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Playbook for a winning Super Bowl ad: Embrace risk, seek emotion

Joe Arney — Fri, 30 Jan 2026 16:19:23 +0000

Playbook for a winning Super Bowl ad: Embrace risk, seek emotion Joe Arney Fri, 01/30/2026 - 09:19

Ryan Huff

On Super Bowl Sunday, playing it safe is a guaranteed fumble.

At least when it comes to the commercials.

Courtesy Coca-Cola

“If you show up at the Super Bowl and your ad is just OK and nobody talks about you, you've wasted millions of dollars,” said Jeff Gillette, an assistant teaching professor of advertising at the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information. “If people are divided about whether they love you or hate you and they're talking about you, that's a big win.”

Gillette, a former creative director with 20 years in the advertising business, knows how nerve-wracking it can be to view the commercials and hope for the best as public reaction unfolds. He helped create Coca-Cola spots for six Super Bowls at renowned ad agency Wieden+Kennedy.

Coke’s 2014 Super Bowl ad was particularly memorable for Gillette. The 60-second spot featured young American women signing “America the Beautiful” in a blend of English and their native tongues—including Hebrew, Spanish and a Native American dialect—to celebrate the nation’s diversity.

The scrutiny started immediately, with the ad content debated for days on Facebook feeds and morning news shows.

“We told the Coca-Cola marketing team beforehand, ‘You are going to get backlash, and we need you to back it up,’” Gillette said. And in doing so, they were rewarded: “After it aired, they saw a dip in consumer sentiment for maybe a minute, but then it spiked afterward. There were significantly more people who defended that spot than tried to tear it down.”

Jeff Gillette

Gillette is now co-director of the strategic communication design master’s program, popularly known as The Brand Studios. As he tells his students, airing Super Bowl commercials aren’t for every client. To ensure that today’s going rate of $8 million for 30 seconds of airtime is money well-spent, companies need to have broad appeal to the 125 million people watching.

“If you're in a space that has a lot of competition—like beer, soda, cars—it’s a great opportunity,” he said. “The purpose of Super Bowl marketing is for an established company to persuade you with brand affection and brand emotion. It works when it’s either funny or pulls on your emotional heart strings. It needs to be big and bold, and not trying to sell you something. It’s about communicating on an emotional level.”

Gillette has also seen plenty of flops in his day, too. One that sticks out for him was Mountain Dew’s “Puppy Monkey Baby” campaign during the Denver Broncos’ win in 2016. The spot features a diaper-clad, pug-faced, dancing monkey handing out beverages to three young men on a couch.

“Somebody brainstormed that puppies, monkeys and babies all do well for the Super Bowl. So, what if we mixed them all together?” Gillette said. “You want to be out there and memorable. But you can't just be weird without any kind of a message. Even though some people liked the ad, it didn’t connect with me emotionally.”

Others, though, did make the connection—some critics called it that year’s best ad while others labeled it the worst, creating the divisive buzz Gillette said can lead to consumer attention.

While some companies’ ad concepts only get one Super Bowl in the spotlight, others continue to feature their stable of mainstays. Budweiser has their Clydesdales. Doritos loves user-generated content. And Coca-Cola’s polar bears—icons that began with 1920s French print ads—made a comeback during the 2012 Super Bowl.

Gillette and fellow creative director Hal Curtis dreamed up a fresh angle for those fluffy carnivores beyond the standard in-game advertisement. Would the audience watch a livestream of the bears watching the game?

The creative team used Xbox controllers—this was 2012, after all—to puppet the computer-generated imagery with prepared actions. This enabled the bears—one a Patriots fan, the other a Giants fan—to react with cheers and disgust to the game, halftime show and commercials in real time.

The risk paid off. Nine million people tuned in on phones and laptops for an average of 28 minutes.

“You never get that length of time for somebody to engage with your brand,” Gillette said. “At no time were we like, ‘Hey, go have a Coca-Cola.’ It wasn’t a hard pitch. It was just a brand experience that people seemed to like, because people love the polar bears.”

And apparently, on the eve of this year’s Super Bowl, Pepsi now loves the polar bears, too. More than a week before the big game, Pepsi rolled out a playful twist where a polar bear unexpectedly prefers Pepsi over Coke in a blind taste test of its zero-sugar sodas.

Game on. What’s Coke’s next play?

“If I were Coke, I’d ignore it and concentrate on making better advertising,” Gillette said. “What they shouldn't do is react. If they do, Pepsi gets what they were after: some much-needed attention as the No. 2.

“I don’t blame them, though. Pepsi has always been the challenger brand—and when you’re in that spot, you got to poke, you know, the bear.”

Ryan Huff is the assistant dean of communications and engagement at CMDI.

An advertising professor who’s produced Super spots for Coca-Cola shares what makes a commercial memorable during the big game.

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Announcing the fall 2025 dean's list

Ellie Chase — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 22:57:57 +0000

Announcing the fall 2025 dean's list Ellie Chase Wed, 01/28/2026 - 15:57

More than 800 CMDI students were named to the dean's list for the spring semester. To qualify, students must complete at least 12 credit hours of �鶹��Ѱ��Boulder coursework for a letter grade and achieve a term grade point average of 3.75 or better. Each receives a notation on their transcripts and a letter from the dean. Congratulations to all honorees!

