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Friday, February 14, 2020

Democratic CU-Boulder Faculty member seeks open STATE SENATE SEAT (SD-23)

Photo courtesy Richard Cummings, Boulder

Long-time Broomfield resident to lead a ‘vigorous campaign’

NEWS RELEASE

Long-time Broomfield resident and CU Faculty member Dr. Galina Nicoll announced this week her candidacy as a Democrat for State Senate District 23, comprising the City and County of Broomfield and parts of Weld and Larimer Counties.  

Dr. Nicoll is a distinguished community leader, researcher and educator, teaching Russian Studies and Space Exploration courses at the Global Residential Academic Program at the University of Colorado, Boulder. As a change-maker, Galina also serves on an innovation incubator committee, generating creative solutions for integrating mental health practices into curriculum design.

“Growing up in the Communist Bloc country of Belarus, I know only too well what living in an authoritative dictatorship looks like, and how precious an opportunity it is for citizens to vote and actively engage in their political governance. As a newly naturalized U.S. citizen (as of September 2019), I feel especially fortunate to be able to participate in our democracy by running for office myself as a Democrat for Colorado State Senate, SD-23,”  Nicoll said.

“I promise to run a vigorous campaign, bringing my record of service and leadership skills to the greater mission of protecting Colorado’s natural environment, improving the health and well-being of our residents, adequately funding K-12 and higher education, and championing progressive legislation that maintains our high quality of life.”

Since 2003 Galina has been contributing community-organizing and leadership skills for a number of local non-profit organizations. Her previous activities include outreach and education for grass-roots campaigns addressing environmental issues including the dangers of GMOs and Roundup herbicide. More recently, she has attended Broomfield City Council meetings speaking up against devastating environmental and health-related impacts from hydraulic fracturing (‘fracking’) operations and proposals for new development that threatened protected open space. She actively supports the work of LOGIC (the League of Oil and Gas Impacted Coloradans) by reaching out to state legislators, signing petitions, and supplying elected officials with scientific evidence for informed decision-making.

Additionally, she has been involved with designing innovative mental-health solutions for the reintegration of military veterans into civilian life, and curating creative artistic performances at the Denver Art Museum. She also serves on the Board of the Boulder Opera and sings in the Denver-based Balkan and Eastern European Folk Choir Planina.

A life-long grass-roots activist, Galina founded a school-based ecological organization at age fifteen in her hometown of Grodno, Belarus, working with other students to convince the local government to prohibit development of the adjacent historic parkland and designate it as “protected open space.”

While attending graduate school at the University of Colorado, Boulder, Galina served for several years as an officer of the graduate student government (UGGS), co-authoring two state resolutions (limiting teaching-load hours and Holocaust Remembrance Day). She likewise chaired a Board for the National Association of Graduate and Professional Students (NAGPS), co-authoring two national recommendations for the U.S. Congress (access to health insurance for graduate students and basic benefits for international students).  

Galina Siergiejczyk’s parents were born in the former Soviet Republics (father in pre-war Poland and post-war Belarus, and mother in the Ukraine) during the Cold War, and fled political oppression, legally immigrating to the United States when political persecutions became rampant. Galina came to Colorado to pursue her graduate and doctoral degrees at the University of Colorado, Boulder, receiving her Ph.D. in 2010. She married David Nicoll, honorably discharged Army combat veteran, in 2012. Their daughter, Katya, attends public school in the Boulder Valley School District. They have lived in Broomfield since 2008.

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