Research

CU ��ý�� philosopher building a bridge to Africa

Rachel Sauer — Tue, 09 Dec 2025 22:11:46 +0000

CU ��ý�� philosopher building a bridge to Africa Rachel Sauer Tue, 12/09/2025 - 15:11

Cody DeBos

Associate Professor Ajume Wingo was recently appointed as a research associate at the Center for Philosophy in Africa at Nelson Mandela University, a recognition of his decades of scholarship

For a young Ajume Wingo growing up in Nso, a northwestern region of Cameroon, philosophy wasn’t a topic relegated to ancient Stoics or the halls of academia.

“Philosophy was not an abstract pursuit. It was a living practice woven in everyday life,” says Wingo, an associate professor of philosophy at the ��ý��. “As a child I was surrounded by elders who transmitted their wisdom to me through storytelling, through rituals, through symbols, through ceremonies. That had deep philosophic meaning.”

That early foundation shaped not just how Wingo views philosophy today, but also how he practices it. He values using lived experience as a starting point and working toward the abstract, rather than the other way around.

Ajume Wingo, a CU ��ý�� associate professor of philosophy, was recently appointed as a research associate at the Center for Philosophy in Africa at Nelson Mandela University.

“I start from life, and then I go up. That’s the way I think about philosophy as a living practice. As life,” he explains.

Looking beyond our circles

Recently, Wingo’s philosophical journey has taken a major step forward.

In October, he was appointed as a research associate at the Center for Philosophy in Africa at Nelson Mandela University in South Africa. The role recognizes his decades of scholarship and offers a new platform for expanding international research collaborations between African and Western thinkers.

“At a personal level, it’s a recognition many years in the making. It gives me the opportunity to work collaboratively at the international level, to act like a bridge between Western philosophy and African philosophy,” Wingo says.

His appointment is the result of a personal connection with Nelson Mandela University that has grown over many years. Wingo had previously delivered lectures across South Africa, but his keynote speech in April 2024 at Nelson Mandela University titled “In the Shade of Power” sparked something more.

“Many of the students from the university came up to me after. They wanted to exchange numbers and work with me and all that,” Wingo recalls.

During that same visit, he also participated in many broader conversations around ethics and justice in business alongside thinkers and industry leaders from across Africa.

Wingo’s research draws on both his formal training and his cultural roots in Cameroon. That dual grounding allows him to explore concepts through multiple lenses, he says, from Western theories of justice to African communal models of governance.

“Philosophy reflects the lived experience of the people that philosophers are dealing with,” he says. “And that already gives us some kind of differentiation.”

For Wingo and the kind of political philosophy he practices, Nelson Mandela University is a natural home.

“The Nelson Mandela University is named after Nelson Mandela, who was a victim of apartheid and who came out with a lot of compassion and reconciliation,” he says.

Take the concept of freedom.

In Western political philosophy, Wingo says, freedom is often defined as the absence of interference or constraint. But he says that idea doesn’t translate well into many African contexts.

“The African perspective on freedom is the presence of the right kind of associations. The presence of the community, of belonging. The more you belong, the more you are associated with people, the more freedom you have,” Wingo explains.

He says this contrast extends to views on politics, citizenship and even the role of blood and kinship in shaping identity. Where Western models may emphasize choice, contract and individual rights, African perspectives tend to view community as organic and identity as inherited.

“Politics from the African perspective has always been about … these bounded people in this place with a story, real or imagined, deciding for themselves how they should live,” Wingo says.

By bringing these frameworks into the conversation, he hopes to “humanize” politics and offer new ways of asking questions that might help us understand global and regional challenges. However, he warns that conversation can only happen when philosophers are willing to look outward.

“Philosophy itself is a kind of death when it is inward looking,” Wingo says. “Some of the time I worry that philosophy is becoming like a ghetto … a bunch of people sitting around talking among themselves about themselves.”

“You miss a lot when you’re inward looking, when you keep asking the same thing over and over again. And you gain a lot when you open up to the rest of the world.”

He believes true philosophical vitality comes when thinkers “communicate across the mighty mountains and across the vast oceans,” adding, “That’s philosophy at its best.”

Becoming a bridge

For now, Wingo hopes his appointment at Nelson Mandela University can serve as a bridge, both for his own work and for the CU ��ý�� community. He’s already planning faculty and student exchanges between the two institutions as well as an international symposium and conferences in both Colorado and South Africa.

“Even just the idea of me being there is exciting. Many people will learn about CU ��ý�� because of me and will get to hear a new perspective on philosophy,” he says.

That kind of cross-cultural exchange is good for the discipline, helping to shape the ideas born of those who practice it.

“To learn about your culture, you should make it foreign to you by learning about the cultures of other people,” Wingo says, paraphrasing Aristotle. “And in that way, you learn about your culture, not just the cultures of other people.”

In a world facing increasingly global challenges, Wingo believes that philosophers must rise to the moment. He says asking bold questions, ones that defy norms and societal comforts, is the only way we can overcome today’s biggest obstacles.

“You miss a lot when you’re inward looking, when you keep asking the same thing over and over again,” he says, “And you gain a lot when you open up to the rest of the world.”

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Associate Professor Ajume Wingo was recently appointed as a research associate at the Center for Philosophy in Africa at Nelson Mandela University, a recognition of his decades of scholarship.

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Top photo: Hu Chen/Unsplash

Wally the Wollemi finds a new home

Rachel Sauer — Mon, 01 Dec 2025 14:30:00 +0000

Wally the Wollemi finds a new home Rachel Sauer Mon, 12/01/2025 - 07:30

Rachel Sauer

CU ��ý�� alumni Judy and Rod McKeever donate a tree once considered extinct to the EBIO greenhouse, giving students a living example of modern conservation

Wally probably doesn’t know he’s a dinosaur.

He’s just living his best life in a bright spot—but not directly sunny, he doesn’t like that—in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology greenhouse on 30th Street.

This guy! Talk about charisma. People have certain stereotypes and expectations for what he should be, and he defies them. For starters, he’s here and not, after all, extinct.

Yes, Wally the Wollemi is something special—a Cretaceous Period pine tree thought to have gone extinct 2 million years ago, rediscovered in a secluded Australian canyon in 1994 and, with a few steps in between, recently donated to the greenhouse.

. “Where we are right now with climate change, we’re losing plants and animal species and insect diversity at an extremely rapid rate, so as scientists and horticulturists and curators it’s our job to maintain the diversity of the world in collections, and Wally is an important part of that," says Malinda Barberio, EBIO greenhouse manager.

“The Wollemi pine is an interesting story about paleobotany as well as conservation,” explains Malinda Barberio, greenhouse manager. “Where we are right now with climate change, we’re losing plants and animal species and insect diversity at an extremely rapid rate, so as scientists and horticulturists and curators it’s our job to maintain the diversity of the world in collections, and Wally is an important part of that.”

Back from extinction

How Wally came to live in a quiet spot in the 30th Street greenhouse is a story that started in the Cretaceous. Scientists theorized that herbivorous dinosaurs living then dined on Wollemi pines, which belong to a 200-million-year-old plant family and are abundantly represented in the fossil record dating as far back as 91 million years.

Where they weren’t abundantly represented was in the living world. They were theorized to have gone extinct, living only in stone impressions.