Alejandro Abarca
Matt Abatangle
Saroon Abayenh
Marlo Abrahamson
Shea Ackman
Emilio Adams
Phillip Adams
Tassilo Adams
Quinn Ahrens
Lucy Alagna
Maria Alali
Rosie Aldridge
Caitlin Alexander
Kenzi Alipit
Sophie Allaway
Anthony Allen
Trinity Alvord
Saleh Alzamil
Alexandra Anaya
Bridgette Anderson
Molly Anderson
Lila Angelopoulos
Sierra Anguiano
Jaxon Archer
Mia Archuleta
Jazmin Armijo
Remy Arnold
Sydney Arnold
Natasha Arzt
Kaylee Austin
Niles Ayer
Ben Babson
Roxanne Bachana
Alexia Bailey
Owen Balboa
Austin Balconi
Tyler Bales
Cadyn Banerian
Jose Banuelos
Katie Barcroft
Evan Bardinelli
Caleigh Barletta
Julia Barlow
Thomas Barrett
Marina Barretto
Tomas Barrientos
Maddy Barth
Owen Barton
Kate Bashore
Mekdes Bass
Ellena Bassoukos
Leah Baumann
Klaire Bautz
Katie Baxter
Juliana Beans
Lily Becker
Savy Behr
Johnna Belveal
Jane Bengston
Tess Betman
Eliot Bevier Dill
Charlie Bickham
Jack Bigelow
Ezra Billig
Teagan Bischoff
Korinne Bishop
Katie Bixler
Mary Black
Miley Black
Kenna Blank
Sam Blatt
Miranda Bleau
Riley Blomstrand
Sophia Bobier
Sophia Bolich
Piper Bolin
Anvitha Bompalli
Matthew Boothroyd
Carmen Boyle
Reed Bracero
Anna Bradburn
Norah Brady
Kate Branscomb
Antonio Bravo
Elizabeth Brechtel
Olivia Brehm
Keeley Brei
Hannah Brennan
Adeline Briggs
Erin Brinkman
Jack Bronchetti
Elly Brooks
Mia Brosterhous
Samantha Brouhard
Addison Brower
Olivia Brown
Chase Browne
Lili Brownell
Callie Browning
Emma Browning
Eva Bruce
Tessa Buchanan
Tyler Buchanan
Ashley Budy
James Bui
Morgan Burcar
Alena Burris
Parker Burt
Tyler Byrne
America Cabral
Luke Cadenaro
Carli Camens
Claire Cameron
Evan Caplan
Rhiannon Cargo
Jessie Carlin
Gemma Carlson
Gabriella Carnevale
Laila Casanueva
Meredith Case
Madison Cashin
Kathryn Castanoli
Mia Castro
Dominic Celaschi
Zachary Chagnon
Isabella Chan
Emily Chang
Madelyn Chang
Connor Chase
Ellie Chase
Hayden Chedid
Cameron Cheney
Avery Childs
Kate Cho
Anika Chowdhury
Megan Chung
Coco Ciardelli
Malaya Cimino
Abi Clayton
Kay Clifford
Annalia Clifton
Avery Clifton
Emme Clymer
Morgan Coffin
Ava Coffman
MacKenzie Cole
MacKenzie Cole
Jaci Collins-Falcon
Joanna Conforti
Andrew Conley
Sarah Connor
Breah Conradson
Sophie Coombs
Zenden Copeland
Avery Corliss
Susie Cormack
Gilberto Corral
Amelie Couret
Sarah Cowell
Findlay Coykendall
Marissa Crenshaw
Elizabeth Cropper
Maddie Crosier
Chloe Cross
Heidi Crowther
Eryn Cryer
Kaylie Cunningham
Gracyn Custin
Cody Cutone
Liz Cutting
Avery Czachor
Teresa Da Silva
Clara Dailey
Abby Dalrymple
Abikael Daniel
Maya Dank
Olivia Darby
John Davis
Katherine Davis
Mason Davis
Turner Davis
Billy Dayton
Ramon De Arcos Tapia
Brandon De Pena
Olivia DeGregorio
Bella Demartin
Maddy Demmert
Luca Denicola
Rune Denolf
Helena Desoto
Charles Deutser
Leo Dienstfrey
William Dinh
Quinn Dobbs
Sydney Dobriner
Connie Dolati
Lexi Dolsak
Luke Donis
Eric Donjuan
Hunter Donovan
Brodie Dorko
Emily Doskow
Sydney Dossa
Daniel Doupe
Averie Dow
Brady Dowd
Lucas Drager
Irene Drapszo
Baylee Drevno
Kayla Drumke
Emma Dudley
Wyatt Duesenberg
Rowan Dulfer

Carolyn Dunlap
Nicollette Dunn
Etienne Dunoyer
Emily Duvall
Abby Dwyer
Ryan Dye
Ryann Dyk
Esperanza Edwards-Satragni
Avery Ehrig
Riley Eisenstein
Molly Elert
Ryan Elliott
Jenny Ellis
Kaoutar Elouadi
Libby Emery
Ava Esposito
Lucy Esquivel
Felix Estes
Angel Estrada Zarco
Quinn Etheridge
Morgan Evans
Emma Evars
Sienna Fahey
Maddy Farmer
Nolan Farrar
Liam Fehlau-Barton
Aysla Fenner
Peyton Fenner
Anika Fergis
Clare Finnigan
Carolyn Fish
Elena Fisher
Maddie Fisher
Marli Fisher
Tate Fitzgibbons
Emma Flanagan
Aiden Fliszar
William Flockton
Soleil Floyd
Delaney Flynn
Joe Fogler
Callie Forrest
Ellie Foster
Rhen Fowler
Tatum France-Kelly
Natalie Free
Ellis French
Jayne Frey
Rylee Frey
Isabelle Friedrich
Adelene Frymoyer
Colette Gagliano
Kaija Galins
Cassidy Gallagher
Jacalyn Gamble
Lydia Gammon
Gaby Garcia Armendariz
Katelyn Gardner
Abigail Garza
Caitlyn Garza
Zoey Gassner
Samson Gear
Nick Gehring
Carly Gelfand
Piper George
Alex Gertzen
Olivia Gewanter
Hannah Giacomin
Orion Gibbs
Ink Gibson
Caroline Gilchrist
Lauren Gillespie
Danny Gillis
Gigi Gittelman
Graham Givan
Anna Gledhill
Jessie Gleitsman
Arlie Goldman
Susannah Goldsmith
Deborah Gomez
Karlyn Gonsalves
Max Goodman
Salem Goodman
Bella Goodson
Drew Gorman
Avery Goss
Chloe Graham
Kylie Graham
Nora Graham
Ariana Grant
Sophia Graup
Rachel Greenberg
Logyn Greer
Willow Gretsch
Erica Griffiths
Tristan Grosam
Caitlin Grossman
Vivan Guida
Grayson Guinan
Griffin Gurewicz
Owen Guzik
Aric Gyekis
Anthony Haberkorn
Trey Haggarty
Paxton Haines
Hanna Hale
Sabina Hall
Alsa Halquist
Norah Hampford
Nate Hankins
Audrey Hansen
Ella Harris
lanier Harvey
Tyler Harvey
Nick Haseman
Josie Hayes
Keeley Haynes
Brooke Haynie
Skyler Haynie
Madison Hays
Lorraine Healy
Will Henrickson
Vanessa Hernandez
Jane Hershberger
Carter Hessen
Kainoa Hiatt
Tyler Hibri
Bella Hill
Cassidy Hill
Hannah Hillen
Hannah Hoffman
Jason Hoffman
Cruz Hoitsma
Ella Holden
Dylan Hommes
Max Hostetter
Taylar Houck
Mira Hougen
Donavon Houston
Owen Houtakker
Brooklyn Howard
Taylor Hoyt
Oleksa Hryciw
Haley Hubbard Godfrey
Kendra Hudgins
Livia Hughes
Ronan Huizar
Ellie Hultgren
Wyatt Humble
Camille Hunt
Susanna Imhof
Maxine Inman
Samantha Isaacson
Jules Isenberg
Grace Jackman
Grant Jackson
Paige Jaeger
Monroe Jasper
Alana Jenks
Grace Jenks
Alexis Jennings
Annika Jobanputra
Mia Jochamowitz-Endersby Chikhani
Addison Johnson
Tanner Johnson
Liv Johnstad
Neda Jonaitis
Gianna Jordon
Max Julian
Danielle Jung
Emma Kaiser
Nina Kanavati
Chase Kanger
Faith Kaplan
Kush Karamcheti
Lola Karimi
Bailey Karraker
Brooklyn Karraker
Skye Karsh
Ty Keeley
Nicole Keffer
Thomas Keller
Audrey Kelley
Henry Kelty
Charlotte Kendall
Rachel Kennedy
Riley Kenny
John Kerklo
Grayson Kern
Riley Kerstiens
Josh Kesner
Amy Kibort
Madeleine Kiel
Hannah Kijner
Kenzie Kimball
Myra Kirk
Marin Kirkman
Avery Kissinger
Ian Kligora
Ally Klinefeldt
Leia Kliska
Jackson Knapp
Maggie Kocher
Alexa Kofman
Cameron Kolinchak
Jon Kolvereid
Colton Kominski
Alden Koskoff
Kristin Kraml
Riley Krane
Quinn Kreck
Ella Krelovich
Katie Krochalis
Carey Kronhart

