PeaceJam Foundation

Issue: Transformation Section: Collaboration Close Up The PeaceJam Foundation had a large turnout for the UN premiere of their film, Mayan Renaissance, which was held at the United Nations on Wednesday, May 16, 2012. The film was presented during the United Nations’ Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.

The film received a standing ovation, which was followed by a lively question-and-answer period with the film’s director, Dawn Engle, and executive producer, Ivan Suvanjieff. “We were thrilled with the audience’s response. Everyone really seemed to love this film,” Engle said.

“Mayan Renaissance” is a feature-length film that documents the glory of the ancient Maya civilization, the Spanish conquest in 1519, five hundred years of oppression, and the courageous fight of the Maya to reclaim their voice and determine their own future, in Guatemala and throughout Central America. This elegant, beautiful and thought-provoking film shares their vision for the future their call for a long-foretold renaissance of Maya culture and wisdom, and their 100-year plan to lead humanity forward, from the year 2012 on. The film stars 1992 Nobel Peace laureate and Maya leader Rigoberta Menchú Tum. All of the images, voices, expert commentary and music in the film come directly from Central America, from the heart of the Mayan world.

Dawn Engle is an activist and filmmaker, and she has been nominated seven times for the Nobel Peace Prize. Previously, she has directed and written award-winning documentaries and films such as PeaceJam and 2012: The True Mayan Prophecy. She also co-authored the book PEACEJAM: A Billion Simple Acts of Peace, published by Penguin in 2008. In 1994, Dawn Engle and Ivan Suvanjieff began working together to create PeaceJam, which was launched in March 1996. Currently, Suvanjieff serves as the president of PeaceJam and Engle as the foundation’s executive director. PeaceJam has been recognized nationally as an award-winning service learning program and internationally for excellence in peace education.

For more information on Mayan Renaissance, visit www.mayanrenaissance.org. For more information on the PeaceJam Foundation, visit www.peacejam.org.

Sustainable Adventures in Morocco

By: Maria E. Luna Issue: Transformation Section: Collaboration Close Up In Morocco, you will find rows of stucco townhouses, accented with mosaic entryways. This architecture is a common thread from Casablanca to Meknes and farther east to Sefrou, which is a city adjacent to the Middle Atlas Mountains. The townhomes are intertwined with neighborhood boutique shops. In all these cities you will notice entrepreneurship at the root of the Moroccan commerce system, as the majority of businesses are owned and operated by families. Of course this type of system comes with both negative and positive aspects, but that subject is for another article.

Located beyond the bordering mountain cities, into the Middle Atlas Mountain range, is the village I visited. It consists of seven homes built from stones and mortar. The village is named Tafert, now whether or not that is the official name I can’t say, but it’s what I was told by the Berber family that hosted my two-week stay in Morocco. To better pinpoint the location of Tafert, the nearest town is Imouzzer Marmoucha.

After leaving Imouzzer Marmoucha, a 30-minute drive will take you to an area starting out with rolling hills of slate rock. At that point is a path created by de-foresting machinery leading into the mountain range. One tent camp was set up for those who worked cutting down the trees. Most of the harvested trees were about four feet wide. About an hour’s walk into the mountain area you will find Tafert.

The eight-hour journey to Tafert was part of my vision—an opportunity to promote environmental and economic growth. I provided 30 Nokero solar light bulbs to the Berber village. Nokero solar light bulbs provide efficiency in that they promote clean and safe light compared to kerosene or propane lamps and will allow for re-allocation of the money spent on oil and propane. Plus they are just cool!

The Tafert village was established three generations ago, and little has changed since that time. Tafert is an off-grid community not only without electricity but without running water. I’d like to think providing Nokero solar light bulbs are the start of this community’s awareness that there are sustainable alternatives available. The impacts of this country’s growth are being made now. Committing to sustainability needs to happen at this time. Being ecologically minded is the proper way to engage with the Berber community as a whole. If you are interested in the rights of native populations, read the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Within time, the story of this community could be marked by ICOSA partners such as the Peace Corps, Goal Zero and the Paradigm Project. ICOSA and I are open to partnering in providing sustainability not only to Tafert—but globally.

Cristin C. Tarr

Issue: Transformation Section: Advisory board Cristin C. Tarr is cofounder and managing director, speaker, trainer and corporate social responsibility specialist at Business Service Corps, LLC (BSC). As a transformative social enterprise, BSC assists companies with high-impact community engagement programs. The company has developed a unique experiential leadership training program focused on corporate, global and community citizenship.

For Tarr, global citizenship started at age 11 while traveling to Europe as an international peace ambassador. She participated in a one-month multicultural program sponsored by Children’s International Summer Village (CISV) and traveled with her delegation (two boys and two girls and an adult leader) to a summer camp or “village.” Here she lived with children from 12 different countries across the world to create lifelong friendships through cultural understanding and global citizenship, a pretty powerful impact for an 11-year-old. Little did she know, this would shape her life and her career. After high school, Tarr traveled extensively and lived abroad. She graduated college with a degree in marketing and international business. Her first job was on Wall Street as an investment banker. Later, she worked for six years at American Airlines in airport budgets and as the director of international and domestic sales.

Tarr has volunteered at a variety of nonprofits. After moving to Colorado, she met two women with previous CISV experience, and the three cofounded the Denver Chapter of that organization. Today, CISV’s Rocky Mountain Denver chapter has involved well over 1,000 youth and adults in international and domestic programs, encouraging peace through friendships. On April 22, 1999, two days after the Columbine tragedy, Tarr—who was president of the CISV chapter then—received a call from a CISV parent saying that her son was in the library at Columbine High School that fateful day. The distraught mother asked how she and CISV could help. That was the beginning of CISV Denver’s multicultural minicamps, which now occur every January. The minicamps bring together inner-city and suburban youth to spend one weekend together to learn from each other with the goal of promoting tolerance, diversity and fun. After the 9/11 tragedy, she again organized a special minicamp of almost 100 Jewish, Muslim and African refugee youth whereby they could experience understanding, safely ask questions, and become more aware of their communities, while creating a global citizen ambience at a local level.

Tarr continues to actively work with CISV and recently directed the first International People’s Project in Denver. Twenty-two adults from around the world collaborated with a local nonprofit—Denver Indian Center—and three major corporations on a two-week service project. The committed volunteers planted a community garden, conducted a Native American youth camp and documented several tribal elders’ oral histories. She has also implemented training and diversity programs at both the national and international CISV levels.

In 2005, Tarr joined the staff at the South Metro Denver Chamber of Commerce. She was instrumental in building multi-sector collaborations to promote tourism in the South Denver region, where she launched the brand “Best Trails,” nominated for top tourism initiative in Colorado. She also received a proclamation from the City of Centennial and twice received the Leadership in Motion award through the chamber. Tarr led the Nonprofit Business Partnership committee at the chamber, which encourages cross-sector partnerships to better our communities. She has served on the executive committee for three years.

Tarr’s passion for collaboration, citizenship and community sparked the inception of BSC in 2010 with her business partner, Candace Ruiz. They founded BSC to assist companies in creating civic programs and train employees on how to be better community stewards. BSC has transformed the idea of global citizenship to include employees at companies that are concerned with local problems. She fundamentally believes that it takes a village to support a village, and that we all need to work together to solve pressing issues. The private sector can find value in social impact through creating a focused, high-impact community program; engaging employees; building reputation; and ultimately making a positive change where we live and work. Tarr and her husband, Jonathan, are raising three boys in Littleton, Colorado, and both are active in their local community.

Pam Jeffords

Issue: Transformation Section: Advisory board Pam Jeffords enjoys a diverse and dynamic professional career, as best described by a recent conversation with her family. After many dinner conversations about her day, her husband and four children finally recommended that she give them a more formal presentation about her new business ventures so they can understand what she does. Before her current entrepreneurial activities, Jeffords spent 20 years enjoying the growth and excitement of the telecommunications industry, serving in leadership roles for MCI, Qwest and PAETEC.

Pam’s current business ventures have roots in her active involvement over the past 11 years as a volunteer with the Mile High United Way. She joined a team of highly energetic women that share a common belief in the collective power of a group of woman. This group, called the Women’s Leadership Council, is now more than 3,000 members strong and dedicated to inspiring, educating and encouraging women to invest in their community.

Raised in the Deep South with several generations around the dinner table, she reflects appreciatively on the endless stories that were told year after year. She is known for using stories and analogies to get otherwise difficult concepts across and make them clear. She often refers to herself as the “stereotypical southerner”—there is no food she can’t fry, and she embraces some very traditional female tendencies and sees them as assets in many business settings. She believes women rally in situations of crisis—a death in the family, a missed forecast projection, whatever the crisis; women rally and just “do it.” She believes that if you ever want swift change, just find a pissed-off mom.

This past decade has certainly presented our community, our country and the world with enormous challenges that no one has escaped from. We are in the midst of an education crisis and economic instability, which affect families across the board. Two years ago, Jeffords and a few members of the Leadership Council had an idea that if there were a way to bring all the various women’s organizations and interests groups together to “rally,” it would be a collective powerhouse focused on extraordinary issues.

They acknowledged that even with all of these organizations in existence, it still remains a fact that women in business and community organizations are underrepresented in rank and influence. Several independent studies and consulting firms’ research agree that the performance of businesses and communities are positively impacted when women are strongly represented at board or top-management levels. Companies with the most gender-diverse management teams outperformed the industry average on many financial measurements.

With the Mile High United Way’s endorsement, Jeffords and her colleagues formed a for-profit venture, The Virtual Exchange (The Vx). The Vx is a membership-based organization that expands on the current foundation of women’s organizations and serves as the vehicle to provide a collaborative platform for growth to take on overarching issues. In other words, rallying a very big group of pissed-off moms, daughters, business leaders and mentors. Each initiative The Vx takes on will involve multiple women’s organizations and clubs, have a clear call to action, and establish the alignment of key people and organizations.

Jeffords is also part of the Denver-based consulting firm, Execution Specialist Group (ESG). ESG is a group of experienced industry leaders that assists corporations in the execution of their strategic plans. ESG’s “been there, done that” experience is valued by their clients, and the flexible, collaborative engagement model provides a confident approach to execution. To someone who does not know her, it may seem like she “just has a few different business cards,” but the synergies and alignment are clear when you meet her. Her desire is to align a group of individuals, create collective power and leverage that power to focus on extraordinary issues. When she speaks, you are not really sure which venture she is talking about, as the ideas are interwoven among the organizations. Her passion around philanthropy, her focus on defining women’s leadership and her desire to foster a culture of execution is threaded through everything she works on.

Recently, her eighth grader came home from school and said that one of the moms came to talk to his class, and he thought she should join the woman’s group. He added, “She seemed very smart and talked about the importance of leadership—isn’t that what you do?” While Pam was excited that her son might finally understand her work, she does think she might get a little concerned if her first grader starts providing referrals.

Pam earned an undergraduate degree from LSU and an MBA from Georgia State. She lives in Highlands Ranch, Colo., with her husband and four children. She currently serves as the CEO of The Vx, as the co-chair for the Mile High United Way Women’s Leadership Council, and is a member of ESG.

Transformation Starts With You

By: Jan Mazotti Issue: Transformation Section: Letter From the Editor Transformation is a funny thing. Its definition says it all—to change in composition or structure: to change the outward form or appearance of: to change in character or condition: to convert. Oftentimes people, and therefore organizations, resist change, causing leadership to push even harder toward a goal. This issue highlights some of the best transformational organizations and leaders around.

There are many interesting stories from academia, business, government and community/nonprofit organizations that are leading innovative transformational work or who integrate planning that has systematically changed business or strategy and developed economies and growth.

And, while you may wonder why you should read on, consider the story of Kent Thiry, the CEO of DaVita, and how he has created a corporate culture of respect and team. Or the story of Rachel Lloyd, who tirelessly works to change the laws for girls who are trafficked here in the United States. Or, there is Flibe Energy, the revolutionary nuclear company that is bringing thorium-based reactors back into the energy conversation. Or Votifi—a company so steeped in the political dialogue of the American voter that they are transforming communication styles. Or, there is eight-year-old Paul Felix, who is on a mission to provide fresh, clean water to thousands of people on the other side of the world in South Sudan.

But these are just a few of the transformational stories in this issue. Read on and hopefully you will be transformed too—even if for a minute. As Michael Jackson so eloquently sings, “I’m starting with the man in the mirror. I'm asking him to change his ways. No message could have been any clearer if you wanna make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and then make the change. You gotta get it right, while you got the time 'cause when you close your heart you can't close your mind!”

Remember, transformation starts with you. No one can make you change if you don’t want to. The stories in this issue just might make you want to try.

All the best, - Jan Mazotti

The Transformation of the ICOSAhedron

By: Gayle Dendinger with Annette Perez Issue: Transformation Section: LETTER FROM the PUBLISHER We have received numerous inquiries over the past few years regarding the name ICOSA. Readers have questioned: What does ICOSA stand for? What does ICOSA represent? Is ICOSA an abbreviation? The icosahedron in its original form is a math concept. Later, Buckminster Fuller turned it into a recognizable architectural icon. And now, we are changing the perception of the icosahedron to represent connection and collaboration.

The Icosahedron

The icosahedron is one of five platonic solids and is a regular polyhedron with 20 identical equilateral triangular faces, 30 edges and 12 vertices. The name “icosahedron” originates from the Greek word εικοσάεδρον, meaning “twenty.” The element of water is represented by the icosahedron and was assigned by Plato. I personally think that Plato screwed up by not making the icosahedron the world or the ethos.

The icosahedron shape is found in various present formulas today. Because the icosahedron is the easiest shape to amass because it builds from a single basic unit protein used repetitively; it saves space in the viral genome and is often the way many viruses such as the herpes virus accumulate. This is known as icosahedral shells. Additionally, the boron B12 uses the shape as a basic unit structure.

In the game Dungeons and Dragons a 20-sided dice is used to determine the triumph or disappointment of an action. The popular game Scattergories uses the icosahedron to choose a letter of the alphabet, obviously omitting six letters. The Magic 8-Ball, a ball used to answer yes and no questions, uses the shape set in liquid to reply to the requests.

