October 2026 Employee Accomplishments

On September 22, 2026, Counselor Education and Supervision Doctoral Student Benjamin Bünte published his first book, a memoir, The Pain of You. It’s the story of the chronic pain he lived with since he was a teenager, the career in music it eventually took, his father’s long illness, the way his family learned to say ‘fine,’ and the years it took him to stop hiding. Ben wrote most of it during his time in the MA program and finished it this past summer, before the doctoral cohort began. That isn’t a coincidence. The program at Adams State asked him to sit with things he had spent decades managing, and provided Ben the training and the courage to do it.

Counselor Education and Supervision Doctoral Student Jamie Hays, was named Oklahoma Counselor of the Year by the Oklahoma Counseling Association.

Director of the Salazar Rio Grande del Norte Center Paul Formisano, Ph.D., presented at the Sustaining Colorado Watersheds Conference in Avon, CO, on October 6. He and his co-presenter, Hannah Thill from the Rio Grande Watershed Conservation and Education Initiative, discussed the Rio Grande Basin Water Education Mural Project that included partnerships with classes at Alamosa and Del Norte High Schools and community painting days to produce murals about valley water issues on the Dunes Inn Motel (Alamosa) and Del Norte Public Library. They, along with Jocelyn Catterson at the Rio Grande Headwaters Land Trust, were recently awarded a grant from the Colorado Water Conservation Board to extend the mural project to another nine communities throughout the valley in the coming years.
Dr. Formisano and the Salazar Center also published the SLV Conservation and Outdoor Legacy Report to help guide future conservation and economic development efforts throughout the valley.

Professor of History Richard Loosbrock, Ph.D., is finishing up his term on the NCAA Division Committee on Infractions. Dr. Loosbrock has served on the committee for nine years, including serving as the chair for the last three years.  The Committee on Infractions has seven members; six from either schools or conferences, and a public member, a lawyer from a firm not connected to the NCAA. “It has been interesting work, essentially adjudicating cases from schools and coaches who violate NCAA rules.”

Professor of Sociology Heidi Schneider’s, Ph.D., book, “The Struggle for Respect in Urban Classrooms Student and Teacher Perspectives,” is scheduled for publication in November.

Clinical Lecturer in the School of Counselor Education Colleen Stabolepszy received the Colorado School Counseling Association Lance Huffman Award. The award recognizes school counselors or counselor educators who have made significant contributions to the field of school counseling.  The purpose of the award is to recognize persons who have demonstrated leadership within the association and have advocated to educate, promote, and further the profession, not only within the state but at the national level as well.