Viktoriya Kukarekina
Justin Kulas
Brayden Kurzawa
Emily Kwon
Amy Labontu
Bentley Labrecque
Genevieve Lacey
Devin Lafave
Ella LaMura
Kadence Landis
Skyler Landry
Dalton Lanham
Delaney Lantz
Ben LaPlante
Leighton Larsen
Blake Larson
Maddie Lasker
London Lawrence
Sarah Lawrence
Alex Lazarou
Kaija Lazda
Camille Leach
Lauren Leclair
Lou Leclercq
Alice Lee
Skyler Lee
Chloe Legere
Asher Leish
Aubrey Leneweaver
Brian Leuthold
Charlotte Levine
Kara Liguori
Jasmin Lin
Ahnnali Lindgren
Isabelle Lingo
Joe Lingold
Mia Lioudis
Alexander Lipka
Margaret Lipscomb
Lucy Lloyd
Aramis Loma-Guzman
Luke Lommatzsch
Leif Lomo
Skyler Longerbone
Lauren Lopez
Deborah Loseke
Katelyn Love
Lexi Lower
Stella Lowery
Janie Ludington
Julia Luther
Bailey Luts
Maille Lyon
Claire Macaluso
Molly Machoskie
Julia Maclean
Natalie Madeira
Maxwell Majors
Carly Malamut
Julianna Maldonado
Devon Malling
Mel Malloy
Patrick Mancuso
Lily Maniotes
Emelia Mantz
Alexis Manzo
Nicholas Marcin
Kea Margolis
Annaliese Markel
Isabella Marquez
Sedona Marshall
Taylor Martin
Mia Martinez
Maggie Marusin
Eloise Masciola
Carolyn Mason
Keely Matthews
Alden Mazur
Grace Mcanany
Finn Mccarthy
Evan Mccormick
Elizabeth Mccoy
Wyatt McCune
John Mcdermott
Teague Mcdonald
Maeve Mcerlane
Andrew Mcfadden
Lucia Mcgetrick-Dima
Fiona Mcginnis
Delaney Mckernan
Abbey McMahon
Margaret McQueen
Ava Melen
Alex Melvin
Jenna Mendelssohn
Claire Mercer
Ava Merias
Olivia Meyers
Allison Miller
Channing Miller
Creed Miller
Ellen Miller
Hailey Miller
Maggie Miller
Morgan Miller
Ashley Mohrbach
Camryn Montgomery
Gigi Montgomery
Justice Montoya
Bronte Moore
Emily Moore
Felipe Moore
Jenna Morley
Chaney Morris
Maya Morse
Scout Mortenson
Nathan Mosley
Madison Moss
Trevor Mueller
Ally Murphy
Reese Murphy
Rue Murray
Mason Mutz
Becca Myers
Emma Myers
Aahana Nandy
Caitlin Neil
Remi Netupsky
Natalie Newmann
Taylor Nickerson
Matthew Nielsen
Maximillian Noble
Charlotte Norton
Anna Novak
Lila Nuttle
Remy O'Connell
Nora O'connor
Olivia O'Haver
Addie O'Neil
Brinley O'neill
Ashlyn Oklesh
Taylor Oldenburg
Annabelle Olson
Sofia Olsson
Alexandra Organa
Annika Ort
Maddie Osterkamp
Max Osterman
Alina Ouligian
Emmett Owenby
Josie Pachla
Phoebe Paletta
Aly Pardo
Katy Parks
Macie Parsons
Lauren Paschke
Liliane Patrick
Kaya Patterson
Audrey Patton
Izzy Pell
Caroline Pellerito
Ava Pelster
Lily Pemberton
Mia Pendergast
Paige Pennell
Annie Peragine
Jaclyn Pereira
Kennedy Perez
Brisa Perkins
Emma Perlmutter
Eliza Perry
Isabelle Perry
Quetzal Peterson
Patrick Pethybridge
Ellie Phillips
Bell Piccirillo
Norah Pietras
Mackenzie Pinksa
Macy Place
Alison Plagge
Nico Plaisted
Skye Platto
Liliana Poast Soler
Lilly Polak
Katharine Polep-Sawyer
Ella Policastri
Ashley Pomeroy
Lyla Ponce
Norah Pope
Elle Pottinger
Dax Prata
Bradley Pratt
Addisson Pribble
Elle Price
Giana Pritchard
Taylor Pulley
Sutton Raeburn
Jacob Rainsberger
Samantha Ramirez
Olivia Randazzo
Maya Raulf
Nick Rauscher
Huston Rawls
Madelyn Ray
Rachel Ray
Cameron Reed
Hailey Reed
Jenna Reed
Molly Reed
Katrina Reghitto
Anna Rehak
Jack Remington
Jake Reuss
Katie Reuter

Ella Revivo
Peyton Rhodes
Katie Ridgway
Jackie Rivera
Eliza Roberts
Caniya Robinson
Ella Robinson
Michael Robinson
Abby Robison
Gabrielle Rodriguez
Cole Rogers
Laura Rogers
Salome Rojas
Lauren Romero
Diana Romero Bermudez
Brynna Roscoe
Jenna Rose
Sophia Rose
Sierra Rosen
Alison Rosenbaum
Eli Rosenthal
Sierra Rossman
Piper Roth
Taylor Roth
Ava Rotman
Giova Rubenstein
Sophie Rubinstein
Reagan Russell
Sam Russo
Brenna Rutherford
Emme Rutherford
Catherine Rutman
Jessica Ryanczak
Brooklyn Sadler
Sosan Safi
Rylee Sahl
Joaquin Salinas
Yahir Sanchez Diaz
Lydia Sarbacker
Ramey Sattich
Christopher Schepers
Riley Schermerhorn
Carly Schiller
Stephanie Schmitt
Addie Schneider
Emma Schneider
Jaimie Schoenke
Sydney Schrader
Teagan Schreiber
Willow Schulz
Aubrey Schwartz
Ben Schweiger
Ella Scolnick
Grace Scott
Madeline Scripp
Olivia Scussel
Grace Seaback
Veronica Seal
Ella Seevers
London Selah
Michael Seward
Krish Shah
Jack Shand
Ava Shanrock
Marissa Sharon
Danny Sheedy
Jenna Shenbaum
Daniel Sher
Cody Shoelson
Zoe Showalter-Flowers
Rainna Shrull
Aaron Siegel
Matthew Silver
Harrison Simeon
Gannett Simonton
Ella Skoloda
Mac Skudlarczyk
Cj Slattery
Moe Slintak
Marie Slotnick
Ella Smith
Matthew Smith
Ryan Smith
Jack Snyder
Eli Sobel
Edgar Soberon Munoz
Sevi Solari
Ewan Sookswat
Noel Sookswat
Madelyn Speights
Sophia Spheeris
Simon Spillane
Matthew Spivack
Samantha Spiwak
Bella Stamper
Kaeden Stander
Brady Stark
Kate Starke
Ashlin Stasswender Swasey
Trent Steffen
Alexander Stein
Zachary Steiner
Evan Stellino
Cole Stephan
Ariele Stern
Sarah Stern
Samuel Stevens
Jordyn Stewart
Braden Stirrett
Stella Stone
Anna Stout
Mary Strasser
Ava Strauss
Xander Sucich
Elizabeth Suffian
Luke Suitts
Lucy Suja
Aoife Sullivan
Clara Sullivan
Olivia Sullivan
Taylor Sutton
Dennis Swanson
Jackson Swartzendruber
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Emi Takaoka
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Sophia Tambascio
Jack Tannenbaum
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Raquel Tapia
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Cecelia Tecu
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Sol Tirado - Jensen
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Grace Toomey
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Maddie Veasey
Sydney Venetsanopoulos
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Saanvi Vookanti
August Vrielink
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Ashtyn Waddle
Chloe Walsh
Catherine Ward
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Evie Warner
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Valerie Warszawski
Ryder Watkins
Kylee Watrous
Leila Watters
Liam Watters
Jordan Watts
Greta Wattson
Taylor Weatherwax
Jenna Weil
Kennedy Weiss
Erin Wheeler
Kennah White
Ella Whittall
Abigail Williams
Jackson Williams
Ranney Willis
Piper Wills
Holly Wininger
Emma Winkelbauer
Amanda Winslow
Mia Winstead
Trent Wobschall
Zachary Woodbury
Alexandra Woodland
Lily Wright
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Jackie Wynne
Maggie Yalmokas
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Nate Yearous
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More than 800 CMCI students were named to the dean's list for the spring semester.