Buckminster Fuller

Buckminster Fuller, one of the world’s first futurists, said, “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.”

Fuller was a visionary who believed that technology could save the world from itself, if it was properly used. He contributed a wide range of designs, inventions and ideas to the world, particularly in the area of practical, inexpensive shelter. He is best known for transforming the geometric shape into an architectural astonishment—the geodesic dome—a remarkable, sphere-like structure made of a complex network of triangles. Two of the most prominent geodesic domes include the Epcot Center in Disneyworld and the U.S. Pavilion at the 1967 World’s Fair in Montreal. Additionally, Fuller transformed the idea of the icosahedron into a Dymaxion map, which is a projection of a world map onto the surface of an icosahedron. This can be unfolded and flattened to two dimensions. Originally the Dymaxion map appeared in Life in 1943 as a pullout section to cut and assemble. “Fuller intended the map to be unfolded in different ways to emphasize different aspects of the world.”

From Icosahedron to ICOSA

Over the years I have explored the great work of the simple geometric shape and Buckminster Fuller’s astounding work. I believe the icosahedron is a structure to model our philosophies around—especially considering its remarkable physical and optical characteristics. It is one of the most interesting and useful of all polyhedrals, or it can be metaphorically seen as a jewel that symbolizes great value—the value of connection and collaboration.

We are by no means a traditional magazine or media company. We do not operate on a traditional business plan. We believe every collaborator is one of the twenty triangles that when connected create the icosahedron. Each of us is a triangle representing an entity that exists by itself with multiple characteristics—it may be animate or inanimate. In business, an entity is a person, department, team, corporation, cooperative, partnership or other group with whom it is possible to conduct business. The aligned potential of each triangle allows us to connect our resources, collaboratively harness our creative genius so that we can together learn, invent, and communicate to tap into the power of collaboratively achieved results.

The icosahedron is a design that accommodates relationships and ideas. Not only is this platonic solid quite remarkable in its geometric sense, it is found throughout nature, has been the inspiration for design, makes a multifaceted navigation platform, and is the basis for viral connection and communication for the best and brightest in the world. For ICOSA, the icosahedron is the basis of a name, a logo and a concept—a brand that we have transformed from a simple geometric shape to one that represents the collaborative and collective power of us all. Learn more about our work today at www.theicosamagazine.com.

All the Best, - Gayle Dendinger

A State of Transformation

By: Justin Berry Issue: Transformation Section: Academia

Building Utah’s Innovation Infrastructure

2010 study by the Kauffman Foundation ranked Utah as number one in patents per capita, prompting CNN Money to call the state “the hand’s down leader in inventiveness.” In 2012, the Milken Institute cited impressive results by the Salt Lake City, Ogden and Provo metro areas. All three climbed into the institute’s top 25 list of Best Performing Cities based on their highly diversified economies that include thriving medical device and software companies.

Utah has long been known as the Beehive State, and for good reason. With a strong industrious spirit and entrepreneurial drive, Utah is a hive of productivity. Transforming those traits into tangible economic development is not an easy task and takes years of planning and a willingness to lay the groundwork. Now, on the tails of the economic downturn, Utah is transitioning into a state rich with innovation, technology and robust industry, thanks to two related initiatives.

The initial planning and development of a long-term transformative plan began back in 2000, when then-Governor Michael Leavitt became concerned about a forecasted gap in the job market that presented a very large problem. The average wage in Utah was eroding in comparison to other states, but it was not that Utah lacked jobs—rather it lacked high-paying jobs. The governor identified high-tech jobs as the solution to this problem.

Leavitt began an effort to court high-tech firms to bring their operations to Utah. However, this was a slow process, which led to a new awareness that in order to support a high-tech economy, the state needed to develop a well-educated, high-tech workforce. The Governor’s Engineering Initiative was born from this need, and it was Leavitt’s plan to double the number of engineering and computer science students at Utah colleges and universities in just five years.

University of Utah (U of U) Dean of Engineering Richard Brown recalls Leavitt’s remarks at the dedication of the Warnock Engineering Building. “As he told the story, it was in a discussion with John Warnock, one of our Ph.D. alumni and a founder of Adobe software, that the governor became very aware of this need,” Brown said. “John told him, ‘Governor, if you’re serious about building a high-tech economy, you’d better do something about engineering education,’ so Governor Leavitt started the Engineering Initiative.”

The initiative focuses on recruitment, outreach and retention of students. Current university students work with high school classes to provide engineering-based activities and learning modules. Efforts are also made to help university students stay in engineering programs by offering advising, peer mentoring and activities to engage them both academically and socially. For prospective students, the university offers summer camps that focus on the core engineering programs and provide pre-engineering students the chance to work together to solve problems and experience various aspects of engineering firsthand. And at the U of U, Brown says they have increased the number of engineering graduates by 84 percent since the beginning of the initiative. “It’s necessary to have the right workforce in order to attract the companies here. We’ve seen time after time, the companies will go where the workforce is,” Brown said. “And as we attract industry, their demands for a more educated workforce just grow!”

The College of Engineering will graduate about 700 engineers and computer scientists this year. According to Brown, the students his college is now training will be uniquely positioned to take their place in the technology economy. About 100 undergraduate students per year and 100 graduate students at any given time will take classes or be doing research in the Nanofabrication Laboratory of the new James L. Sorenson Molecular Biotechnology Building. This 208,000-square-foot facility has an 18,000-square-foot clean room laboratory, with 6,000-square-feet of working space (class 100/1000/10k) adjacent to a 5,000-square-foot microscopy core.

“We have in our microscopy suite almost an exact copy of the equipment that is used at one of Utah’s leading semiconductor companies, IM Flash Technologies,” Brown said. “In addition to educating the engineers needed by such companies, we will work with Salt Lake Community College and Utah Valley University to train the microscopy technicians that they need. I’m convinced that one of the reasons Utah has come out of the current recession ahead of almost all other states is that we have a very healthy, diverse economy that is strong on high-tech.” As the engineering workforce grows, high-tech industry has provided high-paying jobs to those graduates. One of the leading technology companies in Utah, L-3 Communications West, claims that it has hired an engineer every day for the past five years. While large out-of-state companies such as eBay, Intel and Micron expanded into the state, Utah was nurturing start-ups for economic growth as well.

In an effort to increase the innovation capital of Utah, leaders from the business community came together with government officials and created the Utah Science Technology and Research Initiative (USTAR).

In March 2006, at the urging of then-Governor Jon Huntsman Jr. and Lt. Governor Gary Herbert, lawmakers passed legislation creating USTAR, a long-term, state-funded, industry-led agency positioned to help strengthen Utah’s knowledge economy. This measure drew from best practices of other states such as Georgia, Pennsylvania and Arizona and structured USTAR with three main elements.

First, USTAR provides funding that accelerates the ability of the U of U and Utah State University (USU) to recruit world-class researchers, specifically into high-growth focus areas such as energy and biomedical innovations. Second, the initiative enables the construction of two state-of-the-art interdisciplinary research and development facilities at the Salt Lake City and Logan campuses. Third, USTAR operates outreach teams across the state to help entrepreneurs and existing companies commercialize new technology and access the resources available at higher education institutions.

USTAR Executive Director Ted McAleer is excited about the unique opportunities the program offers. “One of the things that Utah is well known for is the entrepreneurial nature of our people,” he said. “We have a lot of start-up companies, and a lot of new ideas being generated in Utah. USTAR is like a fuel additive that makes a strong engine run faster.” It is the collaboration and focus on innovation between the universities around Utah and the industry partners that has come together as part of the USTAR program. And it is this combination of facilities, human capital and entrepreneurial nature that sets Utah apart from other states.

“The University of Utah is first in the nation for starting companies based on university research,” McAleer said. “This is the second year in a row the university has beat schools like MIT and Columbia, and both BYU and USU are highly ranked as well. It is this entrepreneurial spirit that is making Utah the innovation nerve center of the nation.” With the new USTAR center at the U of U joining its 118,000-square-foot sister facility already in operation at USU in Logan, the ability to bring in research “All-Stars” is fulfilling the objective to become a world-class research destination. John White, the executive director of the Brain Institute at the U of U, is one of these researchers. “There are superb opportunities for industry collaborations,” White said. “The people who are in this building are USTAR faculty, and we came here specifically because we were intrigued and excited by the idea of working more closely with industry partners.”

White understands the opportunity to join forces with industry partners and develop start-up companies. “USTAR is not just about basic science, USTAR is about taking cutting-edge science and engineering, and moving it out into the world,” he said. “It is our charge from the state, and we need industry’s help, so I think the whole design of the program and the building stand as an invitation for industry partners to come in and work with us.”

With all of the advances being made to help secure Utah’s economic future, it is vital that these new discoveries and scientific innovations make the jump to industry. Bringing in top researchers and providing state-of-the-art facilities is only a portion of the equation. It is vital to transition these into production to help build the Utah tax base and economic impact. Bryan Ritchie, executive director of the Technology Commercialization Office (TCO) at the U of U, realizes the importance of taking discoveries and getting them into practical use. “Here at the U of U, the specific approach for USTAR is to bring those resources and researchers together, put them all in one place, have them fertilize one another’s ideas in terms of what we can accomplish across departmental silos, and see where that can go in terms of commercialization.”

It has always been the goal to make these transitions into the marketplace and provide new jobs for the state. “We start moving this technology closer to the commercial market, and a lot of that work will come back and be done here,” Ritchie said.

By leveraging the strengths of the University’s TCO in tandem with USTAR’s outreach resources, researchers who aren’t full-blown entrepreneurs can still contribute to the commercialization effort. Miriah Meyer, a USTAR assistant professor of computer science at the U of U, identifies herself as one of these individuals, admitting she is not at all entrepreneurial. The USTAR program helps those like Meyer transition their ideas to industry.

“The commercialization office and USTAR are incredible resources,” she said. “Having so much support and people who are eager and excited to work with me to bring the work I’m doing to a much broader audience, when I don’t have the skill set to do that, is amazing. It’s an incredible opportunity.”

Collaboration is the heart of the USTAR program—not only between the various disciplines represented by researchers and faculty, but between the academic and business worlds as well. The U of U’s Utah Nanofab, for example, works on a regular basis with more than 40 companies, and the university’s Energy and Geoscience Institute has more than 60 supporting industry partners. USU’s commercialization office routinely solicits industry feedback on its USTAR efforts as well.

Associate Vice President of Research at the U of U Cynthia Furse pointed out, “Industry sponsored research is really critical to our research mission. It is particularly important because it takes the exciting, fascinating things that we discover and turns them into something real that impacts our society, our people and our local economy.” “The combination of the USTAR and Engineering Initiatives to transform our state is unique,” McAleer said. “Through the foresight and dedication of state government and business leaders, we are simultaneously powering up our human capital, our innovation infrastructure, and the workforce of the future. You combine that with already strong spirit of creative entrepreneurism and a business-friendly government, and you have a recipe for long-term growth and success.”

Transform Thinking, Transform the World

By: Donnie Veasey Issue: Transformation Section: Academia

Regis University Delivers Education to Those at Societal Margins

For the past several years, Denver-based Regis University has been at the forefront of an international effort to deliver online higher education to refugees in Kenya, Malawi and Syria, with future expansion to others with little access to higher education. As Colorado’s only Jesuit Catholic university, and one of 28 Jesuit Catholic colleges and universities in the United States, Regis University has been developing curriculum and teaching online courses as part of Jesuit Commons: Higher Education at the Margins (JC:HEM), an initiative of the Society of Jesus that brings Jesuit higher education to those at the margins of society.

Working with the Jesuit Refugee Service, JC:HEM has enabled more than 300 refugees to study courses both online and on-site in partnership with a global network of Jesuit universities. Refugees can earn a diploma in liberal studies and pursue community service learning tracks for a certificate of completion in ways that benefit daily life in the camps. “Of course, Regis University is not alone in its involvement in this massive undertaking to make a positive difference,” notes Steve Jacobs, assistant vice president for academic affairs at Regis University, and one of many individuals committed to the success of JC:HEM. “More than 15 other Jesuit colleges and universities in the United States are also involved in this work.” Those participating institutions include Boston College, Canisius University, Creighton University, Fordham University, Georgetown University, Gonzaga University, Marquette University, Seattle University, St. Joseph’s University, St. Louis University, University of San Francisco, Wheeling Jesuit University and Xavier University.

Led by a passionate commitment from Regis University President Michael Sheeran, S.J., Regis University’s role has been impressive and in some ways unique. Two years ago, the university’s College for Professional Studies’ (CPS) faculty and staff initiated a credentialing process, making Regis University the first credentialing university for JC:HEM. With several other Jesuit universities, CPS faculty and staff then helped to develop the curriculum. In February 2011, CPS faculty began teaching the online courses to refugees in Kenya and Malawi. For its work with the JC:HEM program, Regis University was recently recognized with a national award, when the College for Professional Studies received the University Professional and Continuing Education Association’s Outstanding Credit Program Award. The award recognizes credit-bearing continuing education programs that are “original in substantive ways” and that aspire to and/or demonstrate “excellence in achieving its educational objectives.”

“Jesuit Commons truly provides a model to which colleagues at other institutions can aspire,” wrote Bilita Mattes, chair of the 2011-2012 UPCEA Awards Committee and associate provost for Strategic Markets, in a congratulatory letter to Father Sheeran.

In March 2012, Regis University hosted the first international JC:HEM think tank at the university’s sprawling 87-acre North Denver (Lowell) campus, where 120 Jesuit Catholic higher education leaders and innovators from around the globe, as well as staff from Jesuit Refugee Service, participated with a goal of charting the future of the JC:HEM program. Attendees represented some of the brightest and most innovative leaders of Jesuit Catholic higher education and refugee programs from 25 countries.