However, in 1994, New South Wales (Australia) National Parks ranger David Noble was rappelling in a remote canyon about five hours west of Sydney when he happened upon a stand of pine trees unlike anything he’d seen before. They had fern-like foliage, distinctive bumpy bark and a dense, rounded crown. They towered over other trees in the canyon.

“Typically, you think of pines as Christmas tree-shaped, fairly triangular, so that dense top crown that’s very rounded is a little odd for pines,” Barberio says. “And you typically expect large, fluffy branches, but the Wollemi’s branches are covered in thicker, flat needles that are in two rows parallel to each other along the sides of branches, which is really distinctive.”

Intense scientific investigation followed Noble’s discovery, including comparison to the fossil record, until it was agreed: This was the Wollemi pine—back from extinction.

Follow Wally and his friends in the greenhouse at @CU��ý��EBIOGreenhouse on Instagram.

The ongoing threat of extinction loomed large, though, because there were fewer than 100 trees in that canyon, whose location remains a closely guarded secret. So, in 2006, and in an unusual partnership between the National Geographic Society, the Floragem plant wholesalers, conservationists, botanists and scientists, 10-inch Wollemi pines were offered for sale in National Geographic’s holiday catalog.

“You are now the owner of a tree that is a survivor from the age of the dinosaurs, a miraculous time traveler and one of the greatest living fossils discovered in the twentieth century,” began the catalog description of the 10-inch saplings selling for $99.95.

That’s what caught Judy McKeever’s attention.

A tree named Wally

“My husband (Rod) does bonsai and loves his bonsai garden, so when I saw the advertisement for National Geographic selling these trees, and it was a love story about finding a dinosaur in an Australian canyon, I thought it would be the perfect addition to his collection,” recalls McKeever (A&S’76). “But he never got bonsaied or really trimmed at all, and just kind of grew out of control.”

The couple named him Wally because it sounds like Wollemi, and he lived in a sheltered, south-facing spot on their ��ý�� deck in the summer and under a grow light in their basement in the winter. Between seasons, they toted him up and down the stairs—and every year he was bigger.

CU ��ý�� alumni Judy and Rod McKeever donated Wally the Wollemi pine tree to the EBIO greenhouse in October.

“We didn’t really do anything special, just treated him like every other plant we have,” McKeever says. “He lived a sheltered little life, occasionally got fertilized, and he was very happy. We just let him do whatever he wanted to do; he’s an Australian free spirit.

“We just loved Wally, but he grew a few inches every year and with the soil and pot, he just got to be too heavy to take down to the basement every winter.”

In early autumn, McKeever began looking for places that might be interested in adopting Wally and found the EBIO greenhouse. There was an element of homecoming since both Judy and Rod are 1976 CU ��ý�� graduates (Rod in chemical engineering); Wally would be staying in the family.

“We are very happy to bring Wally into our collection,” Barberio says. “For the university to have a Wollemi pine is a really special privilege. It allows students to have an example of conservation efforts that are modern and recent in history and shows them that they have the opportunity to participate in these efforts as well.”

Plus, she adds, Wally is a great opportunity for public outreach: People can schedule time to visit him in the greenhouse and see science, conservation and worldwide partnerships at work. And students in future paleobotany classes will be able to see just how close scientists and artists got in visually rendering the Wollemi pine from fossil evidence.

“It’s surprisingly accurate how well they were able to reproduce (Wollemi pines) in theory,” Barberio says. “We have all of these animals and plants that are extinct, and having this living example is a really cool way to show how close we got it.”

A part in plant diversity

As for the care and feeding of Wally, who actually isn’t only male since pines produce both male and female cones, he likes acidic soil and bright but not direct light, given that he’s prone to sunburn. He likes regular watering and doesn’t like his soil to completely dry out, but he also dislikes “wet feet,” or for the bottom layer of soil to be damp.

Because his very few wild relatives live in a protected canyon, it may be implied that Wollemi pines prefer protection from rapid temperature changes, Barberio says, adding that so far, he’s shown no signs of producing cones.

“We would love to have Wally produce cones in the future,” she says, “and of course we would try to plant and grow them.”

Until that time, Wally the Wollemi pine will be a signature plant in the greenhouse collection and an example, Barberio says, “that we can play a part in maintaining the diversity of the plant world.”

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CU ��ý�� alumni Judy and Rod McKeever donate a tree once considered extinct to the EBIO greenhouse, giving students a living example of modern conservation.

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CU ��ý�� launches research initiative with Israeli and German partners

Rachel Sauer — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 23:13:49 +0000

CU ��ý�� launches research initiative with Israeli and German partners Rachel Sauer Tue, 11/18/2025 - 16:13

Collaboration between the Department of History, Open University of Israel and Berlin’s Center for Research on Antisemitism brings scholars and graduate students together in joint research

Scholars in the ��ý�� Department of History recently launched a first-of-its-kind international research initiative to bring U.S., Israeli and German graduate students and scholars together to partner on collaborative research.

The partnership is between CU ��ý��, the Open University of Israel (OUI) and the Center for Research on Antisemitism (ZfA) at the Technical University Berlin (TU Berlin), and this semester the three institutions launched a tri-university graduate course on modern German-Jewish ego-documents, or autobiographical writings, team-taught by faculty across all campuses.

The course, which is currently underway, brings together students and professors from the United States, Israel and Germany in a hybrid format that blends synchronous Zoom meetings and asynchronous Canvas Networks coursework with an intensive, eight-day in-person seminar in Berlin that ended last week.

Thomas Pegelow Kaplan (standing, wearing glasses) and students from CU ��ý��, Open University of Israel and the TU Berlin work with ego-documents at the archives of the Jewish Museum Berlin last week. (Photo: Thomas Pegelow Kaplan)

The initiative originated in spring 2024 discussions between Thomas Pegelow Kaplan, professor and Louis P. Singer Endowed Chair in Jewish History, and Guy Miron, OUI vice president for academic affairs and faculty member in the Department of History, Philosophy and Judaic Studies. They envisioned creating a research program that would connect U.S. and Israeli students and scholars through collaborative, cross-cultural study, Pegelow Kaplan says.

He adds that OUI, which was founded in 1974 with an open admissions model and a distance-learning structure intended to democratize access to higher education, is an ideal research partner because it serves one of Israel’s most diverse student populations, ranging from ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities to Druze and Israeli Arabs. In the wake of the upheavals following October 7, 2023, he says, this diversity made OUI an especially compelling partner for a project aimed not only at academic cooperation but also at fostering understanding among students from different backgrounds.

The CU ��ý�� Graduate School and Department of History were early champions of the partnership, Pegelow Kaplan says, and discussions soon expanded a dual partnership between CU ��ý�� and OUI to include the ZfA at TU Berlin. Established in 1982 and rooted in a university founded in 1770, the ZfA is one of the world’s leading centers for the study of antisemitism. Its recent launch of an interdisciplinary MA program added further momentum to the emerging partnership, Pegelow Kaplan says.

Expanding a research network

A key piece of the initiative is the recently completed in-person seminar in Berlin, which is home to Germany’s largest Jewish community and is a global center for Jewish and Holocaust studies and served “as a living classroom,” Pegelow Kaplan says. Participants worked directly with archives and institutions, including the Jewish Museum Berlin and the New Synagogue Berlin–Centrum Judaicum. Students met with leading scholars, archivists, memory activists, city officials and Jewish community representatives for learning and broad-ranging discussion.

