Back in fall 2023, as the weather turned cold, spiders and ants sought refuge inside NAU’s Early Learning and Development Center. The young students, ages 2-5, noticed—and they had some thoughts. “Some said, ‘Whoa, cool, let me look closer,’ while others went, ‘Gross, get it away, squish it!” said Rebecca Cirzan, director of the center. “All of them had opinions.…

A mentorship program born inside a classroom at NAU aims to ease the often-daunting transition from high school to college by connecting students across both levels in structured, meaningful relationships. The program, Contigo: Peer Mentoring for Resilience and Access, is designed to address academic and social uncertainties among underrepresented students. The initiative pairs NAU students with high school juniors and seniors to provide them with practical guidance and grounded firsthand experience. The idea for the project took root in Community University Public Inquiry (CUPI), a community-based undergraduate research class in the Sustainable Communities…

Building on the success of the Western Undergraduate Exchange (WUE) program, which offers out-of-state students from select states and territories a significant discount on tuition, NAU is now making similar moves for grad students. The Western Regional Graduate Program (WRGP) will launch in Fall 2026, significantly increasing affordable access to graduate school for students throughout the western United States. Nearly all in-person master’s degrees and graduate certificates will now be eligible for WRGP, giving grad students from participating states and territories up to 40% off out-of-state tuition. …

The third annual Arizona Statewide Business School Case Competition (ASBSCC), coming to Northern Arizona University, provides students with the opportunity to apply their knowledge and test their soft skills—communication, leadership, adaptability, networking and collaboration—by placing them in realistic business scenarios that demand quick thinking and effective teamwork. This collaborative effort between Arizona State University, the University of Arizona and NAU allows students to work across institutional lines to…

The Arizona Institute for Education and the Economy (AIEE) at Northern Arizona University and the Center for the Future of Arizona (CFA), with support from KnowledgeWorks, have jointly launched Permission Granted, a statewide effort designed to help Arizona school systems move from perceived constraints to practical action. Composed of two complementary tools—a Policy Primer and an Innovation Guide—Permission Granted clarifies what education policy flexibilities already exist and how…

The devastating wildfires in northern Canada in recent years have climate consequences that go far beyond smoke and carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere, according to a new study co-authored by two NAU researchers. The study, which looked at the various effects of fire in northern Canada and Alaska, wasn’t all bad news: The researchers found fires in Canada, when…