Among the who’s who of think tank attendees were Vincent Cochetel, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees regional representative for the United States and Caribbean; Michael Garanzini, S.J., president of Loyola University Chicago and secretary of Higher Education for the Society of Jesus; Heroic Leadership author and Jesuit Commons President Chris Lowney; Peter Balleis, S.J., international director of the Jesuit Refugee Service; author Paul Nakai, who facilitated the conference; Gregory Lucey, S.J., president of the Association of Jesuit Catholic Universities (AJCU); Charlie Currie, S.J., former AJCU president; and Mary McFarland, international director of JC:HEM and a Gonzaga University professor in Spokane, Washington. So what exactly is JC:HEM, how did it get started, who makes it work, and how is the program improving the lives of those at the margins of our society?

The seeds for JC:HEM were planted during a 2006 Regis University–sponsored international conference focusing on adult and distance learning. Then, two years ago in Mexico City, Adolfo Nicolas, S.J., superior general of the Society of Jesus, called for a renewed commitment of Jesuit colleges and universities to share the future for a humane, just and sustainable globe. “Who needs the knowledge we can share, and how can we share it more effectively with those for whom that knowledge can truly make a difference, especially the poor and excluded?” Father Nicolas questioned in his April 23, 2010, address.

In this spirit, with historic support from the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities and in partnership with the Jesuit Commons and the International Jesuit Refugee Service, refugees who live at the very margins of society, be it through poverty, location, opportunity or circumstance, are engaged in Jesuit higher education.

The work was inspired by an Australian Jesuit who helped create online higher education for refugees along the Thai-Burma border. But, Father Balleis, Lowney and McFarland are credited with being the leaders of this later initiative, which is being funded through 2014 by a generous European donor. Current students are refugees living in Kakuma Camp, Kenya; Dzaleka Camp, Malawi; and are urban refugees in Aleppo, Syria. Jesuit university faculty and staff volunteer to teach and support students in their learning. The students, in groups of 30, take four to five courses each year. Students complete three certificate programs over a three-year period leading to an undergraduate diploma.  The diploma in Liberal Studies is a 45-credit-hour offering awarded by Regis University. For-credit courses use immersive virtual learning environments partnered with online and on-the-ground tutors who are JRS and JC:HEM staff.

Rigorous admissions standards are observed, including evidence of English proficiency. Unique to the program, and reflective of the Jesuit educational mission, the Community Service Leadership Track offers noncredit certificates of completion that include leadership training in counseling, community health, English as a Second Language, special needs and tutor training. The first international JC:HEM think tank offered the perfect place to explore and examine JC:HEM’s current success and its future path. The focus and desired outcome of the think tank was to expand the vision and outreach of JC:HEM, “To empower those at the very edges of our societies through access to Jesuit higher education so that together we may foster hope to create a more peaceful and humane world,” notes Jacobs, who also served as conference chair. Participants came armed with intelligence, extensive interest and passion and a deep desire to ensure that JC:HEM continues to evolve as a worldwide presence. Each of the attendees vigorously participated and contributed to myriad dialogues, discussions, debates and presentations conducted during the four-day event.

During his 45-minute keynote address, UNHCR’s Cochetel did not pull any punches in telling attendees that “We need to be better when it comes to the refugee situation.” There are 11 million refugees, 27 million internally displaced persons, an estimated 3.5 million stateless persons, and 837,000 asylum seekers, who endure an average 17 year stay at refugee camps.” He noted the huge demand for higher education among refugees, especially the young ones who are often living in despair, wishing to continue their education and to be of greater service to their communities. Cochetel emphasized the benefits of higher education for refugees, noting that that education cultivates civic leadership, which is essential to any durable solution, develops skills and confidence, fosters the ability to make strategic life choices, provides training for highly qualified teachers for primary and secondary schools, and promotes economic gains.

The JC:HEM programs are coordinated by Portugal native Luis Amaral, S.J., at Kakuma—the largest of the three refugee camps with 85,000 refugees. Dr. Anne Ziegler coordinates the work at the Aleppo camp in Syria—with 10,000 refugees registered by UNHCR. And Frenchwoman Dr. Clotilde Giner serves as JC:HEM site coordinator at the Dzaleka, Malawi, camp where 16,000 refugees are located. Like all of the JC:HEM think tank attendees, Giner’s commitment to making a difference is powerful. Giner relishes her role as Dzaleka JC:HEM coordinator because it gives her that direct opportunity to combine her interest in migration and refugee issues, education and an unquenchable desire to make this world a better place.

“The job description fits me perfectly,” Giner says. “I give a lot for things I believe in. Migration and refugee issues are something I’ve always been keen to work on and therefore any opportunity I have to advocate or to defend their view or give my own views, I do. I believe so much in the JC:HEM program.”

According to Jacobs, conference chair, another aspect that contributed to the uniqueness of the think tank was that each participant was individually invited for his or her expertise, wisdom, and vision of the future. Among those attending the think tank were representatives from the Jesuit Refugee Service; the Pontificia Universita Gregoriana in Rome; Hekima College in Nairobi; the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Geneva; St. Joseph’s University Lebanon; Deusto University Spain; Asociacion de Universidades Confiadas a la Compañia de Jesus en America Latina; Australian Catholic University; Jesuit Refugee Tertiary Education Committee Australia; Catholic University of South Sudan; Institute of Advanced Technology Kenya; St. Xavier’s College Mumbai; Catholic University of Argentina; Universidad Iberoamericana Mexico; Entreculturas; Universidad Alberto Hurtado; Universidad Catolica del Uruguay; Center for Research and Action in Peace in Ivory Coast; Internet 2; GreenBridge Computing; and Jesuits from as far away as Zimbabwe, Kenya, Thailand, South Africa, Latin America, Australia, Europe and India. Father Garanzini’s keynote address, titled “The 450-Year Jesuit Mission at the Margins,” was also among the many captivating and thought-provoking presentations.

In addition to charting the future of JC:HEM and focusing on current education programs in Kenya, Malawi and Syria, conference delegates addressed topics such as curriculum, Ignatian pedagogy, human and fiscal resources, organizational structures and technology. The think tank also showcased two special exhibits that helped participants to better visualize the plight of refugees—a photographic exhibit of refugees by nationally recognized photographer Don Doll, S.J., and a display sponsored by David Yunger, CEO of GreenBridge Computing and consultant with Microsoft Partners in Learning, that demonstrated multi-point servers his company uses in emerging markets worldwide in order to enable digital access and education capacity in the developing world. Regis University’s participation in the formative days of JC:HEM came with several challenges. Bill Husson, now vice president for New Ventures and Strategic Alliances at Regis University, was at the time spearheading the university’s initial involvement with JC:HEM. Husson and others spent countless hours overseeing and orchestrating the academic and administrative efforts, including traveling to Africa and working closely with Mary McFarland, who became the international director of JC:HEM in 2010. One of the many challenges of the project involved varying competencies in computer literacy, as some of the students in the refugee camps have a fair amount of computer literacy, while for others computer and online learning is less familiar.

“Part of the initiative involves enhancing that familiarity with computing, Internet services and library resources,” says Marie Friedemann. She adds that from cultural sensitivities and social structures to values and linguistics sensitivities and meanings, “We are walking into a completely new arena, and we are going to do as much if not more learning than the students. But it’s exhilarating.”

The JC:HEM program combines the best of new technology with the Jesuit concept of Ignatian pedagogy, which emphasizes experience and new learning, reflection and evaluation, action and service. While JC:HEM does not offer immediate solutions to the refugee crisis, it brings refugees into a wider community of academic study, engages their minds and equips them with skills they can apply today, thus offering them a possibility of a life worth living and giving them confidence and skills for the future.

According to McFarland, these programs contribute hope and opportunity by developing leaders among the refugees themselves. Because of their academic experiences, in the first year alone students have created new community health initiatives and a disability center and have experienced enhanced employment opportunities with nongovernmental organizations supporting the camps. During its conclusion, the JC:HEM think tank offered a final round of spirited discussions, poignant presentations and the promise of recommendations that will guide the organization’s future in bringing Jesuit higher education to others at the margins of society. When the JC:HEM pilot programs conclude in August 2014, it is expected that more than 1,500 refugees will have participated in three countries. And the future will see expansion to other regions and needy populations.

To learn more about the JC:HEM work, watch a brief video by Mary McFarland, international director of JC:HEM, at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Fk32znSt00, or visit www.jesuitcommons.com.

Heal, Learn and Thrive

By: Sheila Mason Issue: Transformation Section: Academia

Hillcrest Educational Centers

Locals have written about Gerard “Jerry” Burke’s successes before. They have highlighted his drive and commitment to community, and especially his leadership and ability to steer his agency in a turbulent economy. Spending time with him, you notice his deep traditional knowledge, and he deftly interprets his world through it. This complements his milestones, formal degrees, impressive professional affiliations and even the local college scholarship that bears his name. His story is Hillcrest’s story, and it is worth sharing outside of the Berkshires.

Burke is the president and CEO of Hillcrest Educational Centers, Inc. (HEC), a private, not-for-profit school for youth with extreme behaviors, located in the tranquil hills of western Massachusetts. Although a culturally rich area that boasts renowned institutions such as Tanglewood, Williams College, the Norman Rockwell Museum and the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, it is still searching for a sustainable workforce identity. General Electric and Sprague Electric pulled out in the late 1980s, leaving a wake of malaise, empty storefronts and sagging employment opportunities. In subsequent years art communities and niche companies have spawned exciting growth. Strategies to attract more business and industry are well underway. Burke is an integral part of these efforts and is heavily engaged in the community in addition to his work at Hillcrest. Of the eleven committees he serves on, the most notable are chairman of the Berkshire Chamber of Commerce, Executive Committee of the Berkshire Business Roundtable and a member/director of the Massachusetts Business Roundtable. With close to 500 employees and a $25 million budget, HEC is one of the top ten companies in the county. Employee satisfaction is evident as a majority of the senior team have worked at HEC in various capacities for fifteen years or longer, and in Burke’s case since it was founded 26 years ago. What’s more, when talking to the senior staff, you get a sense of pride and loyalty—one that is impressive and palpable. In fact, during the Hillcrest Annual Campaign—the annual fundraiser—employees raised more than $50,000 for the fifth consecutive year.

Before there was Hillcrest, there was Avalon, a struggling for-profit residential school for troubled youth that eventually succumbed to financial pressures in the mid-80s, along with other private schools in the area. Enter Burke in 1985. He, along with the Hillcrest Hospital Foundation board, acquired Avalon and formed Hillcrest Educational Centers, Inc. (a separate entity from Hillcrest hospital, but still the cause of local name confusion today). With little resources and an appetite for risk, slowly and quietly, the board of directors with Burke’s leadership turned the school into the nonprofit gem it is today.

Hillcrest’s main priority fits in one sentence—to serve children and families in desperate need of social services. Formally stated, the mission is, “to facilitate the social, emotional, intellectual, and physical growth of students through the development of new skills that will enable them to succeed in their home community.” They have truly evolved into a last hope for hundreds of people, and have built a successful reputation on meeting this challenge. This is in part due to their constant mode of self-reflection and self-improvement—or what Burke calls, “The Hillcrest dialogue.”

He recently instituted a Cornell University training program. This $160,000 investment replaced the previously homegrown physical intervention model, which decreased physical interventions and related costs and improved overall safety of staff and students. To further raise standards, HEC instituted a “Learn More/Earn More” incentive program to train, motivate and retain valuable staff. They also maintain a license from the Department of Early Education and Care and certification by the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, in addition to a prestigious accreditation by the National Joint Commission in Behavioral Health Care. When talking with direct care workers, teachers, clinicians and administrative staff, you quickly realize they feel equally invested in the Hillcrest mission and are supported here, beyond the paycheck. The senior team does this by keeping staff informed of company news through inclusive and transparent staff meetings, the intranet and printed publications.

The residential school program serves youth and young adults who have been severely neglected and abused, have witnessed abuse or are otherwise in need of critical therapeutic care. Referred to as high-risk and high-demand children, they have trouble functioning in a traditional setting for a variety of reasons, and many have lived in unsuccessful foster or group homes or had stays in psychiatric hospitals. The goal is to get these youth stabilized, treated and returned back to their home communities, families (if appropriate) and schools. A stay can be anywhere from nine months to several years. Most do not have emotionally supportive parents, nor otherwise engaged family members who could intervene. Often, parents are struggling on many levels themselves—they are apt to be single, financially and psychologically unstable, abusive or victims of abuse, and to have issues with drug and alcohol addictions. Referrals come to Hillcrest from state and welfare agencies and school systems in Berkshire County and greater Massachusetts, New York, Connecticut and other areas in the Northeast. Before arriving at Hillcrest, it’s not uncommon that a student has been turned away from at least five other non-Massachusetts agencies—the result of a tight economy and the pressure on state politicians to keep monies in house, while trying to do what’s best for the child.

Reading the background of an HEC student is an experience you will not soon forget. It will turn your emotions from sadness to anger and outrage, and back to sadness all within one paragraph. The ugliest and most frightening words in our language are used—victim of rape, suffered broken bones, witnessed repeated domestic violence, starvation, verbally and physically assaulted, attempted suicide, and severe trauma—these are just a few descriptors. These children have been betrayed in egregious ways and have experienced repeated failure. It’s a failure that breeds yet more failure along with a sharp mistrust of others, a state of fear and an inability to cope, if left untreated. Studies show that the earlier the child enters treatment, whether from long- or short-term abuse, the better their chances of healing. A staff psychiatrist summed it up neatly: “If you had a physical wound and delayed treatment, the greater your chances would be of ancillary problems including scarring. Same is true with our minds. The earlier we reach a victim of abuse, the better their chances of leading a productive life.” This is the crux of Hillcrest’s work.

They operate three residential campuses and a day academy for approximately 106 students. The residential campuses are all former summer cottages, lovely Gilded-Age mansions once owned by wealthy New York and Boston residents who wanted to escape the city heat. The buildings and grounds still maintain the glory of the past with open fields, high ceilings, ornate woodwork, expansive fireplaces and inviting libraries. They are still respites—places that mirror the Hillcrest motto “Heal, Learn and Thrive.” Each child has a customized and comprehensive education and treatment plan, and like any other public or private school, students must pass mandated exams before moving to the next level.