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When retreat trumps the rise of global free markets

Joe Arney — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 19:34:07 +0000

When retreat trumps the rise of global free markets Joe Arney Wed, 01/28/2026 - 12:34

Joe Arney

For Colette Perold, seeing an imperial power throw its weight around in Latin America isn’t news—she’s an expert on how multinational IT companies have exerted influence in this part of the world.

What she finds curious about Donald Trump’s approach to diplomacy is how out of step it is with the desires of many businesses.

Colette Perold

While the interests of the state and corporations don’t always align, “what’s fascinating about the second Trump administration is that much of its foreign policy appears to undermine the liberalized overseas markets that allowed U.S.-based multinationals to become dominant,” she said. “For that to be replaced by this scattershot, unpredictable type of foreign policy execution is new terrain for them.”

Perold, an assistant professor of media studies at the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information, researches the relationship between media technologies, labor and foreign policy. It’s work she became interested in following her work as a labor organizer and an editor for NACLA Report on the Americas, a quarterly journal on Latin American politics and social movements.

In her best-known work, Perold traces IBM’s investment in Brazil—the company was a dominant force in the country from the 1930s into the late 1970s, and was effectively a monopoly in the region for decades—including how the company contended with, and overcame, labor movements and domestic pressure for economic autonomy. That research is the subject of a forthcoming book, which was supported by the prestigious National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship.

The rise of IBM

IBM’s priorities largely reflected those of the U.S. government, which was eager to build a liberal international order as it expanded its influence and economic might in the post-World War II era. By kidnapping a foreign head of state and exhorting American oil companies to reinvest in Venezuela, Trump has signaled a return to a time when the nation’s interests were less global in scope.

How we got here

Seeing the Monroe Doctrine in the headlines was probably the first time most Americans thought of it since high-school history class. The doctrine was an early foreign policy declaration that established the United States’ opposition to European intervention in the hemisphere.

In reasserting the Monroe Doctrine, Donald Trump is returning to a period when U.S. intervention in Latin America was not just the practice, but the stated policy. That changed in the Good Neighbor days, but during the Cold War, the United States reasserted its interventionism in Latin America.

The 1990s marked a return to economics as the primary form of domination; today, “it looks like military intervention and other forms of ‘extra-economic’ coercion are becoming both practice and stated policy again,” Colette Perold said.

When Franklin Roosevelt introduced the Good Neighbor Policy, committing the United States to nonintervention in Latin American affairs, “that became the starting point for building a liberal hemispheric and international trade order, to remove barriers to trade and open markets,” Perold said. “Trump is retreating from all of that through his ‘America First’ diplomacy.”

IBM, she said, is a perfect example of how companies benefited from that liberal order. When the company arrived in Brazil in 1917, the tech industry looked nothing like it does today, but as it went from tabulating machines to mainframe computers, IBM was increasingly able to benefit from changing legal obligations, new regulations and shifts in labor markets.

“My interest here is understanding the technological changes alongside the political and economic changes, and how those feed each other,” she said. “By looking at these different players—the IT companies, the U.S. foreign policy apparatus, labor—we can understand, strategically, how we got to where we are today.”

The United States’ decades of commitment to that international order allowed it to stifle political movements in Latin America, most visibly to the benefit of companies like United Fruit, or industries like mining, Perold said. “But while no one really thinks about the unbelievable amount of political power IBM exerted in Brazil, it was very much part of building a liberal international order from the 1930s until its influence started to wane in the late 1970s.”

Signals in foreign policy noise

In examining the White House’s national security strategy, released late last year, she has found some potential signals in Trump’s noisy foreign policy execution.

“It seems like a lot of this strategy is motivated by the last two decades of increasing Chinese investment in Latin America,” she said. U.S. strategy, she said, is about expelling foreign powers, including a return to military force. China, Perold added, “is the subtext throughout the section of the document on the Western Hemisphere.”

“From the Trump administration’s perspective, the liberal trade order that gave us the rise of China is what’s hurting U.S. interests in Latin America. In other words, liberal internationalism was working for American interests in Latin America until it wasn’t—so now, our foreign policy is to directly dominate a sphere of influence, rather than manage it through markets.”

“By looking at these different players—the IT companies, the U.S. foreign policy apparatus, labor—we can understand, strategically, how we got to where we are today.”

Colette Perold, assistant professor, media studies

One of her favorite things about teaching this research, Perold said, is that few students are aware of the history at a time of both fast-moving foreign policy and rapid change driven by the tech industry. When she teaches students about the rise of Japan as a semiconductor giant in the 1980s, many are surprised to see, in U.S. media, the same language and signals aimed at China today.

“Two of the most influential of the so-called Atari Democrats,” who guided their party from organized labor to the largely nonunion information economy, “were senators from Colorado, and we have their papers right here at Norlin Library,” she said. “So, my students were looking at these documents about the supposed threat of Japan—and the real threats to organized labor—and going, wow, this is so similar to how politicians talk about China today.

“The beauty of teaching history classes about media and computing is seeing students get that shock, that this isn’t all new. It’s such a cool experience to watch them recognize that there is precedence to the cultural and technological phenomena they are steeped in every day.”

Joe Arney covers research and general news for the college.

A historian and labor expert says companies like IBM typified how the U.S. dominated the post-World War II global order. Trump’s retreat from that stage “undermines the free markets corporations want.”

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Want to keep your news local? It’s up to viewers like you

Joe Arney — Tue, 20 Jan 2026 17:27:11 +0000

Want to keep your news local? It’s up to viewers like you Joe Arney Tue, 01/20/2026 - 10:27

Joe Arney

Denver’s news landscape has been abuzz with the potential takeover of existing stations by Nexstar and Sinclair. An expert on local journalism says the laissez faire attitude of regulators means it’s up to viewers to make their voices heard on station content.

Last year, Denver’s broadcast news market was shaken as Nexstar and Sinclair—the two largest owners of television stations in the country—made moves to enter Colorado by acquiring the parent companies of 9News and Denver7.

Neither is yet a done deal. The Federal Communications Commission would have to approve the sale of Tegna, which owns 9News, to Nexstar; meanwhile, Denver7 owner Scripps rejected Sinclair’s takeover bid late last month. But relying on regulators or corporations to protect Colorado journalism is a poor strategy, said an expert on local news.