The seminar coincided with Germany’s annual commemoration of the November 1938 anti-Jewish pogroms, also known as Kristallnacht —events that marked a turning point in the Nazi regime’s persecution of Jews. Students served as “participatory observers,” analyzing contemporary memory practices during the commemorations as part of their research.

The CU ��ý�� Department of History, Graduate School, Research and Innovation Office and Benson Center, as well as several new donors who joined the trip as auditors, contributed to student travel costs for the Berlin seminar.

Pegelow Kaplan emphasizes that the Berlin seminar was the first step of many. Plans are already underway for future course offerings, an international conference in Berlin in June 2026, expanded research trips—including, once conditions allow, to Jerusalem—and broader disciplinary participation extending beyond the humanities and social sciences into fields such as engineering.

The initiative also aims to establish exchange pathways to bring Israeli and German students and faculty to ��ý�� and to send CU affiliates abroad for both short- and long-term stays. More ambitious possibilities, including joint degree programs, are being explored, Pegelow Kaplan says.

Throughout its development, the project has remained closely aligned with CU ��ý��’s mission, he says, to be “a global research and education leader intent on transforming individuals, communities and the entire human experience.”

As this international partnership grows, Pegelow Kaplan says he and his colleagues in Israel and Germany are aiming to make it not only a model of collaborative scholarship but also an avenue for fostering meaningful connections among students navigating a rapidly changing world.

Professor G. Miron (left, gray jacket) of Open University/Yad Vashem introduces students to the most pertinent debates at the House of the Wannsee Conference Memorial in Berlin. (Photo: Thomas Pegelow Kaplan)

Program participants at the Gleis 17 Memorial in Berlin, which commemorates the 50,000 Berlin Jews deported to their death in the East. (Photo: Thomas Pegelow Kaplan)

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Collaboration between the Department of History, Open University of Israel and Berlin’s Center for Research on Antisemitism brings scholars and graduate students together in joint research.

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Top image: CU ��ý�� MA students working with archival collections at the Centrum Judaicum in Berlin. (Photo: Thomas Pegelow Kaplan)

Meet the scientist who stumbled into the cold—and stayed

Rachel Sauer — Mon, 17 Nov 2025 14:30:00 +0000

Meet the scientist who stumbled into the cold—and stayed Rachel Sauer Mon, 11/17/2025 - 07:30

Clint Talbott

John Cassano, professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences at CU ��ý��, lead scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center and fellow at CIRES, recently returned from his 15th research trip to Antarctica

The first time John Cassano flew to Antarctica, he found the 12-hour commercial flight from Los Angeles to Auckland, New Zealand, uncomfortable. Then he boarded a C-130 cargo plane bound for Antarctica.

“Put me on a commercial plane in a middle seat for 12 hours,” he says, chuckling. “I’ll take that over being in a cargo plane any day.”

John Cassano, a CU ��ý�� professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences and self-described "weather weenie," has been pursuing research in Antarctica since 1994.

That was January 1994. Cassano was 25 and a graduate student who had agreed to work on a project installing weather stations in Greenland and Antarctica. He figured he’d go once, check Antarctica off his list and move on with life. Thirty years later, he’s still going back.

Cassano did not plan to be a polar researcher. Growing up in New York, he imagined a career in architecture—something tangible, predictable. But a freshman weather class at Montana State University changed everything. “I decided architecture wasn’t for me.”

Meteorology seemed a better fit. Montana State didn’t offer meteorology, so Cassano earned an earth science degree and headed to graduate school at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, intending to study storms. Then came an invitation from Charles Stearns, professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences, asking if Cassano would be interested in working on a project in Antarctica.

“I had no real interest in the polar regions,” Cassano admits. “But I wasn’t going to pass up the chance to go to Antarctica once.”

That “once” became a career. After two field seasons with Stearns, Cassano pursued a PhD at the University of Wyoming, focusing on Antarctic meteorology. Today, as a professor in the ��ý��’s Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, he has lived about a year in Antarctica over the course of 15 trips there.

Cassano is also lead scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center and a fellow at CU ��ý��’s Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences.

'A weather weenie at heart'

The science keeps him coming back. Cassano’s work explores how the atmosphere behaves in Earth’s most extreme environments—knowledge that underpins climate models and weather forecasts worldwide.

The adventure is also alluring. “I’m a weather weenie at heart,” he says. “I like experiencing extremes—strong winds, big snowstorms, really cold temperatures. Antarctica gives me that.”

He recalls standing in minus 56°F air, frostbite nipping his fingers as he launched drones. “I enjoy experiencing those conditions,” he says. “I wouldn’t want to camp in a tent for months like the early explorers, but I like the challenge.”

John Cassano (right) and then-fellow graduate student Mark Seefeldt (left), now a research scientist in Cassano's group at CIRES, on their first trip to Antarctica in 1994. (Photo: John Cassano)

Cassano’s contributions have helped reshape polar science. In 2009, he led the first U.S.-funded drone research campaign in Antarctica, opening new ways to measure the atmosphere where traditional instruments fall short.

“Drones let us probe the boundary layer—the part of the atmosphere that exchanges heat and moisture with the surface,” he explains. “That’s critical for understanding climate.”

Earlier, as a postdoctoral researcher at Ohio State University, Cassano helped modernize Antarctic weather forecasting. The Antarctic Mesoscale Prediction System, launched in 2001, transformed flight safety.

“When I started going down in the ’90s, forecasters were confident about eight hours out,” he says. “Now it’s five days. That’s huge.”

That’s a big change for several reasons, not the least of which is that an eight-hour forecast could change from the time a plane left Christchurch, New Zealand, and got closer to Antarctica. Planes often had to turn around mid-flight back then, Cassano recalls.

Witnessing dramatic changes

Cassano has witnessed dramatic changes in three decades of research.

Arctic sea ice has declined about 40 percent in recent decades. Antarctic sea ice, once at record highs, now hovers at record lows. Ice shelves are collapsing.

“These changes matter,” he says. “They alter the temperature gradient between the tropics and poles, which drives global weather. Even if you never go to the polar regions, it affects the storms you experience.”

Meanwhile, fieldwork isn’t all adventure. “Emotionally, it’s hard,” Cassano says. “When I was single, I didn’t mind being gone for months. Now, being away from my wife and daughter is tough.”

Comforts are few: shared dorm rooms, institutional food and the knowledge that if something happens at home, he can’t leave. “Once you’re there in August, you’re stuck until October.”

But Cassano treasures the Antarctic community—a self-selecting group of scientists and support staff who thrive in isolation. “You don’t wind up in Antarctica by mistake,” he says.

“Everyone wants to be there. Contractors work six-month stints and spend the rest of the year traveling. It’s like living in a travelogue.”

Kara Hartig (left), CIRES visiting fellow postdoc, and John Cassano (right), in Antarctica during the 2025 research season. (Photo: John Cassano)

He loves the stories: a mechanic who spent his off-season trekking through South America, a cook who had just returned from hiking in Nepal. “You hear all these amazing experiences,” Cassano says. “It’s like living inside a travel magazine.”

Behind every scientific breakthrough lies a vast support system. “I can focus on science because others make sure I have food, water, transportation and a warm place to sleep,” Cassano says. “That infrastructure is critical.”

Cassano worries about the cost of fieldwork and the ripple effects of recent disruptions. “Field projects are expensive,” he says. “COVID and a major McMurdo Station rebuild created a backlog. My project was supposed to be in the field in 2021—we went in 2025. NSF is still catching up.”