Highpoint campus, in Lenox, Mass., cares for male students in the treatment of abusive sexual behavior in addition to aggression, self-injurious actions and emotional deregulation. Most have been diagnosed with psychiatric disorders, learning disabilities and mild development or neurological challenges as well. The Fernbrook program, housed next door to Hightop, treats young men with extreme psychiatric, emotional and behavior disorders such as fire setting—and common with victims of sexual abuse. Hillcrest Centers, also in Lenox, works with young women who have experienced physical or sexual abuse and trauma. These young women can be severely aggressive, sexually reactive, or self-injurious. Most have been in psychiatric hospitals, and many have moderate to serious learning disabilities. In Great Barrington, the Brookside Campus serves as an intensive treatment unit that provides nonmedical stabilization and diagnostic services for youth.

What’s striking when walking the campuses, aside from the high student-staff ratio—one-to-one in most cases—isn’t the occasional verbal or physical outburst, but that despite what these students have been through they look like our, or our neighbors’ children. They are energetic, clean, dressed appropriately and healthy looking. Some are chatting happily with peers or staff and are busily engaged in class and outdoor sport activities. These children look hopeful, and you feel optimistic knowing they are on a better path with people who understand their needs.

Over the years, Burke has proactively worked in the community with troubled youth—even through the various financial and population fluctuations. In fact, Burke used to run a group home for children but closed it in the late 1990s when it became a liability. Near the same time, he saw a decline in adolescent girls needing services and discontinued that program for a few years until the population rebounded two years ago. Today, HEC has a dedicated girls’ campus and program.

During the 1990s there was also a huge philosophical shift in the human services field that opined that children younger than ten should be kept out of residential care. To keep serving that population, and also others who only needed a day program structure, Hillcrest opened Housatonic Day Academy in Pittsfield in 1995. To serve the students and families of a fast-growing autistic population HEC created autistic-specific programming for both residential and day programs. They invested $40,000 in 2008 for a new addition and an autistic-specific program at the Housatonic Day Academy, and in July 2011, they also created an autistic-specific residential program on the Hillcrest Center Campus with a capital investment of $359,000.

As Burke carefully navigates the predicted market challenges ahead, he and the Hillcrest leadership also remain committed to opportunities for development and growth. Researching and anticipating trends, much like a for-profit business model, are what’s keeping them relevant and sharp, and only adds value to their current mission and programs. In testament to this, Hillcrest Dental Care was founded in 1985 originally to provide care to the children of Hillcrest, for whom access was a major obstacle. Since its establishment, the clinic has steadily expanded and now serves close to 9,000 patients from the region. In keeping with the mission, the majority of patients served are individuals and families without previous access to regular care, war veterans and recipients of Mass Health Care. They now employ five full-time dentists who use eight treatment rooms and state-of-the-art equipment; there are plans to open a satellite office to reach others who lack access.

Hillcrest Psychological Services is another community-based program that specializes in high-risk assessments and evaluation services for families and schools in Berkshire County. In another very recent change, Hillcrest formalized an affiliation with Berkshire County Kids’ Place in 2011, a fully accredited Children’s Advocacy Center for child abuse victims and their non-offending family members in Pittsfield—again, staying true to the mission of helping children and families and advocating on their behalf.

Burke says, “By exploring collaborations and partnerships with organizations in the region while emphasizing the diversification of our services, programs and clients, we will provide an array of beneficial community-based services for those in need, that extend and strengthen the Hillcrest legacy.”

Sheila Mason is the Director of Development and Community Outreach at Hillcrest Educational Centers. Prior to Hillcrest, Mason worked in college relations and development.

ICOSA Ignites Starto.tv

By: Annette Perez Issue: Transformation Section: Government At ICOSA, we pride ourselves on leading by example. We reach out to collaborative partners, leverage our resources to support them and believe we are building an ecosystem of connected leaders who are putting their noses to the grindstone and pushing for change on important topics all over the globe. So when an idea evolves into something actionable, we challenge ourselves to give it a shot.

ICOSA itself was born out of the need to spark a fresh start. Her parent, the CAP family of companies, faced enormous—almost insurmountable threats—about 10 years ago when CEO/founder Gayle Dendinger began conceiving the notion of pulling together a network for connection and collaboration. We believe in fresh ideas, new energy and hard work. Few sectors of industry reflect that better than the American start-up community. Great ideas are being turned into exciting new companies, and every day we see glimmers of hope in the recovering economy. Such was the case a couple of months ago.

So what are we doing? We have a new project focus in a start-up of our own called Starto.tv. Starto.tv is the brainchild of Gayle Dendinger and Eli Regalado, who recognized that if we applied our resources to this space, we could drive visibility to some of these young companies, partner with important organizations such as Startup America (www.s.co) and spark exciting changes all the way around.

We have built a state-of-the-art television studio here at ICOSA. We have the technology to compete with the best in TV, and we have a scrappy, fast-learning, smart group of willing people who are excited about the prospects. Our new show, which is being prepared weekly for an IP/TV broadcast on our YouTube channel, is THE show for American entrepreneurs. Made by entrepreneurs, for entrepreneurs, it is focused on what young companies need to know.

Starto.tv has news segments, a bit of comedy, “man on the street” interviews and more. Regular features with Startup America regional partners highlight successes around the country. We have an informative “whiteboard” session in each episode where we bring industry leaders from different disciplines to offer quick lessons for young companies. And we anchor the show with solid interviews with the best minds in business from all over the country. Just in the past week we have spoken to Jigar Shah, formerly of the Carbon War Room and founder of Sun Edison, and Wing Lam, the founder and owner of the iconic Wahoo’s Fish Tacos.

Leaders such as Shah and Lam remind us of important lessons that apply to all businesses as well as to start-ups. Shah, for example, spoke of the challenges he faced when he realized that his bold new ideas in solar were going to require lightning-fast deployment. Customers snapped up his ideas so fast that he struggled to keep up at times. But he knew he was on to something, and he never gave up or assumed he would not succeed.

Lam inspired us with his down-to-earth approach, both with his phenomenal success and his humility. He talks about supporting other entrepreneurs as part of his obligation to give back and as part of the “circle of life” of business. Both Jigar Shah and Wing Lam, as well as the dozens of others Starto has talked to in the past weeks, inspire us.

By coincidence, both Shah and Lam were born into immigrant families and talked about the great influence of parents who, in Shah’s case, literally bought him a book about energy that sparked his interest in solar power as a child. And Lam, who is of mixed ethnicity, talked about seeing his mother and father open a Chinese restaurant in South America. Both gentlemen looked at their prospects at one critical moment and rather than asking, “Why?” they asked, “Why not?” and they pursued their visions relentlessly until they recognized success.

Undaunted determination is one of the great pillars of ICOSA and now of Starto.tv. Everyone can apply lessons from start-ups to reignite their own passions and to reinvigorate their work. Leaders such as this remind us that if you can imagine it, you can do it. All of us should look to these bold innovators for inspiration and, if nothing else, to see what lessons we can glean as we work together on our model of multifaceted success.

To watch Starto.tv, visit http://www.icosa.tv/shows/starto-tv/.

Kathleen Kennedy Townsend at the Denver Forum

By: Annette Perez Issue: Transformation Section: Government The Denver Forum hosted Kathleen Kennedy Townsend at the Oxford Hotel on May 9, 2012. She was in Denver because of the 50-year anniversary celebration of the Migrant Health Act. Typically, Townsend gives a speech based on a story from her past; however, her presentation was based this time on theory. She questioned the audience, “What’s going on in this country?” She is worried that as a country we are tearing each other apart, and not building a nation. “I believe that a nation works best when all people feel they can participate. I think it is part of human nature to be part of a mission.”

She continued, “America was founded as a mission into the wilderness, and every American felt they were part of that mission.” Townsend explained that during World War II, every American did his/her part somehow—whether fighting in the battles, working in the factories or obeying the wage and price controls. Everyone participated and was proud to be an American because the effort connected them to each other. She shared with the forum a passage about John Winthrop’s metaphorical ‘shining city’—that described the America he imagined. This passage was read to the troops by President Dwight D. Eisenhower before the invasion on D-Day, by President John Kennedy the day before his inauguration speech to a special session of the Massachusetts Legislature, and by President Ronald Reagan in his final address to the American people.

Unfortunately over the past 30 years the model of collaboration and working together has turned into a focus on “me—how can I do better? How can I pay lower taxes—rather than considering the whole, we only think of ourselves.” Townsend went on to explain that when her uncle was president, he was asked to define happiness. President Kennedy said that “happiness was the full use of powers along the lines of excellence.” Townsend asked the forum audience to imagine what happiness was as defined by us. She said, “If you don’t have a system that allows you to use your talents, it’s hard to be happy. The metaphor in the ‘shining city’ reflects the abiding truth that we use a political community for happiness to work. Today, unfortunately, the rhetoric of happiness focuses on private acts, assuming it’s an individual’s personal responsibility to find satisfaction.”

Townsend explains that over the past 30 years America’s notion of community has been shrinking. She questioned if the American Dream is all about “me.” She continued with stories of her grandfather and how her family used to pay more taxes so that everyone benefited. “Back in the day there was no question of people with a higher income paying higher taxes,” she said. In the end, “Happiness has nothing to do with money, courage, self-sacrifice, honor, duty or stoicism—these are the essential virtues of democracy, and none of them can be bought. These values are lost when we enter a world where greed is good. A nation needs to instill virtues and values of selflessness important to survive,” argued Townsend.

An Evening with Phil McKinney

By: Keenan Brugh Issue: Transformation Section: Government Innovation, put simply, is the process of creating and implementing new ideas. Organizations face ever-changing environments, and innovation helps secure an institution’s future. ICOSA Magazine itself is the result of implementing new ideas. Recently, the belief in innovation and the mantra “Connection and Collaboration” led to the idea of bringing in a world- class expert on the subject to speak at our studios here in Colorado. The process of transforming a warehouse into the ICOSA Studio & Event Center had begun. Springboarding from the relationship with publisher Simon & Schuster, director of social outreach, Eli Regalado, arranged to get the highly-prized speaker, Phil McKinney. Recently retired from Hewlett Packard, McKinney just released his first book Beyond the Obvious, an instant hit with those responsible for consistently generating innovation.

Phil McKinney recently retired as CTO of Hewlett Packard’s $40 billion personal systems group. In this position, he was responsible for strategy and managing R&D for one of the world’s largest personal computer companies, producing mobile devices, tablets, notebooks, desktops, workstations and printers. His experience leading innovation within such a large organization has given him unique insights. Currently, he is an “innovation consultant” and frequently gives speeches at top institutions. His podcast, “Killer Innovations”, has been hailed as a “must listen” by CIOInsight and his own website, www.PhilMcKinney.com, has go-to posts on a wide variety of innovation topics.

Beyond the Obvious offers a well thought out, yet extremely practical, approach to innovation. McKinney poses that too many business aren’t asking enough questions (or at least enough of the right questions). He offers “Killer Questions” to inspire thinking a little differently and to find answers that are “beyond the obvious.” While the best source of these questions is the book itself, you can check out some daily samples on Twitter using the handle @killerquestion. Another of the book’s assets is the FIRE method, which is an acronym for Focus, Ideation, Rank and Execution. This strategy acts as a framework for focusing on the right problems, coming up with plenty of original ideas, cutting them down to a few great ideas, and executing on them for success.

Concepts like ‘innovation’ are abstract and difficult to learn. Google or Wikipedia cannot provide the right answer for every organization. People need to connect with other people in order to learn best practices and develop their own innovative strategies. The ICOSA Innovation Event welcomed 200 guests to listen to thought leaders and share their perspectives with others through networking over drinks and heavy appetizers. Sharif Youssef, founder of iGivefirst, spoke on innovation from his perspective as a CEO of a startup company that is revolutionizing online philanthropy. Kelly Quan, the executive director of the Colorado Innovation Network (COIN), spoke about her thoughts on the Colorado community and how working with other organizations can lead to new results. Mr. McKinney talked about his book and the lessons learned from his experiences at HP and since his retirement. Excited about the attendance and enthusiasm of the crowd, he gave plenty of time for Q&A as well as networking afterwards. And we thought the ICOSA studio was a fitting location for an event on innovation since less than two months earlier, the “event center” was still just a warehouse full of boxes. Innovation moves things forward.

Want to share your thoughts? Email [email protected].

Shaunna Mozingo

By: Suzanne Pletcher Issue: Transformation Section: Government

Transforming the Building Energy Code Industry

When Shaunna Mozingo raised her hand in 2006 at a City of Westminster building division meeting and volunteered to learn building energy efficiency codes, she had no idea that simple act would transform her career and life.

Back then, she was a building plan reviewer in the Westminster building division. Today, she is a nationally recognized expert in building energy efficiency codes. She works alongside the United States Department of Energy and others, for instance, leading teams of diverse people from the fields of construction, design, community and county building departments; tradespeople in insulation, heating and air-conditioning; and others through the long conversation that leads to final agreement on the next generation of energy efficiency building codes. Those codes are the evolving blueprint for improvements in American buildings that provide greater comfort and lower utility bills to inhabitants as well as preserve precious energy and water resources that are increasingly a top priority for city and county planners and code officials—as well as climate scientists.

“She is definitely motivated, she’s willing to pursue an issue that she’s passionate about and she’s passionate about just about everything that she does. She’s not afraid—not afraid to ask questions, to pick up the phone and call someone regardless of their position or status,” said Dave Horras, chief building official for the City of Westminster, who served as both boss and mentor to Mozingo.

Horras led the fateful meeting with the entire city building staff during which Mozingo raised her hand and volunteered. The staff was discussing the 2006 international energy conservation code, and Horras was adamant that, if the building department was going to adopt the code, then it also was going to enforce it. He needed someone to head up the effort. Mozingo had been in the job less than a year at that point, but she told Horras she would take it on. One of the first people she called was Gil Rossmiller, chief building official in Parker. Rossmiller was the only other building official in Colorado who was at that time fully implementing the 2006 energy code. They sat down for an entire day, and he taught her the basics.

