environmental justice in his Vulcan Mine Bakery.

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