Federal priorities are a concern in the current political climate, but Cassano suggests that Antarctic research might be less vulnerable than other kinds of federally sponsored science.

“Antarctic research has always had a geopolitical dimension,” Cassano notes. “The Antarctic Treaty encourages nations to maintain scientific programs. It’s how you keep a seat at the table.”

Constant curiosity

For Cassano, mentoring is particularly rewarding. “I love bringing new people down,” he says. “Seeing Antarctica through their eyes makes me excited again.” On his latest trip, he watched a young researcher, Kara Hartig, CIRES visiting fellow postdoc, as she experienced the ice for the first time. “Her enthusiasm reminded me why I do this.”

That excitement ripples outward. After Cassano shared photos in class, a former student emailed, saying, “I’m on my way to Antarctica to work as a chef at McMurdo,” the largest research station on the continent.

“He just wanted to experience it,” Cassano says. “I think that’s awesome.”

Cassano’s curiosity remains undiminished. On his latest trip, when drones failed to arrive, he improvised with van-mounted sensors, uncovering puzzling temperature swings across the ice shelf.

What might we learn from the data? “It hints at important processes,” he says. “Now we need to go back and figure out why.”

After three decades, Cassano still marvels at the complexity of the atmosphere—and the urgency of understanding it. “Increasing our knowledge is broadly beneficial,” he says. “And for me, it’s just fascinating.”

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Top image: Sunset over the Royal Society Range (background), sea ice in McMurdo Sound (mid-ground) and McMurdo Station from John Cassano's 2025 Antarctic trip. (Photo: John Cassano)

Readers still traveling through the wardrobe to Narnia

Rachel Sauer — Mon, 10 Nov 2025 21:11:45 +0000

Readers still traveling through the wardrobe to Narnia Rachel Sauer Mon, 11/10/2025 - 14:11

Bradley Worrell

Marking its 75th anniversary this autumn, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe has become a cultural touchstone for fantasy and faith, says CU ��ý�� religious studies Professor Deborah Whitehead

When it was first published in 1950, few could have imagined the lasting impact that The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by author C.S. Lewis would have 75 years later—not only on children’s literature, but also on religious thought and popular culture, says Deborah Whitehead, associate professor and chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the ��ý��, whose focus includes religion and its intersection with media and popular culture.

The book’s broad appeal today is even more impressive considering that when it debuted the initial response was muted, as fairy tales and fantasy at the time were viewed as indulgent and only appropriate for very young readers. At the same time, fellow Oxford scholar and Lord of the Rings author J.R.R. Tolkien, also one of Lewis' best friends, was famously critical of Lewis’s approach to fantasy, Whitehead says.

CU ��ý�� scholar Deborah Whitehead, associate professor and chair of the Department of Religious Studies, studies religion and its intersection with media and popular culture.

“Tolkien is the consummate world builder. He creates these entire races with their own kinds of distinctive personalities, characteristics and languages and these very detailed backstories in his books,” she notes. In contrast to the detail Tolkien took to differentiate elves, dwarves and hobbits with their own attributes and personalities, the fauns, centaurs and other creatures inhabiting The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe were fairly indistinguishable personality-wise, she says.

Additionally, Lewis didn’t attempt to provide the same level of detail about Narnia’s history as is found about Middle-earth in The Lord of the Rings books.

“I think one of Tolkien’s criticisms of Lewis’s book is there is no backstory,” Whitehead says. “For Tolkien, I think he was a little perplexed at the less exacting nature with which Lewis built his story.”

Book enjoys wide appeal

Still, Lewis’s looser structure may have been precisely what allowed his story about the magical world of Narnia to be more approachable, especially for young readers, Whitehead says, noting that while it’s possible to read The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as a Christian allegory, the story can be appreciated simply as enjoyable fantasy.

“It’s a great example of how a text can mean different things to different audiences, depending upon how it’s framed,” Whitehead says. “The Narnia books, since their publication, have had this broad-based appeal. There is a way to appreciate them as children’s literature and fantasy literature and to enjoy the characters and the story and not take the Christian theological elements as foreground—even though they are there.

“I think that’s exactly how Lewis intended them to be. He said he intended for the books to make it easier for children to accept Christianity when they are older and for the books to provide the ‘seed beds’ for ideas about atonement and faith, which you can see in the figures of Aslan the lion and Lucy, respectively.

“But at the same time, he was not intending for the books to be didactic or only read within a religious context, so they do have that broad appeal,” she adds.

While many Christian readers interpret Narnia as allegory, Lewis himself described it as a “supposal”—a reimagining of what it might look like if Jesus were incarnated in a different world. Whitehead says Aslan, the noble lion, is a clear Christ figure, sacrificing himself for Edmund, one of the four siblings magically transported from World War II Britain to Narnia via a magical wardrobe.

Lewis’s decision to depict Christ as a lion rather than a lamb is significant, Whitehead says, because both are biblical, but the lion conveys majesty, power and triumph in battle—qualities that she says align with Lewis’s vision of Christianity’s victory over the forces of evil, as personified by Aslan’s victory in battle over the evil White Witch.

In the 75 years since it was first published, C.S. Lewis' The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe has had a lasting effect on children’s literature, religious thought and popular culture. (Image: original book cover by illustrator Pauline Baynes)

Lewis in his time—and ours

Starting with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Lewis went on to write six additional books in the series, which came to be known as the Chronicles of Narnia. He also wrote several works of Christian apologetics, perhaps most notably Mere Christianity, which resulted from a series of BBC radio addresses he gave to the British public during World War II in defense of Christianity.

“In those addresses, he’s representing Christianity as this shared cultural and moral heritage that was a bulwark against the forces of evil that, to him, were very active in world during World War II in the form of the Nazis,” Whitehead says. “His radio addresses during the war were very popular, and he sort of became the public face of British Christianity as someone who reinterpreted Christianity for a 20th century audience.”

In his day, Lewis was an exemplar of high-church liberal Anglican Christianity and ecumenism, but Whitehead says the image of Lewis has morphed over time. Evangelical Christians came to embrace the British academic and lay Anglican theologian as a defender of the faith in an increasingly secular world, interpreting his works as tools for spiritual formation and cultural resistance. By the 1970s, his works—including the Narnia series and Mere Christianity—became staples in Christian bookstores, in part contributing to their continued popularity, she says.

Gender and race in Narnia

While The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe has been celebrated for its imaginative storytelling and how it conveys biblical concepts in approachable ways, in more recent years it has also faced scrutiny for its portrayals of gender and race.

One of the most vocal critics of Lewis’s work is Philip Pullman, author of the fantasy trilogy His Dark Materials, who has described the Narnia books as “monumentally disparaging of women.” Whitehead acknowledges the series is largely male-dominated, with female characters often relegated to secondary roles or portrayed in stereotypical ways.

Separately, in the Narnia book The Horse and His Boy, some scholars have taken issue with the depiction of the evil Calormenes as conquest-driven, dark-skinned savages and culturally “other,” possibly reflecting colonialist ideas. In that book, Aslan destroys Narnia rather than allow the Calormenes to conquer it, Whitehead notes.

These critiques potentially complicate Lewis’s legacy. While he was progressive on certain social justice issues within the context of liberal Christianity, Whitehead says his work also reflects the bias of his time—particularly in its idealization of British culture and Christianity as the pinnacle of civilization.

