The Conference on World Affairs is pleased to announce its programming executive team for the 2020-21 conference year. Laurie Leinonen has been elected to serve as CWA Program Committee Chair, working in partnership with Lauren Daniels, our first-ever Student Program Chair. The Board created the Student Program Chair position several months ago in an effort to further enhance student voices in curating the conference.
Robin Luff will serve as the Community Program Vice Chair, and William Romano as the Student Program Vice Chair, supporting Laurie and Lauren’s programming leadership.
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Laurie Leinonen is a 40 years+ resident of Boulder where her two children were born and raised. Having attended CWA for years, she became involved directly as a volunteer with CWA in 2014 when she joined the Arts Committee, later becoming its Co-Chair from 2016-2019. Her interest in volunteering for CWA has always been about reaching a more diverse community and student population. Laurie focuses on how best we can keep CWA thriving and engaging, whatever the current issues may be.
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Lauren Daniels is a Junior CU Boulder studying Aerospace Engineering. She began volunteering for the conference in 2018, and has been a Student Chair for both the Science & Technology Committee and the Health Committee, in addition to volunteering as a producer, ambassador, and driver during the conference. Lauren has previous leadership experience through her role as President of the CU Club Fencing team.
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Robin Luff is an Advisory Board member for Watson Institute and is Program Vice Chair for the Conference on World Affairs. Professionally, Robin had a long career in publishing, working with magazines that focused on sports or health. Robin has also worked in post-conflict countries with programming in Early Childhood Education with a Respecting Differences Curriculum. Over the years, she has served on the board of Impact on Education, Summit Charter School, The Community Foundation, The School Food Project and El Centro Amistad. She worked with Community of Sudanese and American women and hosted Sudanese Refugee, Mary Ingiria, who lived with Robin’s family as Mary she finished her degree at CU. Her team is Kevin, Kerrick and Aidan Luff.
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William Romano is currently a Senior studying Political Science and International Affairs. He has been a member of CWA Student Committee, Co-chair of CWA Politics and Media and International Affairs. Along with CWA, he is a cadet at Detachment 105 in Air Force ROTC. He is currently a part of the CU Political Science Club and Pi Sigma Alpha.
Laurie Leinonen will also serve on the CWA Board, along with new member and CU student, Anya Berlova. For the 2021-22 term, Leslie Durgin serves as the Chair of the CWA Board and Alison Cool serves as board vice chair.
- Anya Berlova is a senior majoring in finance at the Leeds School of Business, and is a member of the Leeds Scholars. As a freshman, Anya joined the Conference on World Affairs as the Student Chair of the Arts Committee, and has had an active role in the conference ever since. Outside of CWA, Anya is an anti-bullying activist, published children's book illustrator, and founder of a social startup.
For a complete list of board members and information on the CWA governance structure, visit the CWA Board webpage.