Then she volunteered for the energy code interpretations committee with the International Code Council (ICC). The committee took requests for interpretations of the code and rendered an opinion, so she knew she would learn many of the details. Learning the code, which is updated every three years and is now at the 2012 level, might be compared to learning law, or accounting—the complexity is astounding and intimidating to most people—including the building community. But, there are major benefits to the building energy code.

Explained Jim Meyers, an energy code analyst for the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project who helped Mozingo with her first workshop on the 2006 code, “Buildings use 39 percent of our total energy in the United States. The more energy-efficient buildings we construct to new energy code standards, the more potential we have to use far less. By adopting and enforcing more recent codes, communities are providing economic and environmental benefits to all citizens.”

But at that time with the 2006 code, Westminster decided that it would require builders to start sizing heating and air-conditioning equipment specifically to how the more energy-efficient buildings were built rather than by rule of thumb. Mozingo remembers that builders were up in arms, so she held a public meeting for anyone interested in the issue, and they discussed it and learned together.

“I thought that other communities would be adopting the 2006 energy code soon, and they would have a steep learning curve,” Mozingo said. So she decided to share what she knew, applied for and received a small grant, and developed a weekly energy code training program called Westminster Wednesdays. The trainings were open to all. “Shaunna is a leadership type. She makes people comfortable in the trainings that she leads, and she is not overbearing,” said Rossmiller. “She is very good at letting people find their own way.”

In 2011, Mozingo was named president of the Colorado chapter of ICC. Then the national ICC asked her to teach the code in other states, so she took a vacation day here and there to do just that. Shortly thereafter, she was asked by Colorado Code Consulting to take on a new job with them to manage an energy contract they had with the state of Colorado, visiting each of the 339 jurisdictions and working with them on building codes. “I didn’t want to leave Westminster,” she said. “I had a great job and they gave me such wings!”

But Horras knew better. “I saw early on that she wasn’t going to be with us for the long haul just because she had so much going. She had so much potential that, ultimately, I encouraged her to look at other options,” said Horras, who remains a Mozingo fan and mentor to this day.

So Mozingo took over the management of a $1 million contract and visited every corner of Colorado to ask what help was needed. She would find out where the community was weak and design a training to fill the gap. “My family calls it my ‘out to save the world’ complex,” says Mozingo, and added that she wants to please people and help out. In fact, she has tackled other interests with the same zeal. She learned auto mechanics so that she wouldn’t have to rely on someone else, and ended up working on other people’s cars. And, when her boyfriend raced motocross, she took up the sport and learned to race.

But what grabbed her most was teaching. “I remember the first time I ever taught, I thought, ‘Ah, that is what I like,’” she said. “The next day on my lunch hour I went for a walk and thought about all the different kinds of classes that I could create and teach.” As it turned out, she would be teaching and leading workshops nationally. From her experience in Colorado, she convened a national-level meeting of all the different parties affected by the improvements in energy codes. She figured that if everyone came together and worked out their differences and made compromises, that the new codes would be better for everyone.

Today Mozingo is working to develop “train the trainer” programs nationally, consulting with the National Renewable Energy Lab and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory on energy codes, among other things. “Before that first code hearing, I had never opened an energy code book in my life,” said Mozingo. “For me, it has been transforming that I have found my niche. I love to learn, and I love for everybody else to know what I know.” But in the process of her own transformation, Mozingo helped to transform the group of building code officials working in Colorado. Now they know that there are many people whom they can turn to if they need help, and they are not afraid of the more stringent energy codes, said Mozingo.

She also has played a role in transforming the housing market in Colorado. Today, close to half of new homes are built to Energy Star efficiency standards, and those standards are pegged to the latest energy codes. Mozingo and her colleagues are now concentrating their efforts upon commercial buildings. “Soon we will be making a major difference in commercial buildings, and I’m excited about that,” she said.

Suzanne Pletcher is director of communications at the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project based in Boulder, which promotes energy efficiency policy in six states of the Southwest. To contact her, call 303.447.0078 x5 or visit www.swenergy.org.

FEMA

By: Kelly de la Torre Issue: Transformation Section: Government

Creating Business Continuity and Resilience

A resilient community depends on all of us, says Tim Manning, Deputy Administrator for Protection and National Preparedness for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Years of experience in wilderness mountain rescue, as a fire fighter, an EMT, and the former Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management for the state of New Mexico uniquely situates Manning to help create and implement FEMA’s whole community vision. FEMA is in the process of building scaffolding to link disaster to recovery with its Whole Community Approach to emergency preparedness planning. This scaffolding consists of a community network, appropriate tools, and strategies that are put in place before disaster strikes so that critical recovery mechanisms can be mobilized immediately. “Our collective preparedness relies on the strength and preparedness of everybody,” says Tim Manning. “Building resilient communities is a top priority.”

Manning explains that the “Whole Community approach is a reflection of what FEMA has learned over the years in responding to and preparing for disasters and emergencies. We have learned that the public isn’t a liability in the response but is the most important part of the team in responding to a disaster.” Manning draws on his experience as a fire fighter to explain. “As a firefighter, there was no emergency where the public wasn’t already helping when I arrived on scene. The public helps in the community in an emergency.” It happens naturally. Historically, however, emergency planning was undertaken from the perspective of what the government needs to do. For example, deployment of police and fire department assets in this manner often treats the public as something that needs to be worked around. “The reality,” says Manning, “is that the majority of response in an emergency is neighbors helping neighbors.”

Resilient communities depend on multi-stakeholder participation. “It’s a large team effort,” stresses Manning. FEMA targets partners from every critical sector, including state, local and tribal government agencies, cities, counties, private sector companies, and the public, to name a few. Next, the planning needs to coordinate with FEMA operations. Comprehensive Preparedness Guide (CPG) 101 “provides FEMA guidance on the fundamentals of planning and developing emergency operations plans” and in one respect, “provides methods for planners to conduct community-based planning that engages the whole community by using a planning process that represents the actual population in the community and involves community leaders and the private sector in the planning process.” The goal is to achieve coordination and integration of plans “across all levels of government, nongovernmental organizations, the private sector, and individuals and families.” Manning notes that this is fundamentally different from what FEMA has done in the past.

Business continuity and resilience enables disaster recovery. “Disaster recovery is characterized by having a restored and thriving economy in an area and you can’t have that until your retail and business sectors are operating, the tax base is operating, and the people of the community are back to work. You can’t have that until you have resilient supply chains and resilient businesses,” explains Manning. At its most basic level, recovery can’t start until consumers have access to resources. Ensuring access to critical resources means that businesses need to work to identify weak links in the flow of information and in their supply chains so they can establish procedures to eliminate downtime. Importantly, industry is recognizing that they can use emergency preparedness to gain market advantage over competitors. According to Manning, FEMA has seen large retailers insist on continuity in their first and second tier supply chains.

Inherent in FEMA’s Whole Community Approach and directly applicable to the ability to maintain business continuity, is the understanding that the community is a critical element in preparedness planning. Indeed, preparedness planning is personal to a community requiring consideration of a number of characteristics including, for example, its population distribution, its resources, and its culture, just to name a few. Based on this philosophy, says Manning, FEMA is taking a more holistic approach to planning and encourages all members in the community to undertake advanced planning.

Companies are critical and integrated members of a community’s ecosystem and their business resilience is directly dependent on its employees, the people that are dedicated to both the community and to getting operations back up and running. This can’t happen if those employees can’t get to work. To address this, FEMA recommends that companies encourage their employees to individually prepare for disasters so that they can get to work. In another example, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and FEMA developed a process to credential personnel. For companies and their supply chains, credentialing their employees can help expedite their drivers through road blocks and cordoned areas in order to get supplies to where they are needed. This can be especially important where an employee is “borrowed” from another utility in order to get power lines up and running.

Employee preparedness is just one way that private industry is stepping out-front on the issue of planning in order to drive company preparedness. The issue is multi-faceted and another way for companies to build market advantage is to explore opportunities to use emerging technology. Under Federal law, FEMA and the Department of Homeland Security do not endorse private enterprises or their products. And while Mr. Manning did not discuss any particular technology or company, private industry is making strides in developing innovative solutions to address emergency needs. For example, emergency and disaster situations are frequently accompanied by a disruption to the power supply. Companies can prepare by investing in alternate means of electricity generation sized to at least power critical operations.

Preparedness however, does not need to be limited to traditional tools. Advanced technologies can be incorporated into the toolbox and some of these new technologies can provide viable and economic solutions for times when there is not an emergency while adding benefit when there is. For example, mobile solar generators could provide an alternative to traditional diesel generators. Mobile solar generators can provide a lifetime of energy savings because they can be placed at the facility in advance of an emergency and be used to reduce facility energy use and cost during times of peak load demand—the time when energy costs are highest. The facility energy savings realized can help offset the cost of the unit and decrease the pay-back period.

For example, SolaRover, a Colorado company, offers a rapidly deployable critical-output mobile solar power generator system that properly configured, can deliver up to 50 kW of continuous power. Comparatively, the cost per kilowatt hour is dramatically less than that of a diesel generator because the diesel includes fuel costs, resupply logistics, maintenance and overhauls that must be taken into account over the lifetime of the generator. A mobile, zero emission and silent generation unit addresses not only the need to restore power to get operations up and running, but has the unique ability to be “pre-positioned” next to the most critical services for public safety and commerce. These mobile solar power units can be strategically placed throughout a region or a predicted disaster zone to power systems or assets vital to recovery, like emergency clinics, police, fire, emergency room facilities, refrigerators and street lights without the requirement to find a safe storage facility for fuel or undamaged functional infrastructure for resupply support. Because the system is mobile, however, if a critical need is identified during the recovery process, or the disaster strikes in near proximity to the preparedness area, the units can simply be “unplugged” and transported to the new location. Strategic distribution of units throughout a region can help by providing clean and silent back-up power that could be rolled into neighboring cities if required.

For communities, it is also critical to protect assets that support public health. A strategic use for a mobile unit like this is to power pharmacy refrigeration units. In the event of an emergency, uninterrupted power ensures the community access to critical life-saving pharmaceuticals and from the insurer’s perspective protects against loss. During a natural disaster, loss of refrigeration can wipe-out stock piles of essential pharmaceuticals costing upwards of hundreds of thousands of dollars. A small up-front investment in clean mobile solar technology can mitigate this type of asset loss to the benefit of the community on multiple levels. A clean and silent energy mobile unit could further be used to power cell phone towers or could be integrated with water purification units. In essence, in a disaster, the mobile solar generator could function as a mobile operations center for a facility by powering critical assets, enabling cell phone use and providing access to clean water to the facility and also to the community. In short, removing power disruption from the equation, expedites recovery by maintaining business continuity.

With its Whole Community Approach, FEMA is transforming the historical approach to preparedness planning. Meanwhile, the private sector, the community and the state, local, tribal and federal governments each have a role to play in mitigating and preparing for potential disasters. For each of us, “The time for planning is right now; take a few minutes and get ready,” says Manning. If each member of the community contributes, and we integrate not only the stakeholders but also the right kinds of material and equipment, we can bridge the gap between disaster and recovery and bring all of our communities back on-line quickly.

FEMA encourages everyone to take a look at www.ready.gov for tips on planning.

Transforming Politics as Usual

By: Kim DeCoste Issue: Transformation Section: Government If you live in the United States, you have probably noticed that despite the fact we vote in November, on presidential election years—particularly in swing states—the races start months before you cast a ballot. If you live in a swing state, you may also have been among the millions of people who loudly complained in 2008, as we saw the coming-of-age of “robo-calls” and telephone polling. Clearly, candidates were trying to get their messages out, and many were trying to gauge how those messages were received. There are people who are so polite, they just cannot hang up when a telephone pollster catches them, so they dutifully answer the questions—age, income, gender, race—and then rank responses on the scales they are given from carefully crafted scripts. The fact is, politicians and others are paying staggering sums of money to get those replies from people who still answer a landline when it rings with an unknown caller on the other end.

Have you noticed, however, there is a growing number of people who no longer have landlines or who screen all their calls at home? Do you ever stop to consider who they are?

Many are millennials—those newly minted adults just entering the world on their own. Culturally it is interesting to note that many are minorities. In fact, 56 percent of minorities only connect to the Internet wirelessly. But, there are other important political and economic demographic blocks of people whose voices are absent when politicians are defining their messages and crafting their platforms, and they are doing so largely based on generalizations and assumptions.

To be honest, it seems those invisible folks are fine with it—if they wanted to be polled or to reach out, there is nothing stopping them. You know when people are not excited by their choices, you can often hear their frustration at the two-party system or frustration that “big government doesn’t listen.” Many believe political leaders don’t even care what we think. That is debatable. But what is clear is that it is difficult, if not impossible in these polarized times, to find a way to have civilized discussion across demographic or political divides based on ideas and positions, rather than polarizing rhetoric. There are, some say, 12 percent on the far right and 12 percent on the far left who are making the majority of the noise and who are influencing traditional mainstream media. The rest sit quietly in the middle and go unheard, and sadly, unrepresented.

In 2008, Lou Aronson had an epiphany while standing at the school bus stop sending his son off to school. He heard the crowd talking about robo-calls, and he suddenly realized a need. How could mobile devices be engaged to reach that invisible block of people?

Based in Washington, D.C., Aronson managed to define the idea with his partner Vijay Perincherry, a scientist who thought about the challenge and believed he could develop a cluster-based algorithm to help him bridge some of the gaps. Using his Ph.D. in applied mathematics and working across industry sectors such as housing, retail, transportation, advertising, bond trading and data management, Perincherry worked and reworked it until he came up with the solution—Votifi.

“Votifi is transforming polling while disrupting politics. We deliver polls and survey questions while using the results to help simplify your access to political content, quantify where you fit on the political map, and amplify your voice through discussion with people who share your views and debates with people who are on the other side of an issue,” explains Aronson.