Theatrical adaptions and generational nostalgia

Over the years, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe has been adapted into numerous plays, musicals and films. The book’s association with Christmas, because the White Witch bans the holiday, makes it a seasonal favorite, and the story’s visual richness—with Turkish Delight, talking beavers and epic battles—lends itself well to theatrical production, Whitehead says.

Meanwhile, the 2005 film adaption by Walden Media exemplifies how Lewis’ work has been repackaged for contemporary audiences.

"There’s something just so magical in itself about learning to read, or having your parents read to you, and discovering these fantasy worlds through reading,” says CU ��ý�� scholar Deborah Whitehead. (Narnia illustration: Galchi/Deviantart)

“There was the mass marketing, which was like, ‘Rediscover the magic of these classic children’s books,’ but then there’s marketing specifically to Christian audiences following the model of the niche religious marketing for The Passion of the Christ,” Whitehead says. That marketing for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe positioned the film as a safe, faith-affirming alternative to secular films such as the Harry Potter wizard series, which some Christians criticize for its portrayal of witchcraft, she says.

At the same time, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is, at its core, a classic story about good versus evil and about sacrifice and redemption. Those themes are timeless and continue to resonate with readers of all ages and backgrounds, Whitehead says, recalling her own emotional response to the book as a child—mourning Aslan’s death at the hand of the White Witch and marveling at the idea of a magical wardrobe that led to another world.

Whitehead says the book’s status as a children’s classic is reinforced by generational transmission. Parents and grandparents pass it down, creating a shared cultural memory that keeps the story alive.

To her knowledge, no other modern Christian thinker and author has had a similar level of success bridging the gap between Christian literature and children’s fantasy literature. It’s a feat made even more impressive given that Lewis did not have children of his own and was not particularly fond of spending time with young children, which he confessed was something of a defect on his part, Whitehead says.

Will Narnia endure?

During his lifetime, C.S. Lewis published more than 30 books, including fiction, non-fiction and academic texts. While there is nothing to suggest that Lewis primarily set out to be a successful children’s book author, Whitehead says she thinks Lewis would be fine with being primarily remembered that way—with the hope that readers would understand the underlying message he was attempting to convey. She adds that Lewis was a big believer in the idea that “good stories” by definition are those that appeal to children as well as adults.

As for whether children will still be reading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe in another 75 years, Whitehead says, “I hope so. I hope we’re all still reading in 75 years and not having Speechify and ChatGTP do everything for us. There’s something just so magical in itself about learning to read, or having your parents read to you, and discovering these fantasy worlds through reading.”

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Marking its 75th anniversary this autumn, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe has become a cultural touchstone for fantasy and faith, says CU ��ý�� religious studies Professor Deborah Whitehead.

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Top illustration: Aslan the lion in a scene from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Illustration: ChrisStarkiller/Deviantart)

Players roll the dice on the healing power of collaborative fantasy

Rachel Sauer — Fri, 07 Nov 2025 22:22:42 +0000

Players roll the dice on the healing power of collaborative fantasy Rachel Sauer Fri, 11/07/2025 - 15:22

Cody DeBos

At the D&D table, says CU ��ý�� humanities scholar and gaming podcast host Andrew Gilbert, everyone has a voice

You can often find Andrew Gilbert behind a cardboard dungeon master’s screen, scheming up new ways to derail the carefully laid plans of the other players at his Dungeons & Dragons table. The game has been part of his life for decades, and as D&D gains a larger foothold in the mainstream, it has also become a powerful avenue for friends to connect, laugh and heal.

“It’s such a fascinating way to connect people through story. But it’s a story with limitations and rules,” says Gilbert, a teaching assistant professor of humanities, game studies and media at the ��ý�� Department of Cinema Studies and Moving Image Arts.

In September, Wizards of the Coast studios released Heroes of the Borderlands, the game’s most expansive beginner-friendly box set yet. It arrives with the goal of helping a new generation of players roll their first d20s.

Andrew Gilbert is a CU ��ý�� teaching assistant professor of humanities, game studies and media in the Department of Cinema Studies and Moving Image Arts.

Gilbert and a group of friends have been doing so together since 2018, broadcasting play sessions from their campaigns online via the Goats & Dragons and Helpful Goat Presents podcasts.

“When we created the show, we knew we wanted to play games in a way that centered player experiences and collaborative storytelling,” he says.

The group’s campaign is now approaching the end of a years-long adventure, which has included guests like The Lord of the Rings actor Dominic Monaghan along the way.

The hobby has brought them closer together and created no shortage of memorable moments. But that’s just one facet of Gilbert’s connection to Dungeons & Dragons.

After years of rolling dice and telling stories, he’s come to see the game as something far bigger than fantasy. But why does D&D, a game first published in the 1970s, still captivate us today? How can a tabletop game rooted in imagination compete with video games, AI content, and near-constant digital simulation?

Gilbert has a few ideas.

Still captivating after 50 years

At its heart, D&D is a storytelling engine. Unlike books or movies with fixed narratives, tabletop roleplaying games ask players to improvise solutions, make moral decisions, and stay in character. Players sit around a table (or communicate virtually) and collaborate to tell a story where no one knows how it will end.

“It’s a fascinating form of media where, to a certain extent, the audience are the creators of the media at the same time,” he says. “There’s something wild and magical and fun about giving up control of a story to the group and to chance itself with die rolls.”

Gilbert first encountered D&D through a cousin who taught him to play when he was just 7 years old.

“I was hooked right away,” he recalls.

Years later, as both a scholar of games and a long-time player, Gilbert is fascinated by the emotional and social experiences D&D fosters. No longer seen as just an escapist fantasy game, D&D has become a catalyst for community building.

“There are social and emotional dynamics happening in every game,” he says.

That community is what makes Dungeons & Dragons so special, says CU ��ý�� scholar Andrew Gilbert; whether players are battling monsters in an imagined fantasy world or conquering their own internal demons, the table becomes a shared space where anything can happen. (Illustration: Wizards of the Coast)

At the same time, D&D is incredibly accessible for newcomers. Today, with an updated rule set and a plethora of digital tools to simplify the experience, that’s truer than ever, Gilbert says.

“Literally, you can know nothing about Dungeons & Dragons, and I can teach you how to play by just doing it. All you have to do is tell me what your character wants to do, and then someone who knows the rules can say, ‘Great, roll this dice, add this number to it.’ You really don’t even need to know the rules before you start playing,” he says.

He believes that’s a big reason why the game has endured for half a century and is still growing.

“A lot of us were worried the growth we saw in 2015 and 2016 was a fad that would sort of fade. But then we got the pandemic, and a lot of people started playing as a way to connect with friends when there was nothing to do but play games at home. And, of course, you have a ton of content creators making content about the game professionally,” he says.

“It’s just a perfect storm of factors that have shot the popularity of D&D through the roof.”

Healing through character

Sometimes, though, the game is about more than enjoyment or even storytelling. For many, D&D and games like it have become tools for healing from past traumas or building crucial social skills in a safe environment, Gilbert says.

“There are so many stories about people using the game to work through trauma, including some really cool research about games and PTSD specifically. You can just not be you for a little bit,” he says. “I’m not always a proponent of pure escapism, but it releases a tension. Whether you’re remembering your character doing something or remembering something that actually happened, your brain goes through the exact same process.”