“The community needs to step in—that’s the only thing that can prevent these economic and social missteps,” said Angelica Kalika (PhDMediaSt’19), an assistant teaching professor of journalism at the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information. “When the community says, ‘we’re not going to watch this kind of content, this isn’t what we want’—if you are profit driven, you should listen to your audience, right?”

For that audience, Kalika said, takeovers represent a case of less choice means less voice. Consolidations typically mean fewer reporters to provide local coverage, encouraging stations to carry more national content. And the conservatism championed by both Nexstar and Sinclair would not reflect the progressive attitudes of viewers in the Denver metro market, while also encouraging the formation of a news desert. Kalika, who studies hyper-local news, said when the same people and companies own all the outlets, it means fewer editorial voices to watch town halls, board meetings and other news that’s ignored by larger, national players.

“Look at 9News—it’s iconic, it has a very clear brand,” Kalika said. “Is the community going to stand up to the corporations and make their voice heard?”

It’s something that worked, she said, when the Walt Disney Co. pulled Jimmy Kimmel off the air “and people screamed.” Search traffic on how to cancel Disney+ spiked as influential voices condemned the decision to suspend Kimmel.

“And Disney responded right away, because at the end of the day, it’s about the money. If you find organized ways to uplift community voices while hurting someone’s bottom line, you can have more control over your local media.”

A history of consolidation

Angelica Kalika

That public pressure will be required to counter an FCC that has enthusiastically embraced deregulation—not just in journalism, but across media in general. Last month, an $83 billion bid by Netflix to acquire WB stunned a legacy media industry already reeling from the tech industry’s continued incursions into their business—first by converting cable customers into streaming subscribers, and more recently by acquiring reliable revenue-generating intellectual property; the James Bond franchise, for instance, was sold to Amazon for $20 million last winter. The WB deal, which features a hostile takeover bid from Paramount Skydance, is the latest in the trend toward consolidation, which has seen takeovers by Xfinity, Disney, Amazon and others.

“The big tech companies have their eyes on local media and entertainment, because ultimately their goal is control of information and access to information,” Kalika said. “It’s worth analyzing the minutia of these deals and the climate at the FCC because the more omnipresent tech becomes here, the more we end up in bubbles of information—where we don’t know what’s real.”

Kalika knows what she’s talking about. She teaches a popular CMDI course on media and technology and has published several papers on the fall of legacy media gatekeepers—especially through the lens of TMZ, which in its pursuit of scoops has sometimes crossed lines that journalists will not. A paper she presented at the National Communication Association’s annual convention looks at TMZ’s decision to publish photos of the body of One Direction singer Liam Payne after he fell to his death; editors then removed the post without explanation amid public outcry.

‘No more adults in the room’

“If you find organized ways to uplift community voices while hurting someone’s bottom line, you can have more control over your local media.”

Angelica Kalika (PhDMediaSt’19), assistant teaching professor, journalism

“We’ve lost the social rail guards of what media is legitimate and what is not, what is trustworthy and what is not,” she said. While Kalika said there are trusted, verified sources in social media, those standards aren’t as visible as they were when most Americans got their news from local newspapers and network television. So, it’s harder to detect mis- and disinformation—especially as the algorithms populating news feeds are focused on engagement.

“There are no more adults in the room,” she said. “Everyone is now fighting for attention. They didn’t have to before.”

With the adults out, the natural place to look is at the kids. Kalika said legacy media’s inability to create authentic content for Gen Z—or to nurture them as an audience, the way Viacom did through properties like Nickelodeon, MTV and VH1—is a troubling indicator for the future, especially as many turn to YouTube, TikTok and others for news and entertainment.

“I can’t predict what they’re going to do, but I know they’re aware and trying to make changes in real time to the media and political environment that’s being presented to them,” she said. “I think they are going to use their money and who they’re signing up for streaming in order to get their voice and values heard and reflected in brands.”

That kind of pressure is going to require news organizations to be creative in order to maintain and grow their local audiences—something we might see in Denver as threats of consolidation loom.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if you start seeing some kind of profit-sharing business models, or people who provide direct financial support to a station in return for, say, a meet-and-greet event with reporters,” Kalika said. “I think we’re going to start seeing a growth in experimental business models.”

Joe Arney covers research and general news for the college.

An expert on local journalism says community pressure is key as consolidation changes Colorado’s media landscape—because when it comes to regulation, “there are no more adults in the room.”

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‘Not afraid to say yes:’ CMDI mourns actor Pat Finn, who taught unique improv class

Joe Arney — Mon, 12 Jan 2026 22:29:18 +0000

‘Not afraid to say yes:’ CMDI mourns actor Pat Finn, who taught unique improv class Joe Arney Mon, 01/12/2026 - 15:29

Joe Arney

As she prepares to start a new job, Erin Baptiste is reflecting on one of the more unusual classes she took as a senior in the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information.

Pat Finn laughs in this file photo as he watches students working in an improv course he taught at the college. Finn, a well-known actor whose work included roles on The Middle, Seinfeld, Friends and many others, died of cancer in December. Alumni and faculty remembered Finn as a passionate teacher who made improv less intimidating. Below, Finn offers pointers to a group of students during class. Photos by Kimberly Coffin.

The course—a special topics class around improv and strategic communication taught by character actor Pat Finn—challenged students to bring a different set of skills to the kinds of challenges awaiting them as advertisers, marketers, public relations experts and designers.

“Something that stuck with me from that course was not being afraid to say yes—to be open and go with the flow,” said Baptiste (StratComm’18), who is leaving a design, social media and events management role at Groove Toyota, in Englewood, to become marketing director at University Bicycles, in Boulder.

“Anytime I start a new job, I go in feeling—well, like a bit of an idiot,” she said with a laugh. “There’s so much you don’t know. And that openness that Pat encouraged in that improv class showed me it’s OK to not know everything. Saying ‘I don’t know’ isn’t showing ignorance—it’s opening up a chance for other people to share with you.”

Finn, a lecturer at the college between 2016 and 2022, died from cancer in December—a loss that was felt at Boulder and beyond, as Finn’s own acting career led to guest roles on Seinfeld, Friends, Murphy Brown, The Middle and elsewhere.

“There are moments in college that have been lost to time. Pat’s course is not one of those,” Baptiste said. “He brought such joy and kindness to the classroom. Pat was so open to whatever you were feeling. He was excited to take that journey with you, and made an experience like improv feel a lot less scary and easier to grasp and use.”

Bringing ‘yes, and’ to the curriculum

Finn’s use of “yes, and”—an improv technique that’s found home in organizational leadership as a tool for building trust and collaboratively solving problems—was something Lori Bergen, founding dean of the college, mentioned in bringing Finn on board in CMDI’s early days. She first met Finn as dean of Marquette University’s Diederich College of Communication, which includes a major in theatre arts, alongside traditional media and communication studies; Finn was an alumnus.

“‘Yes, and’ is almost a cliche in improv, but the idea of keeping things positive, of making other people on your team look good—after all, you’re there together—that’s just what he did, how he taught and how he lived,” Bergen said. “He reached out to me shortly after I started in Boulder to congratulate me, and of course he used ‘yes, and’ to pitch me—‘Who’s innovative enough to bring improv to strategic communication?’ How was I going to say no to that?”

“He was so good at encouraging us to experiment and take risks while being gentle and making sure you felt safe.”

