News

Members, guests and Scholars recently celebrated the 50^th anniversary of the Colorado ARCS Chapter. Nancy Kellogg, Chapter President, put it in numbers:

“Since the chapter’s founding in 1976 by trailblazing women, thanks to volunteers, donors, family foundations, and endowments, we have provided $7,073,500 cumulatively for 1,354 Scholar Awards. In the current academic year, we were able to present $7,500 Scholar awards to 52 young scientists at six Colorado campuses.”

Those campuses included:

• Colorado School of Mines
• Colorado State University
• University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus
• University of Colorado, Boulder
• University of Colorado, Colorado Springs
• University of Colorado, Denver

Kellogg went on to explain how strong partnerships are imperative.

“We have developed strong working relationships with our recipient schools and excellent relationships with our donors,” Kellogg said. “Our members provide more than 60% of all awards given, followed by corporations, foundations, and individual donors. Most of our awards are funded by donors who have opportunities to interact with their Scholars.”

The chapter’s gala was well attended to celebrate the chapter’s anniversary and to fundraise for the future.

“We had the largest number of attendees at this year’s gala since I became a member of ARCS Colorado in 2019,” Kellogg said. 

Twenty-six Scholars presented research posters to the attendees. An auction and SOS (Support Our Scholars) surpassed last year’s fundraising.

Dr. Lesly Leinwand spoke at the celebration as the 2026 honoree. Leinwand, PhD, is a Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology (MCDB) Distinguished Professor and the Executive Science Officer of the BioFrontiers Institute at the University of Colorado Boulder. 

She received her bachelor’s degree from Cornell University, her PhD from Yale University, and did post-doctoral training at Rockefeller University. She joined the faculty at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York in 1981 and remained there until moving to Colorado in 1995. 

The interests of Dr. Leinwand’s laboratory are the genetics and molecular physiology of inherited diseases of the heart and how gender and diet modify the heart. The study of these diseases has required multidisciplinary approaches, involving molecular biology, mouse genetics, mouse cardiac physiology, and the analysis of human tissues.