He adds, “With D&D, you can create all these beneficial, healthy memories of not being the victim of some trauma but the one who solves the problem.”

"There’s so much good. The act of collaboration, of creation, of working through issues in the game. It’s something we talk about in my class a lot. These things are hard to navigate, but it’s incredibly helpful to learn how to navigate them."

Gilbert also acknowledges how roleplaying games like Dungeons & Dragons can be deeply meaningful to people who don’t always find social interaction intuitive.

“The idea of how to just construct scenes and conversations is really, really helpful for individuals on the autism spectrum,” he says.

Part of that comes from the game’s structure. Unlike everyday conversation, which can be unpredictable and overwhelming, D&D provides a clear set of rules and roles.

“There’s an element of learning how to pass the microphone, which on a very basic level is just good practice for conversation,” Gilbert says.

Indeed, research suggests that D&D and similar games can be used therapeutically to build communication skills, reduce stress, and foster a sense of community among people who may struggle to connect.

That community, Gilbert says, is what makes the game so special. Whether players are battling monsters in an imagined fantasy world or conquering their own internal demons, the table becomes a shared space where anything can happen.

“There’s so much good. The act of collaboration, of creation, of working through issues in the game. It’s something we talk about in my class a lot. These things are hard to navigate, but it’s incredibly helpful to learn how to navigate them,” he says.

As new players crack open Heroes of the Borderlands or learn the game from a friend, they become part of a decades-long tradition that values creativity and connection in a world that is too often devoid of these qualities, Gilbert says, adding, “We keep finding new amazing things about this game, and it’s only getting better. The possibilities are just limitless.”

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At the D&D table, says CU ��ý�� humanities scholar and gaming podcast host Andrew Gilbert, everyone has a voice.

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Voters’ dislike of PAC donations cuts across political lines

Rachel Sauer — Mon, 03 Nov 2025 17:12:52 +0000

Voters’ dislike of PAC donations cuts across political lines Rachel Sauer Mon, 11/03/2025 - 10:12

Bradley Worrell

CU ��ý�� political scientist Michelangelo Landgrave’s research finds Republicans and independents share Democrats’ concerns over corporate donations in federal elections

In a time when political consensus is difficult to find, one topic that cuts across partisan lines is American voters’ disdain for political action committee (PAC) money in federal elections.

That’s one of the key findings of research recently published in the journal Research and Politics, which was co-authored by Michelangelo Landgrave, a ��ý�� Department of Political Science assistant professor whose research focus includes campaign finance and public opinions on how it can be reformed. The paper was co-authored by Aubree Hardesty, one of Landgrave’s CU ��ý�� postdoctoral fellows.

Pointing to a 2017 Washington Post story, Landgrave and his co-authors note in their paper that people surveyed for the article said money in politics and wealthy political donors are primary causes of political dysfunction.

CU ��ý�� political scientist Michelangelo Landgrave and his research colleagues found that Republicans, Democrats and independents all share concerns over corporate donations in federal elections.

“What we found is that it’s not money itself that people oppose,” Landgrave clarifies. “People are fine with small donations—$5 or $10 from an individual. What they oppose are massive contributions from corporations that ordinary citizens simply can’t compete with.”

As the research paper notes, in the 2024 election cycle, PACs contributed about $5.6 billion to presidential and congressional campaigns, representing about 65% of total contributions.

This distinction—between small, individual donations and large, corporate checks—is central to understanding public opinion on campaign finance, Landgrave says, and voters are concerned that PACs have outsized influence with candidates.

Who’s giving the money?

Voters often view PACs as conduits from special interests, allowing corporations, unions and wealthy donors to channel significant funds into the political system. Landgrave says most PAC contributions come from older, wealthier and disproportionately white Americans. Asian Americans are an emerging group in this donor landscape, but Black and Latino communities remain underrepresented in campaign financing, he says.

“That raises equity concerns,” Landgrave says. “It’s not that older white voters shouldn’t have influence—they should—but so should African Americans, Latinos and especially younger voters. It’s not just about race; it’s about age, class and general representation.”

And while some PACs, such as the National Rifle Association or Emily’s List, are notably partisan or ideological, many are more pragmatic than political, Landgrave says. Companies such as Walmart and McDonald’s often contribute to both Republican and Democratic campaigns—hedging their bets to maintain influence regardless of which party wins, he notes.

Public attitudes: a bipartisan dislike

As the researchers surveyed voters, Landgrave says one of the biggest surprises was the lack of a stark partisan divide on the issue of PAC donations.

“Starting this project, we assumed that there was going to be major partisan differences in public opinion. We assumed that Democrats—much more than Republicans—would be much more concerned about the amount of money in American politics,” he says. “But one of our big findings was that Democrats and Republicans, and also independents, want their politicians to not be accepting this PAC money.”

Again, the underlying concern is that PACs have outsized influence with politicians in return for their contributions, because those donations tend to be larger than those of individual donors, Landgrave says. He notes that previous research has found that less than 1% of Americans give more than $200 in political contributions in a given year. (For their part, PACs can contribute up to $3,500 per candidate.)

“How much influence they (PACs) actually get for their contributions is a subject for debate, but the perception by voters is that it really undermines the democratic values that we have,” Landgrave says. “The underlying concern voters have is that everyone should be able to give, but the amount should be constrained enough that, for example, one person making six figures is not able to make much bigger donations than the guy making $40,000 or $20,000 a year.”

"We assumed that Democrats—much more than Republicans—would be much more concerned about the amount of money in American politics. But one of our big findings was that Democrats and Republicans, and also independents, want their politicians to not be accepting this PAC money,” says CU ��ý�� researcher Michelangelo Landgrave.

The study’s findings suggest that swearing off PAC donations can be a winning strategy for Republicans and independents as well as Democrats, Landgrave says.

“While Republicans at the national level have not embraced this idea, these findings lead me to believe that an enterprising Republican candidate could make their name, especially at the primary level, by keeping their same policy positions, but really presenting themselves as this anti-corporate, populist individual,” he says.

Risks and rewards of swearing off PAC money

In recent U.S. election cycles, some candidates have made headlines by vowing not to accept PAC donations, including U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Massachusetts, who during her 2020 campaign said she “swore off PAC money to make a statement.” She was not the only one.

Landgrave’s notes in his paper that 44 candidates (43 Democrats and one Republican) refused PAC money during the 2020 election cycle.

Landgrave says politicians swearing off PAC contributions is a trend that has gained momentum since the mid-2010s, mirroring earlier political reform efforts dating back to the Progressive Era of the late 1890s to early 1920s, when reformers sought to address political corruption that extended to buying political offices.

Today, candidates such as Bernie Saunders, D-Vermont, have successfully built brand identities around refusing corporate donations, drawing support even from those who may not fully align with their policy platforms, Landgrave says.

His research suggests voters place as much weight on a candidate’s campaign finance stance as they do on hot-button issues such as gun control.

“That’s a big deal,” he says. “Gun control is one of the most polarizing, mobilizing issues in U.S. politics. If a candidate’s position on PAC money can mobilize voters to a similar degree, that’s a serious strategic advantage.”

Show me the (small) money

Still, given how astronomically expensive modern federal election campaigns have become, is swearing off PAC money viable moving forward?

Yes, but with caveats, Landgrave says.