In fact, Aronson says, Votifi is really a hub for political engagement and exploration, whose primary focus is the $3.6 billion political information services industry, which is primarily tied to the landline phone. As he describes it, “Our platform is geared toward the mobile device and engagement. Content is delivered both online—desktop and laptop—and via mobile—smartphones and apps. By delivering poll questions via SMS, email and our app, Votifi gains unique access to Americans irrespective of the availability of a landline, personal computer or in-home Internet. And, we discern the fundamental connection between emotion, engagement and activation while clustering and connecting people regardless of the mode of input. The Votifi platform provides issue-focused and weighted analysis of opinions of the largest segment of the American voting population in real time.”

It is hard at first to understand what an incredibly disruptive idea this is. But, if you are politically inclined, or a political junkie, as Aronson describes himself, this makes your heart beat a little bit faster. Both of the other co-founders, Aasil Ahmad and Sid Smith, were also politically connected and involved. Ahmad worked in politics both in the United States and in Asia for about 10 years. He worked with grassroots campaigns to develop effective technology strategies, and he sees the incredible reformative potential this platform may have on our democracy. Smith worked as an attorney for emerging growth companies and investors and describes himself as a “disaffected Democrat who worked in New Jersey politics for several years.” He, too, recognizes the powerful transformative potential Votifi brought to others like him.

Votifi allows users to log in, create a profile or remain anonymous, and then engage with others in discussions about topics of interest. It is poll-driven, eliciting opinions from users and simultaneously factoring out data that are not pertinent. And it could allow someone interested in influencing the vote, for example, to see the opinions of entire sectors of the population currently being missed by the traditional call center pollster.

When we talk about connection and collaboration at ICOSA, we are interested in seeing how bright new ideas are changing old-school paradigms. The transformative power of the Votifi platform is stunning and certainly reflects our interest! It has been argued that our nation is at an inflection point, where it is easy to lose perspective. Aronson and his team firmly believe that Votifi addresses this by allowing users to engage in a new, objective fashion. After all, “you cannot solve anything until you start talking,” he says.

“What We Have Here Is a Failure to Communicate,” a recent NPR story, addresses the challenge Votifi is tackling—the imperative of how we can use data to understand what people are saying, not just for their sake, but for our own as well. Basically, the company attempts to give users an understanding of where the issues really lie. Aronson riffs on Gil Scott-Heron’s 1974 poem when he says, “The revolution will not be televised… but you can bet your bottom dollar it’ll be broadcast to your smartphone.”

What Votifi does allow is for us to look beyond “the theocracy into which we were born” says Aronson; “It helps to normalize an online dialogue and take it beyond 140 characters, which sadly, is the amount of information upon which some people base their views and opinions.” He goes on, “When we engage on Votifi, we see that through all the rhetoric and bombastic language that is thrown at us, ‘there really is a there there.’ In other words, we are able to get to the true heart of the matter and have productive conversations.”

Talking about transformation vis-à-vis the American political scene, we at ICOSA are not unlike most people in the United States. We want to see change, and we believe that connection and collaboration are necessary for us all to get together and drive change. But we have to start somewhere. We can’t even know what hard choices we are going to have to make unless we start having these conversations. Votifi levels the playing field for the political debate and provides substantive information back to policymakers and others about what we really think and helps each of us play a role in transforming politics-as-usual into the politics of now.

To learn more about Votifi, visit www.votifi.com.

Choosing to Compete

By: April Anderson Lamoureux Issue: Transformation Section: Government

How Massachusetts Is Leading the Nation in Economic Competitiveness and Regulatory Reform

Massachusetts is recovering faster and stronger than the rest of the nation, as evidenced by an unemployment rate significantly lower than the rest of the country and exciting growth trends in our world-leading innovation economy, including the life sciences, clean energy and advanced manufacturing sectors. None of these successes happened by accident. In fact, we’ve maintained a steady strategy over the years that included making targeted investments in key areas such as infrastructure, innovation and education. And as a state, we are now reaping the benefits of having spent the economic downturn laying the foundation for greater prosperity ahead.

To maintain our position as a global leader in education, research and development, and economic innovation, we must continue to reassess our approach and compare it to our competitor states. And we are doing just that. The foundation for our economic progress is our state’s economic development strategy titled, “Choosing to Compete in the 21st Century: An Economic Development Policy and Strategic Plan for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.” Created by a 34-member Economic Development Planning Council of public and private interests, our plan provides a consistent and comprehensive framework for economic development to extend far into future.

The plan concludes that the Massachusetts economy is driven by a diverse but related group of innovation-based industry clusters that compete successfully on a national and global level, with the benefit of one of the best educated workforces in the country. The council’s goal became to help those businesses and entrepreneurs create and retain jobs here in Massachusetts, and to do so they created five themes to advance toward a more competitive Massachusetts economy: Advance education and workforce development for middle-skill jobs through coordination of education, economic development and workforce development programs; support innovation and entrepreneurship; support regional development through infrastructure investments and local empowerment; increase the ease of doing business; and address our cost competitiveness.

Now that the state has a clear, written strategy that was developed and endorsed by a public-private partnership, including members of the Massachusetts Business Roundtable, we are intensely focused on implementation. There are a total of 55 action steps associated with the five themes, including benchmarks for success, and each action step has an assigned “owner” and “contributors” who are responsible for advancing the actions. The state has hired a performance management consultant to guide the progress and has created an online tool for the council and the public to monitor implementation at www.mass.gov/compete.

An early result of the plan has been the execution of a comprehensive strategy to achieve meaningful regulatory reform in Massachusetts. Under the theme of increasing the ease of doing business, Massachusetts has launched a first-in-the-nation effort to systematically reform the public rule-making process and the way our state views government regulation and its impact on the economy.

The regulatory reform initiative has four parts aimed at reducing small business impacts of new regulations, reviewing and reevaluating the continued need for “old” regulations, increasing awareness of state government regulators, and creating and maintaining open lines of communication with the business community on the topic of regulation.

Through a legislative mandate in 2010, all agencies proposing new regulations in Massachusetts must prepare and publicly release a small business impact statement that analyzes the potential impact that regulation will have on small businesses in the Commonwealth. The law requires that agencies answer five questions relating to business impacts, but does not describe the process for how this requirement should be implemented.

Recognizing the value in small business impact statements for regulatory changes, a uniform template for state agencies to report impacts in a consistent and comprehensive fashion was developed. When regulations are proposed today, a statement of small business impacts is filed with that draft regulation and published online by the Secretary of State’s Regulations Division. Individuals with concerns about the regulation or the impact statement are then invited to participate in a public comment and hearing process, to discuss these matters and make suggestions for improvements. The intent of the small business impact statement is to provide the utmost transparency during the regulatory process, and to bring the potential small business impacts into the forefront of the public debate. Governor Deval Patrick has taken a strong position in favor of this process and recently said, “If compliance can be made easier and cheaper, we will make it easier and cheaper. If compliance is too cumbersome or costly, relative to the benefits, the proposed regulation will not take effect until we identify a less cumbersome path forward.”

The second part of this reform initiative takes aim at reducing regulatory impacts of existing regulations and seeking opportunities for streamlining, improving transparency of processes, and improving government efficiencies. Governor Patrick kicked off this effort with a directive to all agencies in late 2011 to review at least 10 percent of their existing regulations over a 12-week period and seek opportunities for changes. During that period, more than 200 existing regulations were reviewed across nearly 60 agencies, resulting in 150 recommendations for regulatory rescissions or modifications. Of the recommended regulatory improvements, 25 of the amendments will seek to align Massachusetts with a national model or standard that is utilized by other states to support the ease of interstate commerce and export opportunities for our businesses.

We are proud of the initial results of the regulatory review effort, and we will continue to pursue an aggressive schedule of regulatory review with a goal of reviewing 1,000 regulations across the administration by the end of 2012. While engaging in continued reviews, agencies have simultaneously begun to advance regulatory amendments that are making a difference to small businesses in Massachusetts today.

For example, the Division of Professional Licensure recently filed regulatory changes to clarify the application process for new salons and provide a means for transferring ownership of a salon without disrupting business, positively affecting the 9,000-plus salons in business today. In late April–early May, the Division of Marine Fisheries filed regulations to extend the season for recreational sea bass and fluke fishing and increase catch limits, positively impacting the more than 800 licensed recreational fishing vessels in the state.

The Department of Environmental Protection has completed a top-to-bottom review of its regulations to find smarter ways to protect the environment while reducing regulatory burdens on businesses. The department worked hand-in-hand with both businesses and environmental stakeholders to identify more than 20 reforms that will streamline environmental permitting, eliminate duplicative approvals, and encourage better environmental outcomes by reducing barriers to environmentally beneficial projects such as renewable energy sources. These efforts will promote a more predictable and transparent development process to support new commercial and housing growth in our communities. These are all productive and thoughtful ideas generated by our state regulators, and businesses are feeling the immediate positive benefits of these changes. To encourage more of this thinking and to improve awareness of the connection between regulators and the health of our small businesses and greater economy, the state’s third objective for regulatory reform involves training and encouraging state regulators. To initiate this effort, Governor Patrick taped a video message to state employees asking for their best ideas for regulatory reform and encouraged them to continue their pursuit of government innovation. The video features some small businesses in action and was sent to state regulators in every agency to generate a sense of recognition, enthusiasm and shared purpose. Training sessions for state regulators are under development now and are expected to be launched later in 2012.

As the reevaluation of existing regulations continues, Governor Patrick will personally recognize the state regulators who present the most innovative and significant ideas for regulatory reforms, intending to eliminate unnecessary burdens on businesses and improve state efficiencies. These individuals will have an opportunity to meet with the governor and discuss regulatory issues, and they will be publicly recognized in local newspapers and on the state’s website for their outstanding contributions to the project. These small gestures go a long way in reinforcing the importance of regulatory reform across all agencies and all levels of state government.

And finally, the administration, through its Executive Office of Housing & Economic Development, has appointed a state regulatory ombudsperson who will lead the overall regulatory reform effort inside state government and act as a liaison to the business community to ensure that they are engaged from outside of state government. Together with Michael Hogan, president and CEO of A.D. Makepeace, member of the Massachusetts Business Roundtable and Economic Development Planning Council, and leader of the Planning Council’s Subcommittee on Increasing the Ease of Doing Business, it will convene business leaders, chambers of commerce and trade associations through a Business Advisory Group on Regulation to discuss regulatory issues of importance to their members. They have also established an intake process for small businesses to make recommendations for reforms directly to state government.

Massachusetts has made great progress in its economic recovery, but there is more to do to stay ahead. “Choosing to Compete” has provided a productive vehicle for engaging business leaders in a public-private partnership that supports continued economic prosperity in our state, and through regulatory reform we are making sure the world knows that Massachusetts is the best state in the country to do business.

April Anderson Lamoureax is the Massachusetts assistant secretary of Economic Development and has been recently appointed to serve as the state’s regulatory ombudsperson. In this role, she leads the overall regulatory reform effort happening inside state government and acts as a liaison to the business community to ensure that they are engaged from outside of state government. To learn more about the work going on in Massachusetts, visit www.mass.gov/compete.

Past, Present and Future

By: Anthony Pafford Issue: Transformation Section: Government

Nebraska’s Evolution from Agriculture to Innovation

The storied 109-year history of the Nebraska State Fair in Lincoln isn’t lost on any Nebraskan. After relocating the “Grand Dame” to Grand Island in 2010, ground is being broken at the former state fairgrounds for new, as of yet uncharted, history to be made in the shape of future economic development. In many ways there is considerable crossover in what took place for more than a century and what is about to take place for the next century and, hopefully, beyond.

In the past, the State Fair celebrated the current and future growth of Nebraska’s number-one industry—agriculture—in all forms. Whether it was the Future Farmers of America showing their prize livestock, or implement dealers featuring the newest, state-of-the-art machinery; whether it was children competing in feats of endurance such as pedal tractor competitions, or people vying for blue ribbons for quilts, canned goods or photographs, the 10-day annual event symbolized Nebraska’s collective goals and dreams for a prosperous and comfortable future.

Now, in 2012, plans are taking shape for new, yet reminiscent, kinds of goals and dreams to be realized in the form of collaboration, communication, cutting edge research and intellectual property development related to the areas of food, fuel and water on the newly christened Innovation Campus. It is here where university, government and private-sector entities will work cooperatively to solve issues that are critical to Nebraska, and globally. Always woven into this objective are common desires for a prosperous and comfortable future for all involved.

What’s more, since the University of Nebraska joined the Big Ten Conference, it stands at the cusp of even more exciting ecological, biological and life-altering discoveries, from intellectual drawing boards and research laboratories to tangible products. Is there any doubt that the University of Nebraska’s Innovation Campus may very well become one of the premier—if not the premier—international institutions of its kind? And, the Nebraska Department of Economic Development (DED) is positioned to play an integral role in the future research, development and subsequent created intellectual properties and potential new company formation that takes place at the Innovation Campus.

This past legislative session saw the rollout of the new Talent and Innovation Initiative (TI2) administered by DED. The program has been enthusiastically embraced in the brief time in which it’s been in place. The four-part TI2 includes the InternNE program, Business Innovation Act, Site and Building Development Fund and Angel Investment Tax Credit.

InternNE, a partnership with Nebraska businesses to create new, quality paid internships for college and university students, has received 193 business applications, of which 141 companies have been approved, with 403 intern positions created of which 121 are currently filled with interns earning an average $11.41 an hour, resulting in $1.847 million in funds awarded to date.

The Business Innovation Act (BIA) helps businesses develop new technologies and leverage innovation, resulting in the creation of higher-paying jobs. BIA will distribute approximately $9 million during FY2011-2012 and another $9 million during FY2012-13 to small business owners and entrepreneurs via competitive matching grants for research, development and innovation and outreach services.

Included under the BIA umbrella are The Nebraska Innovation Fund-Prototyping (pre-seed stage) that awards up to $50,000 grants per project to create prototypes of products growing out of research and development at businesses operating in Nebraska, or from research at in-state public or private colleges or universities. Of the 30 applications received thus far (four in distressed areas), 14 (three in distressed areas) have been approved and received $698,125, leaving $301,875 to fund future projects.