Harrison Morof (StratComm’18),
associate director, Duncan Channon

Finn was not a headliner, “but he’s someone you’d recognize, because he always played such cool roles,” Bergen said. “And that was a reflection of who he was as a person—he worked so hard to make other people feel seen, especially our students. And his generosity and warmth of spirit always made you feel special.”

Harsha Gangadharbatla, who was among the founding faculty of CMDI, recalled enlisting Finn to run a workshop for faculty in the early days of the advertising, public relations and design department.

“He really helped bring our faculty together and instill that ‘yes, and’ attitude and approach to solving problems,” said Gangadharbatla, now a distinguished professor and senior associate dean for the Hussman School of Journalism and Media at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “He played a key role in building the department’s culture during its early days.”

Bergen echoed that, saying Finn’s ability to make people feel special made the workshop, which she attended, a hit.

“Most of us are programmed to not say the first thing that jumps into our head when we’re solving a problem,” she said. “And when you do that, you’re suppressing creativity and imagination. Pat’s workshop was great because in the early days of the college, those were two things we couldn’t afford to bottle up.”

Teaching students to think on their feet

Gangadharbatla said Finn’s skill as an actor and teacher made students comfortable applying lessons from improv to think on their feet and quickly make decisions.

“Pat helped many of the APRD students hone in on their presentation skills and learn how to get comfortable in front of a crowd,” Gangadharbatla said, adding that Finn’s impact was especially felt at the National Student Advertising Competition, where his guidance helped students earn second place in the district in 2018.

It was perhaps unusual for a Hollywood actor to wind up teaching in Boulder, but Harrison Morof (StratComm’18) remembered him talking about his daughters, who both graduated from CMDI and work in entertainment. Cassidy Finn (Comm’17) worked on Michelle Obama’s The Light We Carry and Rupal; Caitlin Finn (Comm’19) has held roles at Netflix, ESPN and elsewhere. His son, Ryan, attended Marquette.

“It was a very touching, sweet thing,” Morof said. “I’m sure he was teaching here to be closer to his daughters, which I think we all admired and appreciated.”

Morof, associate director of media and analytics at Duncan Channon, grew up watching improv on Saturday Night Live, and saw the chance to take the course with Finn as a truly unique opportunity.

“He had a way of making everyone feel welcome and important,” Morof said. “Going up in front of your peers and wanting to impress them—I remember being nervous about that, but he was so good at encouraging us to experiment and take risks while being gentle and making sure you felt safe.”

Making quick pivots

Improv lessons also have helped him rapidly pivot when change happens at work—important, since many of Morof’s clients are in healthcare.

“We worked on California’s COVID-19 vaccine campaign, and things were changing by the day,” he said, including who was eligible, how patients got it, moving supply to meet demand, even the period when the Johnson & Johnson shot was temporarily paused. “Figuring out how to solve those kinds of dynamic problems was absolutely influenced by flexing that improv, ‘yes, and’ muscle.”

It’s a sentiment Baptiste shared, as well—especially when her work has taken her places where she may be the only creative professional on the team, surrounded by finance or analytics experts who don’t get the rush of seeing an idea take form as a campaign.

“When you’re on a team where other peoples’ work doesn’t have the same public visibility as yours, it becomes so much more important to hear what they’re saying and recognize how they are informing your process,” she said.

“I have been struck several times in my career about how much I think about improv as a result of that class—like, my team and I should do a class like that, or my husband and I should, because it just opens up communication so much. In such a short time, Pat made such a huge impact on my life.”

Joe Arney covers research and general news for the college.

He was best known for roles on The Middle, Seinfeld and Friends, but alumni and faculty best remember his joy and kindness—and an impact that extended into their careers.

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Standout student channels enthusiasm for people, pop culture into HBO internship

Joe Arney — Mon, 05 Jan 2026 15:00:00 +0000

Standout student channels enthusiasm for people, pop culture into HBO internship Joe Arney Mon, 01/05/2026 - 08:00

Hannah Stewart

For someone aspiring to work in public relations for the entertainment industry, Leah Szabo’s internship with HBO was a dream come true. She tracked media mentions and worked the red carpet for shows like The Last of Us and The White Lotus.

Leah Szabo is a great friend to watch TV with. When you ask the inevitable, “Where have I seen them before?” she can tell you.

That pop culture consciousness—combined with top-notch networking skills—is how the college senior landed a summer internship with HBO Max—a position she hopes helps launch a career in the entertainment industry.

“I want to be in entertainment because I love amplifying the storytellers' voices through strategy and creativity,” said Szabo, who will graduate from the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information in the spring with a degree in strategic communication. “I like talking to people, but I like being behind the scenes as the person who helps people get their stories told.”

Szabo’s own story is both fun and inspiring. The California native grew up surrounded by the sparkle of Hollywood, which extended to the Christmas parties thrown by her uncle—an entertainment industry veteran whose guest lists included publicists, actors and other professionals.

It was at one of those parties that she chatted with family friend Raina Falcon, an HBO executive, who invited the then-first-year public relations student to follow up with her after a bit more schooling.

“Year after year, I would follow up saying, ‘Hi, I’m a sophomore now and I study PR.’ And the next year, ‘I’m a junior; it’s my time. I want to work for you. I want to be in entertainment,’” she said. “So it was leveraging a connection, but also making sure I maintained it.”

Falcon pointed Szabo toward the correct internship application and passed along her resume to the recruiters. Three rounds of interviews, she was accepted, and on the path toward her dream job.

The cast of HBO’s The White Lotus poses at a premier event. Among Szabo’s responsibilities at her internship were tracking press and working red-carpet events. Photo by Leah Szabo.

Behind the silver screen

Once she arrived, it was clear Szabo’s CMDI education had prepared her to succeed on an internship where she was tasked with everything from tracking media mentions to working the red carpet.

“Interns in the entertainment and PR business need to be organized, motivated, good with people and very adaptable,” said Lily Walker, a publicity coordinator for HBO Max. “Leah did a great job of taking on new situations as they came, both at in-person events and online.”

Szabo’s work impressed the HBO team so much that they extended her internship to last through the fall semester as well. Though Walker was not Szabo’s supervisor, the two worked together throughout the internship, including at the I Love LA and Welcome to Derry premieres in October.

She also credited Szabo with bringing fresh perspectives to work, such as ideas to promote shows to younger audiences.

“For instance, on I Love LA, an influencer makes a cameo, and I said, ‘Why haven’t you asked to go on her YouTube? She has a whole segment where she interviews celebrities,’” Szabo said. “It was really cool that they saw value in what I was telling them and applying it.”

Naturally extroverted, Szabo has found her stride within public relations. But she was quick to credit her success to her mentors and past internships. Prior to her role at HBO, she completed two PR internships, one with JKD & Co. and another with SchroderHaus. While at times it was intimidating to represent a global brand, she said, the skills developed at CMDI and during her more community-focused internships applied in every setting, giving her confidence.

Equally as formative has been her leadership experience with the �鶹��Ѱ��Boulder chapter of the Public Relations Student Society of America. As president, Szabo serves as a liaison to the university, national organization and members, managing a team, running meetings and working with different personalities.

“PR is basically personality management—how can you satisfy every stakeholder and adjust to different situations,” she said.

Notably, under her leadership, PRSSA has grown significantly. Since August, 99 new members joined—all while Szabo was continuing her HBO internship and maintaining a full course load.

Role model

“Leah, to me, is already a professional in the way she handles herself,” said Jolene Fisher, an associate professor in the college’s Department of Advertising, Public Relations and Design. “She is able to perform in many different capacities beyond what I expect to see from a student level.”