He references an earlier paper by one of his co-authors that found that rejecting PAC money can be a powerful campaign message—especially when it’s clearly communicated to voters. That earlier paper noted that candidates who reject PAC money see a surge in small-dollar donations. While those contributions do not fully replace corporate funds, Landgrave says they often make up 70 to 80% of the shortfall.

“It’s a significant substitution effect,” he says. “You lose $1 million from PACs but you might get $700,000 to $800,000 from small donors instead.”

However, Landgrave says this model may not scale indefinitely.

“Right now, if you are the sort of candidate who swears off big corporate influence money, there’s enough donors that care about that to compensate you to a degree,” he says. “What’s unclear is what happens at scale. If every candidate rejected PAC contributions, would enough people change culturally to make up what they’re losing? If there’s only a few thousand people who care about this and do this, it won’t work if everyone rejects the money.”

What do voters actually know?

A common critique of public opinion surveys is that voters don’t really understand the issues they’re being asked about. But Landgrave’s research challenges that assumption when it comes to campaign financing.

“Right now, if you are the sort of candidate who swears off big corporate influence money, there’s enough donors that care about that to compensate you to a degree.”

“We’ve done follow-up work on public knowledge,” he says. “And while voters don’t ace these quizzes, they perform reasonably well. For instance, many people guess that the maximum federal contribution limit is around $3,000. The correct number is $3,500, so they’re close.

Americans surprisingly know the general rules. Maybe not all of the details, but they know more than we probably think.”

In short, the average voter may not be a political scientist, but they understand enough to form meaningful opinions—and increasingly, those opinions lean toward curbing corporate influence in elections, Landgrave says.

Studying union PACs and cultural change

Landgrave says his research on political action committees and campaign finance are ongoing. His next line of research looks at how voters view union-backed PACs, which are structured similarly but are rooted in worker representation.

Initial findings are surprising, he says.

“Americans seem to be OK with union PACs. And what’s even more surprising—so are Republicans. It’s preliminary, but it suggests people view unions differently, perhaps because they’re perceived as bottom-up organizations, rather than top-down like corporations.”

Meanwhile, looking ahead, Landgrave has another topic he would like to pursue regarding PACs and campaigns.

“In addition to the union angle, I would definitely be interested in seeing young Americans’ attitudes toward money in politics,” he says. “I can tell you that, just talking with my undergrad students, they seem even more skeptical of corporate money in politics than previous generations. They’re not anti-money—they’re fine with small donations—but they’re deeply opposed to corporate influence.”

However, Landgrave is skeptical that Congress might one day pass sweeping reform to limit or eliminate PAC donations.

“I don’t see that happening at the federal level,” he says. “The people who reach Congress are, by and large, products of the existing system.”

Instead, he sees more potential for state-level reforms, through voter pressure and ballot initiatives that limit PAC influence—a strategy that he says echoes earlier populist movements, particularly in the Plains and Rocky Mountain regions.

“Our campaign finance system isn’t set in stone,” Landgrave says. “Other countries do it differently. We could, too—if we decided that’s what we want.”

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CU ��ý�� political scientist Michelangelo Landgrave’s research finds Republicans and independents share Democrats’ concerns over corporate donations in federal elections.

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Students learning dam good lessons from nature's busy builders

Rachel Sauer — Fri, 31 Oct 2025 13:54:40 +0000

Students learning dam good lessons from nature's busy builders Rachel Sauer Fri, 10/31/2025 - 07:54

Rachel Sauer

In a capstone project partnership with the ��ý�� Watershed Collective, Masters of the Environment students study what it means to live alongside beavers

Beavers are so much more than nature’s most eager builders. In many ecosystems, they play a key role in nature-based solutions to flood control, habitat restoration and fire mitigation.

They are a keystone species that can increase biodiversity in suitable habitats, according to Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW), but they also are a source of human-wildlife conflict in Colorado. For example, beavers have been known to build dams and inadvertently flood areas that ranchers or homeowners don’t want flooded.

Jack Carter, Amanda Opp and Colin McDonald (left to right) completed a Masters of the Environment capstone project studying beavers and how they live alongside humans in partnership with the ��ý�� Watershed Collective. (Photo: Masters of the Environment program)

The question for conservationists, land managers and any human who cares about wildlife, then, is how to live alongside this native species that broadly engenders mixed feelings. It’s a question that ��ý�� Masters of the Environment (MENV) students Amanda Opp, Jack Carter and Colin McDonald addressed in their capstone project, which they will publicly present today at the 2025 MENV Capstone Symposium.

Partnering with the ��ý�� Watershed Collective (BWC), Opp, Carter and McDonald examined the social perceptions and ecological impacts of beavers via surveys, research and data collection. They talked with land and wildlife managers across the Front Range to study how public agencies make beaver management decisions, and they participated in two beaver reintroductions, developing a monitoring plan to measure ecological metrics at the sites where the beavers were reintroduced.

“I think we all read the book ‘Eager’ by Ben Goldfarb, about beavers in America and how there was a high reduction in numbers from trapping in the 19^th century,” McDonald explains. “Now there’s a movement to reintroduce them, and we have this thing about ‘coexistence’ as one of those kind of trigger words. We tried to come up with multiple things like ‘living with beavers’ in place of ‘coexistence’ or ‘reintroduction,’ which somehow give off the vibe that your life is going to change by the presence of these animals coming back, which isn’t necessarily the case.”

Back from the brink

Not too long ago, the North American beaver was on the verge of extinction because of 19th-century fashions that required the under fur of beaver pelts. At their population peak before the fur trade began in earnest, there were anywhere between 60-400 million North American beavers, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), but by 1900 there were fewer than 100,000.

As beaver populations began to rebound in subsequent decades thanks to conservation and reintroduction efforts, another issue emerged: Humans had moved into beaver habitat, converting “wildlife-rich wetlands into agricultural lands” and building towns nearby, according to USFWS.

For many years along the Front Range, beavers and humans have lived in an uneasy and sometimes nonexistent détente, so one of the goals of the students’ capstone project was to gather data that might help inform CPW’s beaver conservation and management strategy, which is currently being developed.

Some of the points of conflict that Opp, Carter and McDonald learned about as they collected data included ranchers concerned about losing rangeland to flooding and homeowners who were “very concerned about mosquitoes and thinking that if beavers are creating marshy areas, the risk for West Nile increases,” Opp says.

One of the beaver releases on private land near Nederland in which Amanda Opp, Jack Carter and Colin McDonald participated for their MENV capstone project. (Video: Colin McDonald)

Working with the ��ý�� Watershed Collective, they learned the nuances of effective conservation, which must include education, collaboration and partnership between stakeholders, Carter says: “Due to conflicts over public infrastructure and Colorado water law, reintroducing beavers is not as easy as it may seem.”

At the beginning of the 20th century, the North American beaver was on the verge of extinction because of 19th-century fashions that required the under fur of beaver pelts. (Photo: Amanda Opp)

“I think BWC, and a lot of people involved with conservation, when they’re conveying the message of ‘Hey, these are beneficial animals,’ they have to meet people where they’re at,” Opp says. “One of biggest concerns in Colorado is fire mitigation, so when we’re thinking about unique solutions, nature-based solutions that might not have been considered in the past, beavers have been a really important pitch: ‘If you have a wet environment with wet soil and healthy grass, you’ll probably have reduced risk of fire reaching your property.’”

