Due to a weather cancelation, the Regional Transportation District (RTD) has rescheduled a public meeting (originally scheduled for Feb. 6) in Longmont to gather input and provide an update on proposed Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) service between Boulder and Longmont.

The new meeting is slated for 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 20, at the Longmont Senior Center, 901 Longs Peak Ave.

In addition to BRT service, there will be updates on other options to improve transit service, travel time and roadway improvements along State Highway 119 between the two cities, also known as the Diagonal Highway. The Colorado Department of Transportation will also present information on a proposed bikeway along Highway 119.

Attention all CU students! Do you want to be part of the greatest tradition in all of college athletics? Try out to be a Ralphie handler! Submit your application today.

If you are a female CU Boulder student between the ages of 18-24, you’re invited to participate in a research study. After completing a brief online survey, you will be invited to campus for a 30 minute in-person session, which will include online surveys and computer-based tasks involving short video and/or audio clips related to nature. 

Participants will earn a $5 Amazon gift card.

If you are interested, please follow the link below to enter contact information and scheduling availability, or email kirby.peterman@colorado.edu. 

Calling all CU Boulder graduate and undergraduate students: We are pleased to announce the 20th annual Thompson Awards for Western American Writing Contest is open for entries, due 11:59 p.m. Tuesday, March 19.

Regardless of whether you call the West your home or you are just passing through, as a student at CU Boulder you live, breathe, eat, drink and sleep the West. Here is an opportunity to transform your unique perspective on this region into cash simply by putting it to paper. And you can do so in whichever genre suits your creative impulse: poetry, memoir, fiction, creative nonfiction or academic nonfiction. You can even enter work in each of the categories. 

What is Western writing?

It’s writing about the West. And what is that? In many ways that’s for you to decide. It could be the spiny ridge of the continental divide; or a random rodeo you stumbled upon on a road trip; or the road trip itself; or branding time on the ranch; or your experience growing up in a border town; or the skinning of a deer; or environmental conservation; immigration; or public lands management. The potential topics are endless!

Five $500 prizes will be awarded to CU Boulder students in spring 2019 for writings on Western American topics in the following categories:

• Fiction: Including short stories and excerpts of novels, plays and screenplays
• Poetry: Single poems only (no collections)
• Memoir: Autobiographical essays
• Creative Nonfiction: Journalism, journalistic essays and writing aimed at a wide general audience
• Academic Nonfiction: Research papers or other academic writing

Search your hard drive for poems, stories and papers you have written on Western-related topics—or write something new—and enter the contest. With no entry fees, there is nothing to lose. So go ahead and #WriteWest!

Open to CU Boulder students only.

For contest rules and more information, visit centerwest.org/academics or call 303-735-1399. For more information on the Center of the American West, visit centerwest.org or call 303-492-4879.

The CU Science Discovery paid mentorship program partners highly motivated high school students with researchers at the CU Boulder campus and the CU Anschutz Medical Campus.

In this 4-week summer program, CU faculty and graduate students act as mentors to two high school students interested in gaining real-world laboratory experience. Participating mentors receive $800 for their lab! Apply today.

Please join the Research & Innovation Office (RIO) and the Office of Contracts and Grants (OCG) for a Budgeting 101 workshop Feb. 27 for externally funded research, scholarship and creative work projects. Register by Feb. 21. 

The UMC is accepting applications from student organizations for free office space or lockers during the fall 2019 semester.

Pick up an application in the UMC Executive Director’s Office (UMC 305) or CUSG (UMC 125), or download an application from our website. Groups with current space must reapply!

Applications must be submitted by noon Friday, March 1.

Act now! Help your organization succeed with a central office location. Questions? Call 303-492-8832.

Strategic Relations and Communications is seeking first and second year undergraduates to participate in a 60-minute focus group on Feb. 18, Feb. 19, Feb. 20 and Feb. 22. The focus groups will be conveniently held in the CASE building.

We want to hear your opinions about different CU Boulder offerings and programs. Participation is confidential, and all responses will be anonymous.

As a token of appreciation, we are offering each participant a small campus cash deposit to their account.

Find a date and time that works for you and reserve your spot. Participation will be on a first-come, first-served basis—so sign up today!

March 19 is the deadline for a chance to win $500 in the 20th annual Thompson Writing Awards.

The contest is open to all CU Boulder students at both graduate and undergraduate levels. Prizes are $500 in each of five categories: fiction, memoir, poetry, academic non-fiction and creative non-fiction. 

Enter your writing in any or all of the categories. Your work may touch on any theme relevant to the American West—past, present or future. To name some examples: growing up in a Western town; visiting a Western place for the first time; Native American history; immigration; mining; public lands; myth and stereotype in movies and books about the West; ranching; prairie dogs; wolves; wild horses; wild fires; water, dams and drought; tourism.

Visit our website for details, the entry form, and to read winning entries from past years. Contact us with your questions at academics@centerwest.org or 303-735-1399. 

We are looking for a student to co-lead a fun and supportive student group called Biphoria.

Biphoria is for CU students who identify as bisexual, pansexual, queer, fluid and their allies! The goal of this group is to create a community to provide support, address bisexual stereotypes and the "perpetual closet," increase bisexual visibility and foster friendships.  

Meetings are bi-weekly, 3:30 p.m. Thursdays, starting Jan. 31.

If you are interested in helping to co-lead this student group, please contact anna.m.scott@colorado.edu.

Do you have programs, services, courses, events or messages that you want or need to promote to get more attention? Put your message on the University Memorial Center's digital signs!

Create your own eye-catching slides, animations or videos that cycle on three different UMC digital signs in front of hundreds of students and UMC visitors every day. It's environmentally friendly, low-cost and cuts down on print materials.

Visit the UMC website for more details and information on other opportunities within the UMC to help get the word out to the CU Boulder community.

CU Health Promotion is recruiting students to participate in focus groups to better understand students’ perceptions around marijuana use. Participants and their answers are confidential. 

We are looking for both people who use and do not use marijuana to share their thoughts. These focus groups will take place the first week of March. Groups will run 60–90 minutes, and participants will receive a $20 Campus Cash card for their time. These cards can be used for food (dining centers, grab-n’-gos and Starbucks), at the book store, for laundry and for printing. The results of the focus groups will be used to help us craft communication materials and improve programs offered to students. 
 
Please sign up online if you are interested, and you will be contact by the end of Feb. 21 with more information. Please contact kathryn.dailey@colorado.edu if you have any questions.

Interested in your moods and brain? Participate in a paid neuroimaging study to understand your own emotions and the emotions of others on the CU Boulder campus in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience (IRB# 17-0358).

Earn between $15 and $25 per hour to participate in studies involving answering questions about your thoughts and feelings, watching brief videos, playing computer games and having an MRI brain scan taken. Study includes up to three separate visits (first is 4–5 hours, second is 3 hours, third is 1–2 hours). Option for additional paid follow-ups.

To qualify, you must be between the ages of 18 and 55 years old and either have:

• Diagnosis of bipolar disorder
• History of depression
• No history of mental health conditions

Please fill out a brief survey to apply.

If you have questions, please contact us: gruberpeplab@colorado.edu or 303-735-7547.