As faculty advisor for PRSSA, Fisher has worked closely with Szabo over the past two years, and said Szabo has grown not only as a leader, but as a model student.

It’s why she invited Szabo to give a guest lecture to first-year students in an introductory PR class, where she shared with her peers what it took to secure her internship and her responsibilities at HBO.

“When we highlight the success of our current students, it really helps inspire our younger ones,” said Fisher, also associate chair of undergraduate studies. “Leah’s going to make things happen because she is a force. I’m excited to see where she goes.”

And Szabo’s success so far made her a natural choice to speak to her peers.

“I have been able to use my CMDI education and apply it to everything from community relations to consumer packaged goods and now entertainment—you can really take any avenue you want with CMDI,” she said.

Hannah Stewart graduated in 2019 with a degree in communication. She covers student news at the college.

On her dream internship, a CMDI student has done everything from tracking media mentions to working the red carpet.

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All together now: 2025 at CMDI

Amanda J. McManus — Tue, 16 Dec 2025 02:22:15 +0000

All together now: 2025 at CMDI Amanda J. McManus Mon, 12/15/2025 - 19:22

In a year where the college’s biggest story was its name change—following its integration with the environmental design department—CMDI’s community also found itself at the center of the biggest conversations shaping our time—from sustainability and A.I., to media literacy and the future of journalism.

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Code Reddit: How community guidelines, moderation can impede internet incivility

Joe Arney — Tue, 09 Dec 2025 16:33:37 +0000

Code Reddit: How community guidelines, moderation can impede internet incivility Joe Arney Tue, 12/09/2025 - 09:33

Joe Arney

If you were starting a new social media platform—one that tried to balance civil behavior with strong engagement—and were looking for an example to emulate, Chris Vargo has an unexpected one to offer.

Vargo, an associate professor of advertising at �鶹��Ѱ��Boulder’s College of Communication, Media, Design and Information, has a new paper out in Social Science Computer Review that examines the role moderation and decentralized community rules have played in limiting incivility on Reddit.

“It’s not a moderated world in which we live in online, but I think what’s neat about Reddit is that they have these self-enforcing communities—and they work,” Vargo said.

Content accuracy was once an important plank for social media giants like Meta, which hired moderators to sift through the cesspools and remove false or misleading posts about the pandemic, Jan. 6 insurrection and other controversial topics. Uniquely, Reddit relies on volunteers to police posts that are abusive or inaccurate.

The paper, which Vargo co-authored with Toby Hopp, a fellow associate professor in the college’s Department of Advertising, Public Relations and Design, used machine learning tools to study 20 of the most popular subreddits—topic-specific communities hosted on the Reddit platform—in news and politics to understand how community rules could shape both engagement and uncivil behavior.

“Each subreddit is a different community, and they all have different rules and different guidelines on what’s acceptable,” Vargo said. Some groups, he said, encourage incivility—like sports subreddits where fans trash on a rival team, as well as some in the political sphere. “But you also have subreddits that don’t allow for that kind of incivility, or the casting of people as being out-group.”

That’s important because social media has empowered anonymous keyboard warriors to toss around death threats, dox opponents and belittle people for their ideas. Those kinds of uncivil behaviors—as opposed to just general vulgarity—were the focus of this research.

“For a democracy to have diverse voices, people need to feel safe posting content online,” Vargo said. “And we know from incivility studies that silencing and marginalizing opponents, telling them their viewpoints don’t matter, is a great way to silence them.”

“We know from incivility studies that silencing and marginalizing opponents, telling them their viewpoints don’t matter, is a great way to silence them.”

Chris Vargo, associate professor, advertising

When it comes to improving civil discourse on social media, the paper found the strength of a community’s moderation policies and enforcement correlated with greater civility among its participants.

“The more rules that are in a community, the better quality of communication in that subreddit,” Vargo said. “That’s important because building community is less about content moderation and more about content contextualization—this idea of sharing the truth when a poster might not be truthful, or saying when someone's misleading in a comment if they are being misleading.”

Changing perspectives on toxicity

The idea that one would consider Reddit a haven from, as opposed to a hotbed of, toxic behavior would have raised more than a few eyebrows in the past. But as major players in artificial intelligence have looked for new content platforms to scrape, Reddit has tried to sanitize its image. Those efforts have included removing problematic communities from the platform as well as putting moderation in the hands of volunteer users. Last year, the platform struck a $60 million deal with Google that allowed the search giant to train its A.I. models on users’ posts.

“We really expected Reddit to be pretty toxic, but I’ve done a couple papers recently that both point to Reddit being fairly safe, with not a lot of threats,” Vargo said. “I would say it is probably more of a model than it is a problem.”

When it comes to advertising and social media, engagement is the name of the game—one reason why name-calling, shaming and starting fights online tends to be rewarded by algorithms, which are designed to keep people on the site, in order to deliver more ads to users. In this study, though, Vargo said, internet indecorousness amounted to “just a tiny bit” of increased engagement.

“I think it’s great to see on a social media platform that those behaviors aren’t driving engagement quite the way we may have thought,” he said. “Because I don’t think it should be so easy to mine us for engagement, and for it to be so closely linked to hate.”

So, for both existing and emerging platforms, the idea of user-governed communities is worth consideration.

“I would highly encourage other places, like Facebook groups, to allow for those types of moderators to have that role over removing content and enforcing rules,” Vargo said, noting that his paper collected commonly used rules that keep successful subreddits civil.

Joe Arney covers research and general news for the college.

A new paper finds subreddits with clearly defined rules and active volunteer moderators do better at limiting incivility and encouraging engagement.

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Though some of the biggest social media platforms have ended, or drastically scaled back, content moderation, a new paper examines Reddit's volunteer model and finds that the right guidelines can limit incivility.

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Waste not. Want? Yes.

Hannah Stewart — Fri, 05 Dec 2025 21:18:19 +0000

Waste not. Want? Yes. Hannah Stewart Fri, 12/05/2025 - 14:18

Hannah Stewart

The EPOP Shop was a crowd favorite at the Firefly Handmade Market in downtown Boulder. The students sold out of two items in the first two hours of being open; they ultimately sold all their products midway through the second day of the market. Photos by Hannah Howell.

How many students can say one of their first class assignments was to go shopping?

That unusual first assignment is how students in the EPOP Studio course prepare to create sustainably sourced gifts that are sold at a holiday market.

EPOP by the numbers:

39 students

12 unique products

240 items brought to and sold at market

$10,070 sold

For the past five years, environmental design faculty with �鶹��Ѱ��Boulder’s College of Communication, Media, Design and Information have partnered with the Firefly Handmade holiday market to give students hands-on experience in product design.

The twist for students who participate—all of whom are majoring in environmental products of design—is the requirement that their creations have a strong sustainability component, which becomes part of the story for each product sold. Students who complete the degree go on to careers in virtually every design field.

“We want to be the people who make cool things to sell,” said senior Pilar Agostine, who was part of the team that built the EPOP storefront—itself created from sustainable materials. “We’re designing the everyday products for a home, but in an environmental way.”

The EPOP Studio draws its name from the EPOD major and the annual pop-up shop powered by the students. The goal of the course is to challenge them to think critically about sustainability while developing technical, interpersonal and business skills.