Taking the process one step further, the Nebraska Innovation Fund-Commercialization awards $500,000 per seed stage investment project for commercialization of a Nebraska-based business or individual’s prototype or process. Currently, six applications are pending for some of the available $3 million in funding.

The Nebraska Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Initiative financially helps individuals and businesses in Nebraska with applications into the Federal SBIR (Phase 0) and provides matching funds for successful applications (Phases 1 and 2), with total funds available of $1 million. Currently, three businesses have applied and two are approved for Phase 0 for $10,000 total. Two Phase 1 applicants have been approved for $195,000 total, and three Phase 2 applicants are approved for $300,000 total.

The Microenterprise Technical Assistance Fund helps with financial packaging needs, including identifying and determining which programs are the best fit for growing microenterprises in Nebraska. Currently one application has been approved for $300,000 for the next two years.

The Microenterprise Lending Program (micro-lending) encourages and supports implementation of Nebraska-based technology and innovation throughout the state’s rural and urban areas to create high-growth, high-technology businesses and to attract and grow quality jobs and more wealth to the area. As of March 15, three applications had been received.

The two-phase Research and Development Fund has received and approved two applications for $200,000 of the $1 million available as part of Phase 1. No applications have been received for the $2 million available under Phase 2.

The ongoing Site and Building Development Fund is designed to help communities build available industrial sites and buildings for businesses with rapid development trajectories.

The Angel Investment Tax Credit encourages investors to commit to high-tech start-up Nebraska enterprises by providing those who qualify with 35 four percent refundable state income tax credits. So far in 2012, $1,551,166 in credits have been approved.

Other key Nebraska economic development initiatives include The Small Business Innovation Economic Gardening Program, which has received 13 and approved four applications—two from distressed areas—for $130,000. The program provides $400,000 total to eligible state service providers and nonprofit organizations offering technical assistance to eligible Nebraska-based businesses.

Gallup’s Entrepreneurial Acceleration System, a mentorship program that matches new small business owners and entrepreneurs with trained and certified mentor guides recently certified 46 guides who will now assist 160 companies and 746 managers, impacting 4,939 employees.

The State Small Business Credit Initiative, which includes the Nebraska Progress Loan Fund and Invest Nebraska Angel Sidecar Fund, provides loans to qualifying small businesses and has received seven applications and awarded one applicant $300,000 of an available $8.7 million.

The Invest Nebraska Angel provides early investment capital that matches private angel fund investments in start-up businesses that develop, modify or employ new technology. Currently no applications are pending for the available $3.86 million of funding that can be used for advanced intellectual property development and evaluation, advanced proof of concept work for scientific discovery, advanced prototype design and development, hiring key personnel, and other related activities.

When these comprehensive initiatives are combined with the existing Nebraska Advantage incentives, it’s very clear that the state is positioned as a top development contender to which other states and countries will be measuring themselves.

Rapid Transit Transformations

By: Ben Bryan Issue: Transformation Section: Government

Impacting Economic Health and Quality of Life for Years to Come

Downtown Denver is being transformed by the $500 million redevelopment of Union Station and some 19 surrounding acres. When completed in 2014, this project will not only be a multimodal transit hub for the entire region, but will serve as the gateway to a significant new activity center bustling with housing, office buildings, retail shops, hotels and public spaces.

But the real transformative element, the catalyst for this important project is transit—and rapid transit in the metro area (light-rail, commuter rail and bus rapid transit) has the potential to impact more than just downtown Denver. The Denver metro area is in the midst of perhaps the largest rapid transit building project in the nation—FasTracks—and it may well transform virtually every region of the metro area. Approved by voters in 2004, FasTracks will consist of 140 miles of new rapid transit. It adds on to some 40 miles of existing light-rail developed to date by the Regional Transportation District (RTD).

How the metro area takes advantage of this huge and significant infrastructure investment could determine the extent of our region’s economic health in the next 50 years, while definitely having a major impact on our region’s quality of life.

Denver’s Rapid Transit History

Rapid transit is increasingly viewed as a critical element of a metro area’s infrastructure. Tom Clark, CEO of the Metro Denver Economic Development Corporation (EDC), ranks metro Denver’s rapid transit development behind only Denver International Airport (DIA) as the area’s most important infrastructure investment of the past 30 years.

Like many metro areas, Denver wrestled for decades with rapid transit—focused public policy issues: technology, construction and operating costs; competitiveness with highway and bus investments; and how to appropriately pay for it. RTD eventually proceeded on an incremental approach to rapid transit, developing in the mid 1990s a small core light-rail line in the central area of Denver supplemented at the end of that decade by the construction of the Southwest light rail line along South Santa Fe Drive.

The big boost for Denver’s transformational rapid transit development program, however, has come from metro area citizens’ willingness to vote for bond issues and sales tax increases: first for the T-Rex joint highway and light-rail project along I-25 in the southern portions of the metro area in 1999, and then for FasTracks itself.

FasTracks has four new rail lines under development—a combination of light-rail and commuter rail—which will total more than 50 miles at a cost of approximately $2.8 billion. These lines generally reach out to the west, east and north, to supplement the existing rail lines to the south. Most of the work will be done through an innovative public-private partnership—the largest such transit-oriented partnership in the country—which has attracted more than $1 billion in federal funds.

Ridership on RTD’s existing light-rail lines has consistently exceeded projections. Currently there are more than 66,000 daily weekday rapid transit trips, and while this is a relatively small number of overall transportation trips taken by all residents of the metro area, it represents one-quarter of all commuters using public transportation and stacks up very well nationally. Current and future ridership will be concentrated in and around central Denver, which is the job and activity locus of the metro area and where highways are constrained and opportunities to expand highway capacity is very limited.

According to the American Public Transportation Association (APTA), Denver is in good company as there are now more than 30 metro areas in the U.S. with some form of rail rapid transit, including almost all of the cities with which Denver competes for jobs and economic development. Debate still rages in some circles over the efficacy of rail transit and its costs per rider, fueled in part by a shortfall in funds necessary to build out the entire FasTracks network on the schedule originally set out to voters.

But the reality is that rapid transit is already transforming commuter patterns and the “built” environment in major regions of the metro area will create similar opportunities in many other regions in the very near future.

Transit Oriented Development

Molly Urbina, Interim Manager of Community Planning and Development for the City and County of Denver, points out that, “The most powerful element of the public investment in rapid transit, particularly rail rapid transit, is the certainty that is created.” Transit riders can be confident that the rail route and station locations, will not be changed—it is fixed for the foreseeable future and beyond. This certainty also benefits city planners and real estate developers, particularly in and around station locations because riders will congregate there regularly—resulting in real estate development known as Transit Oriented Development (TOD).

The timing and scale of the Union Station development, Urbina believes, is directly related to rapid transit investments. It will be not only a hub for rapid transit but the major connecting venue between rapid transit, regional and local buses, and the mall shuttle. Union Station is the most obvious example of rapid transit helping spur real estate development—TOD—albeit at the most important station in the system.

However, Union Station is by no means the whole story. FasTracks alone has 50+ new stations in its program. Any station location is potentially important because users of transit patronize them on a fairly constant basis, and if areas immediately around stations are properly developed, a symbiotic relationship can ensue: Station areas that provide convenient access, housing and amenities can increase the number of transit riders patronizing the stations, which can then increase the usage and value of the adjacent real estate. TOD can stimulate new growth, create new neighborhood/community centers as well as revitalize existing ones.

Benefits accrue for people who choose to live near stations as they have an inexpensive and reliable transportation option, making them less reliant on a car and its expense, while also having access to convenient amenities such as neighborhood retail. Benefits accrue to the region: less pollution from cars and less congestion on roadways. And, quality of life can be improved all around.

Marilee Utter, an executive vice president of the Urban Land Institute and formerly a Denver-based TOD consultant, notes that “One of the keys to RTD’s relative ridership success and potential for TOD is that the rail lines serve many of the region’s major activity and employment clusters.” Examples on existing rail lines are the Auraria Higher Education campus, the Denver Tech Center and downtown Denver. Examples on soon to be completed lines include the East line, which will serve Denver International Airport, and the extension of the line along I-225, which will serve the new, state-of-the-art Anschutz/Fitzsimmons Medical Campus.

TOD can be as simple as building apartments near stations, such as the recently announced Arista Uptown Apartments in Broomfield or the RiNo Center at 32nd and Broadway in Denver. The real opportunity, however, is for city planners, together with RTD and private sector developers, to work together to, ”holistically create community centers at transit stops,” in the words of Patrick McLaughlin, a TOD specialist with RTD. An existing example is what the City of Englewood facilitated at the old Cinderella City Mall site along South Santa Fe Drive and the Southwest light-rail line. It is now a bustling civic center for Englewood with residential, office, governmental and retail uses mixed with public spaces, whereas before it was a rundown skeleton of a mall.

In developing both its most recent comprehensive plan, Blueprint Denver, and a zoning update, the City and County of Denver focused heavily on the TOD opportunities presented by rapid transit generally and FasTracks specifically. At virtually every stop on the various rail lines in the city a TOD plan is either underway or soon will be. Rapid transit, according to Steve Gordon, the city’s point person on TOD planning efforts, “has created the opportunity to view the city in a different way.”

Interestingly, suburban cities such as Greenwood Village have also embraced the potential of TOD. George Weaver, its community planning director, notes that Greenwood Village had long sought to create a community center or civic center and once the T-Rex project became a reality, focused these efforts around the light-rail station on the Southeast line where Arapahoe Road intersects with I-25—the station is now officially designated the “Arapahoe-Village Center” station. Shea Properties, working closely with the village, has already built a 200,000 square foot office building next to the station on the west side of I-25, the first of three planned office buildings. A big tenant is Regis University, whose web page boasts of the location’s easy access to light-rail.

The village made a number of direct investments in infrastructure here and facilitated a number of others, including a creative solution to the need for the Colorado Department of Highways for a nearby service facility and the Village’s desire for a structured, multilevel parking garage: The two are combined, therefore saving adjacent land for private development, which not only will create activity but potential new tax revenues.

The kinds of zoning changes and infrastructure investments necessary to create true TOD opportunities are often expensive and not always obvious: parking garages, converting lanes of traffic into angled car parking, expanded sidewalks and bike lanes. Of all the investments made by Greenwood Village to support its Village Center, the most important, and perhaps least obvious, may well be the 6.6 acre retention pond area created on the east side of I-25, which is scaled to serve all adjacent Village Center real estate development.

The key to creating TOD that generates the symbiosis between real estate and transit ridership is the kind of density normally seen in central cities, along with pedestrian-friendly access for transit riders who are getting on and off trains. This means elements such as structured parking instead of big open parking lots; apartment and condo buildings taller than three stories; and ground floor, neighborhood-oriented retail.

TOD Examples

Denver-based Koebel and Company, long-time developers of residential and commercial real estate in the region, have totally embraced TOD opportunities along the Southeast light-rail line. They developed the Apartments at Yale Station, a senior apartment project next to their own new headquarters building, and are working on TOD plans for adjacent real estate and for a site near the University of Denver station.

Buz Koebel, president, was a co-chair of the campaign for the T-Rex project in the late 1990s, and he believes that “Rapid transit is exactly the kind of infrastructure investment the public sector should be making to help improve the region’s economic growth and quality of life.” Their most ambitious efforts are at the Arapahoe-Village Center station where they own a significant land holding on the east side of I-25 within easy walking distance of the station’s pedestrian bridge over the highway. The plans they are working on with Greenwood Village “embrace the kinds of urban mixed uses and higher densities commensurate with TOD,” says Carl Koebel, the company’s acquisition and development specialist.

One stop further south on the Southeast line, at the Dry Creek station, the reality of TOD is already taking shape at Vallagio, a mixed use development by Metropolitan Homes, which though located in the suburbs, has a decidedly “urbanist” feel. Also on the east side of I-25 and at the base of an existing pedestrian bridge, this development opens up to people exiting from the bridge with an inviting, curving entrance street divided by a heavily landscaped median, flanked by townhomes and lofts with ground-floor retail consisting of restaurants and neighborhood-type shops.

Peter Kudlo, president of Metropolitan Homes, is emphatic that Vallagio’s design and mix of buildings was “heavily driven” by the proximity to a light-rail station. He firmly believes that TOD is the “development concept wave of the future” in the Denver region.

As Phil Washington, RTD’s general manager, is quick to point out, “RTD has an obvious stake in the success of TOD. RTD is more than the T (transit) in TOD.” They have their own TOD planning staff and have identified four pilot TOD projects—station locations where they can leverage existing activity and help facilitate land assemblages to create a greater likelihood of success: • The Alameda Station served by the existing Southwest and Southeast light-rail lines and adjacent to the Denver Design Center. • The Federal Center Station near 6th Avenue Highway and Union/Simms, to be served by the new West light-rail line scheduled to be opened in May 2013. • The Olde Town Arvada Station to be served by the Gold Line, under construction. • Welton Street stations north of downtown Denver served by the original core light-rail line developed in the 1990s.

Development activity at these locations should start to become apparent as the economy improves and the rapid transit system matures.

Economic Development and Quality of Life

Obviously, the recent recession and subsequent slow economy has adversely affected investments in real estate development generally and TOD efforts specifically: Private developers don’t have demand for new buildings (though demand for apartments has increased recently), and local governments are constrained by lower tax revenues. Nonetheless, RTD publishes an annual report on TOD, and the 2011 report documents the following development activity since 1996 within one-half mile of station locations: • 20,000 apartment units • 5.6 million square feet of office space • 5.2 million square feet of retail space

Economic development officials are buoyed by Denver’s increased image as a progressive region and credit to a great degree the investment in rapid transit. Paul Washington, Denver’s executive director for Economic Development, points to a recent Brookings Institute report documenting that from 2008-2010 the Denver region was the number-one metro area for in-migration of 25-34 years olds. What is the connection? A recent supplement to the magazine National Real Estate Investor makes clear that “Generation Y’s housing preferences are driving apartment firms toward urban, transit-oriented development.” This population cohort, as Washington points out, tend to be urban, eco-friendly and very mobile and thus are attracted to cities with rapid transit.

