The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has provided $500,000 in funding to The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill ‘s Environmental Finance Center (EFC) to assist communities addressing water infrastructure challenges. The funding also goes to partner organization, Southwest Environmental Finance Center at the University of New Mexico.

Trustees of the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation have awarded a grant to the Environmental Finance Center at the UNC School of Government to work in partnership with the North Carolina On-Bill Working Group to provide education, support, and other resources to rural cooperative utilities to expand energy efficiency opportunities across the state.

Faculty member John Rubin was recently honored by the North Carolina Commission on Indigent Defense Services (IDS), which has created a new training award in his name.

The SERVICE mural at the UNC School of Government, created in 2010, honors the Greensboro Four. On February 1, 1960, these North Carolina A&T State University students launched a nonviolent sit-in movement that spread to 54 cities in nine states in protest of racial segregation. The mural also celebrates the contributions of dozens of African Americans to North Carolina.

Allison Hawkins is a first-year Master of Public Administration (MPA) student at the School of Government. She was interviewed by MPA student Audrey Shore for Impact, the program's alumni newsletter. Her father, Translyvania County Commissioner Mike Hawkins, was interviewed separately.

Allison Hawkins: It started at the dinner table