“The theme of the studio is diverting design—they have to identify waste streams, capture material and transform it into a product,” said Jared Arp, an assistant teaching professor of environmental design who teaches the course alongside Melissa Felderman, associate teaching professor.

All products were made with upcycled materials, which many customers felt was both unique and important.

Once students identified a waste stream, they used their experience from observing the market to identify potential products to pitch to classmates. Among this year’s product themes were creative, decorative, fun and—for the first time—masculine.

“Shopping for men, in my opinion, is so hard,” senior John Davis said with a laugh. “When you think about the context of a handmade market, a lot of those things tend to be directed toward feminine audiences.”

Davis and his team had “100-plus ideas” before settling on a set of whiskey glasses made from bottles sourced from Spirit Hound, a distiller in Lyons. Even the glasses’ complementary coasters were made from a mixture of crushed glass, rockite—a fine concrete material—and a cork base. Davis estimated the design is made from about 80% reclaimed material.

“I'm really proud of the fact that we have all consistently shown up and created this product, and of how sustainable we were able to make it,” Davis said. “We were lucky Spirit Hound was willing to give us their bottles for free. That made our story a lot stronger.”

According to Arp, that storytelling is critical to EPOP because it connects customers with the shop’s mission of promoting sustainable design. When the link connecting the waste stream and final product is clear, he said, the audience is more receptive.

As in past years, customers beat a steady path to EPOP’s storefront: Well before the Firefly market closed, the students’ 240 products had sold out. Sales from the weekend amounted to slightly more than $10,000; adjusted for expenses, their gross profit was just shy of $6,100, all of which will support next year’s studio.

A steady flow of customers kept EPOP students busy at the market.

“That’s 240 decisions from shoppers to purchase the students’ work,” Arp said. “There’s no better jury than live people.”

Those live people weren’t just impulse buyers. An hour before the market opened, curious passers-by were watching the shop—partially constructed from reclaimed wood—take form. Within minutes of opening, the first customer bought six sunglasses cases made from reclaimed outdoor gear, like jackets.

Uniquely, the structure included more than just the items for sale. It was outfitted with 12 tablets, which ran looped videos showing the creation process and sustainability story of each product. Buyers also received cards with the product name and a blurb about the item.

“Foot traffic is really important for markets, and I think the shop itself is incredible—it stands out,” said Chrissy Howell, a yarn artisan who frequently participates in markets like Firefly. She and her husband—the parents of a CMDI student—picked up a number of items for their holiday shopping.

Another customer, Jean, stumbled upon the market while visiting Boulder from Frisco. She, like Howell, thought EPOP was perfect for picking up a unique gift—she purchased the Waste Knot for her daughter—while being environmentally conscious. She said the students’ mission really spoke to her.

“This is the culmination of their whole semester, and it makes me really happy for them that they get this opportunity to be out in public to get feedback about their work and ideas,” said Mary Kay Cunningham, another holiday shopper and parent to an EPOP student.

For the students, it’s more than just holiday gifts. In addition to learning to tell a story that resonates with potential customers, the class challenged their technical and teamwork skills, teaching them creativity and resilience as they brought their ideas to market.

The Waste Knot yarn bowls, Respirited whiskey glasses and other items made by EPOP students.

“They warned us at the beginning that we could use software to generate a concept of a final product, but it will dampen your creative experience,’” said Elliette Igel-Manvitz, a junior on the Waste Knot team.

Felderman said that’s an important lesson for students in the studio class. While many CMDI classes challenge students to find useful, ethical and responsible ways to use generative artificial intelligence as part of assignments and projects, she asked them not to do so in the early stages.

Doing so “stymies their creative process and pigeonholes them,” Felderman said. “We offer guidance to our students both on when and how to use A.I. in the design process, so that it can act as a tool, as opposed to a hindrance.”

Students said working through the front-end creative challenges of their projects furthered their learning.

“I’ve definitely become more adaptive,” Igel-Manvitz said. “When we realized we’d have to change our materials because of resource availability, we learned from other teams.

“After working on it for so many months and not really seeing the final product until the very end, it feels unreal.”

Even the storefront was made by students, using both new and reclaimed wood. Students also created all the signs for the shop.

November's Firefly Handmade Holiday Market was packed. Customers frequently visited the EPOP shop, some of them even lining up to check out the products before the official start time. They quickly sold out of items.

Hannah Stewart graduated in 2019 with a degree in communication. She covers student news at the college.

Photographer Hannah Howell is studying media production at CMDI.

At an annual holiday market, CMDI students again sold handmade, sustainably sourced gifts—along with the stories of how the materials were rescued from waste streams.

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Goal oriented: Soccer standout is CMDI’s top December graduate

Joe Arney — Fri, 05 Dec 2025 17:19:17 +0000

Goal oriented: Soccer standout is CMDI’s top December graduate Joe Arney Fri, 12/05/2025 - 10:19

Allyson Maturey

She wasn't just a star on the pitch—Lola Stanley graduates in December at the top of her class for the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information. Photo courtesy Colorado Athletics.

By the time Lola Stanley graduates this December, she’ll be carrying more than recognition as the college’s William W. White Outstanding Graduate. She’ll be carrying the lessons, relationships and personal growth that shaped her at the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information—experiences she said will guide her long after graduation.

For Stanley, a communication major and sports media minor who transferred to �鶹��Ѱ��Boulder from the University of Texas at Austin, the journey to graduation has been marked by balance, focus and a commitment to showing up—both in the classroom and on the soccer field. Her college experiences have given her a better understanding of the power of setting goals and achieving them.

“Working hard to graduate with a 4.0 GPA while being a student-athlete has taught me that I am in control of the goals I want to achieve,” Stanley said. “It’s truly based on how I show up.”

The White award, presented to the graduating senior with the highest GPA in the college, is not the only honor Stanley has achieved as a student. In 2024, she was recognized with the Herbst Academic Award, which celebrates a student-athlete for her classroom accomplishments.

Graduation represents far more than a personal achievement for Stanley: “Above all, my degree represents the generosity, sacrifice and support that I have received from my parents.”

In a way, her diploma is part gratitude and part gateway. It’s the culmination of years of effort and the beginning of countless opportunities ahead.

More than just a degree

Among her most significant areas of growth, Stanley highlights one skill: communication. She didn’t just refine it at CMDI, she came to understand its transformative power. Whether with teammates, professors, coaches or peers, she found clear communication fosters trust while minimizing misunderstandings.

“I’ve learned that being direct, transparent and intentional strengthens every relationship,” she said. “Recognizing its impact across every area of my life is one of the most valuable takeaways that I will bring with me into my next chapter.”

Stanley has many memorable experiences she’ll hold onto, but there’s one class that stands out the most: an American Sign Language course with Paige Hawkins, assistant teaching professor from Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences.

Hawkins, she said, brought joy and care into the classroom, opening Stanley’s eyes to the richness of learning a new language. The experience fostered a deep sense of gratitude and broadened her awareness of the things people often take for granted.

“She truly impacted my life in ways that I did not expect when signing up for the course,” she said. “I want to thank her for the time, effort when showing up to teach my class and me every day.”

Congratulations, December graduates!

CMDI is proud to recognize our new 2025 Forever Buffs.

View a full list of graduates →

Allyson Maturey is a communications project manager for CMDI.

The William W. White Outstanding Graduate this December is Lola Stanley, who carries with her the resilience of an athlete, the curiosity of a scholar and the clarity of a communicator.

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