For both Paul Washington and Tom Clark of the EDC, the region’s progressive, forward-thinking investment in rapid transit is a key component of their economic development sales pitch. It has clearly resonated, a significant example being the success in landing the headquarters of DaVita, one of the leading dialysis provider in the country. These economic development officials note that not only was the region’s investment in rapid transit cited by DaVita as a factor in their relocation to our region, but it was critical in their selection of a site near Union Station for a new headquarters building.

Concern exists among advocates of TOD that planning officials may be overzealous in their requirements, and that developers, and especially their lenders, having been burned in the recent recession, will not embrace TOD and its new paradigms, such as lower parking ratios. Marilee Utter is quick to point out, however, that Union Station aside, TOD is a nascent concept both in the Denver region and across the country, and education with planners and developers as well as the public itself is critical.

Tina Griego, a columnist for The Denver Post, may have summed up the transformational potential of rapid transit and TOD best when recently writing about the light-rail station to be built in Denver’s Sun Valley neighborhood; “Everybody likes to dream … The light-rail station has opened a door to this neighborhood. Challenges loom. Opportunities await.”

Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame Announces 2012 Inductees

By: Gail Frances and Judy Taylor Issue: Transformation Section: Community

The Wonder of Ten Great Colorado Women

Defining moments in our lives unfold in various ways to create the multidimensional thread that weaves women’s history together. Thanks to the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame (CWHF), 132 women who exemplify the best qualities of the people who have built and sustained Colorado are now part of Colorado history.

The Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame—one of the oldest in the country—celebrated held its annual induction in March 2012. The gala event honored ten Colorado women for their outstanding achievements.

Founded in 1985, the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame (CWHF) is dedicated to recognizing and preserving the history and accomplishments of past and present Colorado women. Both historical and contemporary women have shared foresight, vision, and the power of accomplishment but lacked a forum for recognition. “I still think there is a great need to discover women’s history,” said M.L. Hanson, a founder of the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame. “We continue to surface heroines from our past.”

The Hall strives to educate the people of Colorado about the stories of the women who shaped our state and the nation’s history with courage, leadership, intelligence, compassion and creativity. Women of diverse backgrounds, from pioneers to politicians, educators to entrepreneurs, are inducted every even-numbered year. The women inducted into the Hall of Fame have made a major impact on the lives of others and helped elevate the status of women in our state, our nation and around the world.

“The event is always about the inductees. They are the stars of the show,” Hanson said. “It is so inspiring. Many women who attend stand taller, walk with greater confidence and are very optimistic.”

The esteemed and talented Mistress of Ceremony, Marilyn Van Derbur Atler, a prior CWHF inductee herself, introduced each recipient and shared their stories and accomplishments with her distinctive style and grace. It was a thrill to listen to the inspiring speeches of these noteworthy women whose incredible lives give particular meaning and poignancy in our current political environment.

The courage, leadership, intelligence and creativity that guided these remarkable women to accomplish that for which they are revered is told in moving and complex narratives illuminated by many challenges and sacrifices along the way.

A brief snapshot of each of THE 2012 CONTEMPORARY inductees appears below .

Kristi S. Anseth - Ph.D, Biomedical Engineer - Anseth was the first engineer to be named a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. The American Institute of Chemical Engineers named her one of the “100 Chemical Engineers of the Modern Era,” and Popular Science named her one of its “Brilliant 10” in 2008. And, her great-grandmother homesteaded as a single woman.

Loretta C. Ford - Ed.D, R.N., Nurse Practitioner Movement Founder and Women’s Health Advocate - After receiving her doctorate in education from the University of Colorado in 1961, she began her work with Dr. Henry Silver to develop the nurse practitioner curriculum. She pioneered a pediatric model in Colorado that has been replicated and expanded into the fields of family health, gerontology, adult health, mental health, school health and more. She is saddened by the recent return to the fight for reproductive rights in the United States.

Temple Grandin - Ph.D, Animal Sciences and Autism Expert and Advocate - A truly remarkable woman who “thinks in pictures” and “embraces all types of thinkers,” Grandin received a standing ovation after her acceptance speech. Grandin has identified special abilities and helped decode the thinking processes of both humans and animals. Her life’s journey is filled with trailblazing on so many soulwrenching levels.

Ding -Wen Hsu - Businesswoman and Asian Community Leader - Hsu, the granddaughter of a prominent Chinese revolutionist, is best known as the founder of the Colorado Dragon Boat Festival, the largest Asian festival in the Rocky Mountain region. 04.12 - 06.12 ( 113 )

Mary Ann Kerwin - Women and Children’s Health Advocate - Kerwin and her co-founders of Le Leche League International were commonly referred to as the “Revolutionaries Who Wore Pearls.” She was guided early in life by her father’s encouragement. He told her, “it doesn’t matter what others are doing, you do whatever is right for you.” Kerwin’s recommendation: “Right the wrongs you find.”

Mary J. Mullarkey - Colorado Supreme Court Chief Justice - Nominated in 1998 and serving for 12 years as Colorado's first female Supreme Court chief justice, Mullarkey encourages people to “take a chance.” She ominously warned that “progress for women is not a straight line,” and that “it can be rolled back.”

A brief snapshot of each of the historical inductees appears below .

Janet Petra Bonnema - Civil Transportation Engineer - In 1970, Bonnema was barred from working on the Eisenhower Tunnel by supervisors because she was female. Undaunted, she won her fight in the courts and opened up vast new job opportunities for women in highway construction, mining and other previously all-male professions in Colorado and the nation. Her family accepted on her behalf, describing the late pioneer as their Auntie Mame.

Fann ie Mae Duncan - Colorado Springs Businesswoman and Community Leader - Duncan, the granddaughter of Alabama slaves, was the first African-American woman to succeed as an entrepreneur, philanthropist and community activist in Colorado Springs. She founded the Cotton Club, a jazz mecca where she booked luminaries such as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Lionel Hampton, Mahalia Jackson and Etta James, all of whom attracted a racially diverse following. A sign reading “Everybody Welcome” was proudly displayed in the Cotton Club window and is now the name of an annual multicultural Colorado Springs festival.

Erinea Garcia Gallegos - Educator and San Luis Valley Postmaster - Gallegos was one of Colorado’s first Hispanic women to attend college. President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed her postmistress in San Luis in 1935. Ancestors of both of her parents were among the earliest Spanish-speaking settlers, establishing farms and towns on Mexican land grants in southern Colorado and New Mexico. Her grandfather and father served among Colorado’s earliest territorial and state legislators. She lived by her motto, “The more you learn, the more you want to learn.”

Laura Gilpin - Landscape Photographer - A native Coloradan, Gilpin attained international recognition as a landscape photographer, specializing in artistic techniques and honoring Southwest native cultures. She was known for her “highly individualist eye,” and influenced many fine artists such as Ansel Adams and Georgia O’Keeffe. Many still regard her as the only significant woman landscape artist of her time.

In addition to the well-regarded inductions, the Hall of Fame works to share the contributions of these outstanding women through its outreach programs, including:

• Permanent and traveling portrait exhibits—The Hall of Fame maintains a collection of individual inductee portraits and displays the portraits at the induction event and receptions at schools and galleries around the state. • The Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame Speakers Bureau develops, coordinates and implements speakers’ presentations across the state. • The Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame Oral History Project, a more recent initiative, records and preserves the oral histories of the contemporary inductees, sharing those histories through community outreach programs.

Women of Consequence celebrates the lives and stories of the first 59 inductees of the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame. Published in 1999 with a foreword by M.L. Hanson, a CWHF founder, this insightful and thought-provoking book is an excellent reference as generations explore and celebrate these extraordinary lives.

Gail Frances, MPA, is a writer with a background in finance, marketing and public affairs. Judy Taylor is an award-winning journalist and speaker. She is the former president of the Women’s Regional Publications of America.

Wagner Equipment, JDRF, and the Barbara Davis Research Center

By: Michael Connors Issue: Transformation Section: Community

Treat, Prevent and Curet

As a parent, I know there is nothing I would not do for my child. We gravitate to what we have experienced and understand, and as humans, we grasp for solutions when one of our own is afflicted with any type of disease or disorder. We simply want to fix it.

So it is, as well, with parents of children diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. Type 1 diabetes or T-1 (formerly juvenile diabetes) is an autoimmune disease where the body’s antibodies attack beta cells in the pancreas that produce insulin—a protein that normally breaks down in the stomach. It is a disease on the rise.

According to Dr. Robert Slovner, director of Pediatric Services at the Barbara Davis Research Center in Aurora, Colorado, a premier diabetes research hospital: “Type 1 diabetes probably affects about 1.5 million, perhaps as many as 2 million people in this country. We’ve seen an increase in this type of diabetes over the past decade—in fact we’ve seen it grow at about 4 percent a year. And we’ve also seen it affect younger and younger children, so it is quite common now to see children under the age of two who develop Type 1 diabetes. That was not so common ten years ago.” To be certain, the need is urgent, as is the need for funds for research. This is where companies such as Wagner Equipment Co. step in and work with organizations like the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF), whose role is to fund research to find a cure.

For Bruce Wagner, owner and CEO of Wagner Equipment, a large Caterpillar dealer covering Colorado, New Mexico and western Texas, there is a deep and personal connection to T-1 diabetes. His son, Taylor, has T-1 diabetes, and while he is no longer a child, he is still afflicted with the disease. In fact, 81 percent of those with T-1 diabetes are adults with lifelong symptoms and consequences. Wagner shared some of the history of their involvement with the JDRF: “About 25 months after our youngest child Taylor was born, he was diagnosed with diabetes. We decided pretty early on that we wanted to hitch our wagon to an organization that was trying to cure diabetes, and that’s what JDRF was doing.” His wife, Barbara, actually self-diagnosed her own diabetes, recognizing her own symptoms after her exposure to Taylor. Thus it is that Wagner, like so many other individuals and business owners has galvanized his resources and is intensely focused on a cure, hence the partnership with the JDRF.

From such passion come truly innovative and collaborative models. Wagner Equipment is one of hundreds of businesses that have come to recognize the financial, social and personal benefits that arise from working with an organization like the JDRF. And leaders like Wagner bring passion, concern and a voice to the cause. The business helps fund the research and firmly believes that it is good business to advance medical solutions for the benefit of the society at large—as you are then promoting a healthier and happier workforce, and one with better morale because they are committed to a cause.

“There is a large cost to diabetes. For a company of 100 employees it’s about $60,000 a year—which doesn’t sound like a lot—but to a company of 2,000 employees it’s about $1.1-$1.2 million dollars,” Wagner says. In fact, the company sponsors and encourages events throughout the year in order to raise funds for JDRF, which has a threefold benefit to businesses. The collaboration helps reduce long-term health costs by helping to fund cures for common illnesses; working with charities gives employees a sense that they are part of something larger than themselves and helps build teamwork and morale; and finally, it is simply the right thing to do.

One of Wagner’s employees serves as the current president of the local chapter of the JDRF. Jeff Gartz is the lab manager for the company and he notes that “Because of the new initiatives and the progress JDRF has made with research, the push is now Treat, Prevent and Cure—it is a three legged stool and the cornerstone of what we are doing. If you can keep people from getting T-1, the cure is that much more self-evident.” Gartz argues that JDRF is a linchpin that helps connect donors to worthwhile research facilities and is passionate about finding a cure. In fact, according to JDRF, more than 80 percent of its expenditures directly support research and education. They elaborate on the progress being made in several areas, including a better understanding of the causes of the disease, the importance of glucose control, new drug developments and the improvement of pump technology. So in many ways, the JDRF is a catalyst to a cure.

Emerging from the collaborative relationship between Wagner and JDRF are the financial benefits that can then be allocated to the researchers actually doing the work, such as the Barbara Davis Research Center. It is this unique trifecta that helps push forward some of the remarkable successes that have been made over the last decade. The funding and leadership provided by the JDRF is absolutely critical to finding a cure, says Slovner. “The Barbara Davis Center has a foundation called the Children’s Diabetes Foundation that has provided some financial support for us to do research and see patients. In our climate, though, that wouldn’t even begin to cover the needs, especially for research. So in the beginning the JDRF was a major partner with us in providing the funding and support for ongoing research in autoimmune diseases, in finding a cure, and in the development of the artificial pancreas. They have been partners in many areas. A great deal of our research is funded by the JDRF.” Thus, private companies and individuals sacrifice, time, talent and resources to fund and support organizations like the JDRF, which then, in turn, direct and fund critical research which leads to advancements in medicine that transform the quality of our lives.

Dr. Slovner also heads the artificial pancreas program at the Barbara Davis Research Center. Essentially, the artificial pancreas is the convergence of advancements in both pump technologies and more accurate monitoring systems. He describes some of the advancements in the technology, saying, “The closed-loop pancreas or bionic pancreas is a functioning glucose meter which sends needed glucoses minute-by-minute to a computer with a mathematic algorithm. This computer then learns as it goes and directs the pump to deliver or not deliver insulin thereby controlling the blood sugar levels. It’s a closed-loop method.” He notes that in 1997 the JDRF felt that this technology could help lead to a cure, so they developed the Artificial Pancreas Consortium. It is now an international effort where groups from all over the world meet to chart a road forward and minimize the effects on everyday life.

“The wonderful news is that we can be open and honest with children afflicted with the disease. Today, we tell patients that this could be a lifetime disease, but it is imminently treatable,” said Slovner. But, by following treatment, patients now see a better quality of life where the complications of the disease may be completely avoided, transforming their outlook and their life.

Such assurances were not possible only a few years ago, but with the collaborative nature of Wagner, JDRF and The Barbara Davis Center, companies can learn a thing or two about community engagement focused on a relevant issue and the change-making skills of those who are driven to make a difference. The future looks bright!