“Affordable housing is the number-one issue in Colorado.”
It’s not a new refrain. As the state’s population growth continues, albeit more slowly than in years past, the need for affordable housing is becoming ever more important. It’s a problem that requires a diverse approach—professional communities of developers, nonprofit owners, policymakers, and community advocates all make up the fabric of the affordable housing landscape.
With so many people in so many different areas working to solve the affordable housing crisis in Colorado and across the country, it became evident to University of Denver faculty Susan Daggett and Vivek Sah that DU was uniquely equipped to offer these professionals a way to continue their education in affordable housing. The University’s wealth of expertise in business, law, and more provided the perfect runway for affordable housing heavy hitters to learn from DU faculty—and each other.
Thus, the eight-month DU Executive Certificate in Affordable Housing was born—a joint program offered by the Burns School of Real Estate & Construction Management at the Daniels College of Business and the Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute at the Sturm College of Law, funded by the Simpson Family and Grand Peaks as well as Colorado Housing and Finance Authority.
“We found that there are similar programs across the country—but they’re short-term and somewhat incomplete,” says Sah, who serves as director of the Burns School. “They don’t look at the overall holistic approach, and they’re definitely not multidisciplinary.”
Designed to upskill professionals currently working in the affordable housing sector or reskill professionals looking to transition into the field, the program features eight course modules that cover everything from housing policy and real estate finance to the social dimensions of funding and building affordable housing.
The cohort includes 26 students from diverse professional backgrounds, including policy leaders, local government, builders, and real estate and community professionals, pared down from more than 80 applicants.
“The goal is to create a more sophisticated affordable housing ecosystem in Colorado, so we wanted to find people who were positioned to fulfill that role,” says Daggett, executive director of the Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute.
We spoke with five students from the inaugural cohort to learn more about why they chose the program—and what they’re getting out of it.
Dindi Gaines
Housing Stability Coordinator, Adams County Government
Which module do you feel resonated with you the most?
The social dimensions module. I enjoyed it because it’s the story; it gives the narrative of why we’re here and how we got here. In the module, we were asked to dream about if money were no object—if laws and capitalism or no object, what would affordable housing look like? And then they brought everybody back down to earth and talked about things like systemic racism and redlining. We talk about it like it’s the past, but it’s absolutely still here, through different things like zoning and permitting. After you get outside of the concrete structures, then you get to hear the stories of the people affected and the long-term impacts these things had and still have on communities.
My background is in social work. All the spreadsheets and all the numbers in the world will never be able to tell you the human impact story. And we heard about stories from families that have gone from public housing projects into home ownership, which is a rare, rare thing. It just doesn’t happen like it’s supposed to. Hearing the details of the journey directly from folks was super important.
Amy Schwartz
Vice President of Social Responsibility and Community Partnerships, Oakwood Homes
Why do you think a program like this is so important?
These are complex problems, and the interdisciplinary approach of this program specifically is fantastic. The shared learning together with a group of professionals who may never have met each other, or certainly built this level of relationship with each other, from all these different groups and organizations and perspectives, is important—and the industry is changing. Maybe it’s not changing fast enough. For people who have the courage and time to commit to a program like this, this shared learning space, will hopefully accelerate some innovation in the industry over time. I think there’s some strong leadership in this group.
Patti Liermann
Housing Planner, Town of Avon
How have you found the program overall?
I’ve really enjoyed it. Not only are the faculty and guest speakers top-notch experts in their fields, they’re focused on our learning and they’re incredibly accessible. I’ve already reached out to several of the guest experts. I’ve reached out to several of the faculty members and had separate conversations with them about projects that I’m working on. It’s the same thing with the cohort itself; everyone is incredibly supportive of each other and we’ve been communicating about different projects that we’re working on.
We all come from incredibly diverse professional backgrounds—we have some folks who have some strength in the finance sector; we have some folks who are coming in from a housing background; we’ve got an attorney, we’ve got a housing director. When you have a specific question, you can just reach out to a cohort member and say, “How do you handle this thing?” and you can get a really great answer.
Michel Gephart
Vice President of Operations, Maiker Housing Partners
Were there any modules in particular that interested you?
I’ve learned from and enjoyed all of them. I think the areas that I enjoyed more were areas I didn’t really know as much about, or that I knew from private real estate but I didn’t know anything in public, like the land use and the policy and advocacy elements. It was really interesting to meet people that were in mountain resort areas or rural areas, or city areas, even people that are next door to us.
I work in Adams County, and just talking to people even in Boulder, it’s a night and day difference. Even though, portfolio wise, we’re quite similar, we just face completely different political challenges, which speaks to the need of this program—nothing in affordable housing is universally true.
Shelley Jensen
Founder & CEO, We Fortify
How are you going to take what you’ve learned and apply it to your work?
I just applied it, actually. In the that first weekend of the program, where we all had to be on site, a number of the developers mentioned that you should aim to get as many people on board as soon as possible in the beginning of a project. That could look like your project management company that you’re hiring later, because they may have a development design, development plan, design that you could implement that would make their job easier, and therefore it could save you money.
Yesterday, we met with UC Health, because We Fortify is building certified nursing assistant and lab tech villages for them in Woodland Park. Woodland Park is a different culture than we have in Colorado Springs; they have different building standards, different precepts. And I wanted to get the city involved right away, because I learned in class that the sooner we can have them in and listen to what their expectations are, the sooner we can start creating those solutions for them.
To learn more, visit DU’s Executive Certificate in Affordable Housing webpage.
With deep, interdisciplinary strengths in real estate, land use law, social work and public policy, DU is uniquely positioned to lead the Rocky Mountain West’s response to the housing crisis, and we welcome the partnership of like-minded alumni and supporters. By investing in the DU’s Executive Certificate in Affordable Housing, donors will help accelerate this cross-campus effort that will become one of the most comprehensive housing education ecosystems in the country.
This program exemplifies DU’s commitment to the public good through research, scholarship and action. Building on DU’s expertise and partnerships, this initiative will drive innovation in housing policy and practice throughout the Rocky Mountain West. Supporting such programs at DU through The Denver Difference Campaign enables faculty to apply their research to create a better future for communities near and far.
To learn more about how your gift in support of this program can help advance DU’s leadership in housing education and policy, contact Assistant Vice Chancellor of Development Jessica Webb at jessica.webb@du.edu or 303.871.3982.