Search results for

Westminster, Colorado began as a small farming community when the first settler arrived in 1870. Today, it is the state’s eighth-largest city. Even though it’s part of the sprawling, urban metro Denver area, Westminster has held onto its agricultural roots. There’s still a working farm about three miles from downtown. So it’s not surprising Westminster High School has a robust agriculture program. This episode features the school’s Career and Technical Education agriculture pathway and two students who’ve found success in the urban jungle.

Jobs in Colorado are changing, and now, an increasing number require a college degree or credential. The Colorado Dream: Career Education examines how a small metro Denver school district is playing a greater role in training tomorrow's workforce.

Westminster Public Schools is one of the smallest school districts in metro Denver and has only one comprehensive high school. Westminster High School, or Westy as it's fondly called, houses the district's Career and Technical Education (CTE) program. In 2019, the district received a CTE grant from the state which paid for Wolf Bites, a food truck run by culinary students. This episode follows them as they prepare for their first paid catering gig and features a video cinema arts student who helped produce the school's Wolf Bites video documentary.

Thirst Gap is a six-part podcast series about how the Southwest is adapting to water shortages as climate change causes the region to warm up and dry out.

Farmers and ranchers use the vast majority of the Colorado River’s water. Getting them to voluntarily use less is difficult.

The Colorado River’s current crisis traces its roots back to 1922. That’s when leaders from the rapidly-growing southwestern states that rely on the river traveled to a swanky Santa Fe mountain retreat to divvy up the river’s water. Growing populations in some of the West’s burgeoning cities and sprawling farmlands, and the anxieties tied to that growth, pushed leaders to the negotiating table.

Tribes in the southwest hold significant rights to the Colorado River’s water. But they’ve been left out of nearly every major agreement to manage the river. Leaders across the region are debating how to use less water amid the region’s warming climate. Tribes say they never got the chance to use their water in the first place, and that everyone in the river basin should plan for a future where they do.

Las Vegas is known as a city of excess. But not when it comes to water. The desert metropolis relies on the Colorado River to keep its iconic casinos bustling. The short supply has caused city leaders to enforce some of the tightest water conservation measures in the West. Green lawns are enemy number one.

The Colorado River comes to an end at the U.S.-Mexico border. The entirety of its flow, already heavily tapped upstream in the U.S., is sent into an irrigation canal to grow crops in the Mexicali Valley and to flow through faucets in Tijuana and Mexicali. The river’s final hundred miles have been mostly dry for decades. Environmental groups on both sides of the border are working together to let the Colorado flow again in its historic channel.

Lake Powell is a boater’s dream. The nation’s second largest reservoir on the Colorado River is a maze of sandstone canyons teeming with houseboats. But climate change and unchecked demand for water sent the lake’s levels to a new record low this year. In this episode we explore changes to recreation in this popular vacation hotspot.