Not just a cute animal

The two reintroductions in which Opp, Carter and McDonald participated happened on private land near Nederland, with the landowners inviting BWC to release beavers in ponds or wetlands on their land. Several of the reintroduced beavers came from Aurora, where they had been causing problems, McDonald says, so BWC and Aurora wildlife officers worked together to ensure that the beavers were trapped in families so they could be released together.

“Beavers aren’t endangered anymore, so there’s zero protection for them,” Carter explains, adding that the areas in which the beavers were released are far from settlements, hopefully giving the beavers the greatest chance to thrive.

At one of the relocation sites, the beavers had monitors attached to their tails, enabling researchers and wildlife officials to track their movements, Opp says. And at both locations, the landowners are reporting their visual observations of beaver movement to BWC, which is included in the MENV students’ monitoring plan. Their plan also includes measuring how wide the bodies of water into which the beavers were released become.

For the students, each of whom came to the MENV program as committed conservationists, their work with beavers for their capstone project was about more than busy, charismatic rodents.

“I’m really passionate about conservation and passionate about protecting animals in the wild, and this project instilled in me how rewarding this work is,” Opp says, a sentiment that McDonald echoed, adding that he appreciated learning how to build community partnerships and how to maximize impact at small nonprofits.

“Before this, I don’t think I really appreciated beavers,” Carter says. “I didn’t realize how important they are to an ecosystem. One of the biggest things that’s happening right now is biodiversity loss, and beavers create essential habitats for moose, for certain amphibian species. A lot of amphibians are going down the drain, especially in a state like Colorado, and beavers can help solve that problem.”

“The best way to move forward with all the damage humans have done is to realize we’re not separate from our environment,” Opp says. “We have to do everything we can to protect it, and beavers are a really awesome keystone species that’s not just this cute animal; they can play an important role in solving the climate crisis.”

Jack Carter, Colin McDonald and Amanda Opp (left to right) on their way to release a beaver on private land near Nederland. (Photo: Amanda Opp)

A beaver after being released on private land near Nederland. (Photo: Amanda Opp)

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In a capstone project partnership with the ��ý�� Watershed Collective, Masters of the Environment students study what it means to live alongside beavers.

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Migration no guarantee of bird biodiversity

Rachel Sauer — Fri, 24 Oct 2025 01:11:14 +0000

Migration no guarantee of bird biodiversity Rachel Sauer Thu, 10/23/2025 - 19:11

Cody DeBos

CU ��ý�� researchers challenge long-held assumptions about the relationship between bird migration and the process by which new species arise

Every year, billions of birds take to the skies, riding thermal currents and navigating with an innate sense of direction across distances that would humble even the most accomplished commercial pilots.

“Migration is one of the most spectacular natural phenomena,” says Gina Calabrese, an evolutionary biologist and postdoctoral research fellow in the Safran Lab at the ��ý��.

Gina Calabrese, an evolutionary biologist and postdoctoral research fellow in the Safran Lab at CU ��ý��, and her research colleagues, tested the theory that bird migration may be a leading force behind the genesis of new species.

Aside from inspiring awe in bird enthusiasts, this ancient ritual has also sparked many scientific theories. One suggests that migration—by way of dividing populations across different routes and destinations—may be a leading force behind the genesis of new species.

“The idea that this behavior could be a major driver of biodiversity has been an attractive one,” Calabrese says.

But does it hold up under evolutionary scrutiny? That’s what she and a team of co-researchers set out to test in a new study published in Systematic Biology.

Rethinking migration and diversity

Calabrese and her colleagues’ research challenges long-held assumptions about the relationship between migration and speciation, or the process by which new species arise. While scientists have documented cases where migratory behavior appears to be splitting populations, her team wanted to know whether this pattern was widespread enough to have shaped bird diversity at a large scale.

“There’s a body of literature that suggests migration could promote the formation of new species, by isolating populations that use different migratory routes or wintering areas,” she explains. “If this were a widespread pattern, we might expect migratory lineages to be more diverse today than other non-migrating birds.”

To test the hypothesis, Calabrese and her collaborators examined evolutionary trees called phylogenies that map out how present-day bird species are related to one another. Drawing from massive data sets of two avian superfamilies, they used statistical models to estimate how quickly different bird lineages have diversified over evolutionary time. They then compared the rates of speciation in migratory birds to those that make a home in one location year-round.

The results weren’t what they had expected.

“We found no consistent evidence that migratory birds speciate faster than non-migratory ones,” Calabrese says. “This was a surprise—especially given how much attention the idea of migration-driven speciation has received.

“There are clear examples where migration is leading to population splits—those are real,” she says. “But those examples are often recent, and they might not always result in fully separate species.”

In other words, migration might occasionally set the stage for speciation, but it’s no guarantee.

“Not every population split leaves a lasting imprint in the fossil record or leads to a new species,” Calabrese adds.

“We found no consistent evidence that migratory birds speciate faster than non-migratory ones. This was a surprise—especially given how much attention the idea of migration-driven speciation has received," says CU ��ý�� researcher Gina Calabrese. (Photo: Todd Trapani/Unsplash)

One reason for this, she suggests, is that many observed migratory divides are evolutionarily young. These populations may just be starting to diverge, and many might merge again over time. Others may remain distinct but not reproductively isolated.

If the goal is to understand how biodiversity has accumulated over millions of years, a short-term snapshot—whether looking at bird lineages today or thousands of years ago—may not tell the full story.

“This is a good example of how something can be true in some cases but not necessarily explain large-scale patterns,” Calabrese says.

Following evidence, not expectations

Calabrese’s recent work is also a case study in scientific humility. When she and her colleagues first set out to test the migration-speciation connection, they weren’t looking to debunk anything. However, when the results started pointing in a different direction than their hypothesis, they remained committed to following the data.

“I think it’s important that we test assumptions—even appealing ones—with data,” Calabrese says.

The process also gave her a new perspective on how the scientific method plays out in real-world applications.

“I was a little anxious at first, until I kind of really felt like I had a handle on what my results were and felt confident in them. And then at that point, your job is just to tell the story of what your data show,” she adds.

While this study might have raised more questions than it answered, that’s part of what keeps Calabrese curious and driven to study the incredible phenomenon that is migration.

“It’s a little disappointing because you want to believe that what you’re studying today is explaining the answers to your bigger questions,” she says. “But it’s also cool because our findings mean that there’s still a lot to understand about how we get the diversity we see today and there’s still some mystery out there to solve, which is cool to me.”

CU ��ý�� Professor Rebecca Safran contributed to this research, as did Kira Delmore, Jochen Wolf and Daniel Rabosky.

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CU ��ý�� researchers challenge long-held assumptions about the relationship between bird migration and the process by which new species arise.

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Exploring Colorado’s untapped geothermal energy potential

Rachel Sauer — Wed, 22 Oct 2025 21:00:33 +0000

Exploring Colorado’s untapped geothermal energy potential Rachel Sauer Wed, 10/22/2025 - 15:00

A major question looms over Colorado’s energy future: Why does geothermal energy—a natural renewable resource—remain virtually untapped?

Assistant Teaching Professor Shae Frydenlund of the ��ý�� Center for Asian Studies, along with Professor Bri-Mathias Hodge of the Department of Electrical, Computer & Energy Engineering, will examine the technological and social barriers that have held back geothermal development in Colorado.

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A major question looms over Colorado’s energy future: Why does geothermal energy—a natural renewable resource—remain virtually untapped?

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