• Tulane University has banned Colorado Academy students from being considered for early admission this upcoming year because a single CA student reneged on an acceptance offer last year.
• WPP, parent company of PR firms such as Burson and Ogilvy, saw revenue fall nearly 6% in Q3, an ominous sign that sent its stock reeling 18% to set a new 27-year low.
• Denver Mayor Michael Johnston‘s penchant for “secrecy and spin” is causing him to lose trust with some voters. In just the last week, he has faced mounting criticism for unilaterally renewing the city’s contract for the Flock surveillance system, a secret deal with developers that increased the amount of DIA-adjacent land they received in exchange for the former Park Hill Golf Course, and an ugly fight with the parent company of The Denver Post over $2 million in unpaid rent. And this is happening at the same time he is asking voters to green light $950 million in bonds.
• After seemingly free-falling for years, Prince Andrew finally hit rock-bottom this week when King Charles punished him in the only way that remained – stripping him of his royal titles and booting him from his royal residence. He is now known simply as Andrew Mountbatten Windsor. Andrew has been a key player in the Jeffrey Epstein scandal.
• Denver was the biggest loser on this season’s “Love is Blind” reality dating show. John Frank at Axios noted, “It’s widely acknowledged that the city has a horrible dating scene, and the show somehow made us look even worse.”
• The governor of Louisiana announced that LSU athletic director Scott Woodward would have no say in who the team’s next head football coach is. Why? The last two coaches Woodward hired – Brian Kelly at LSU and Jimbo Fisher at Texas A&M – were owed a combined $130 million in buyouts after they were fired before their contracts expired. Not surprisingly, Woodward was fired a day after the governor’s comments.
• In some parts of the country, seeing the first robin is considered the unofficial start of spring. In Colorado, we know winter is upon us when we have our first skier-triggered avalanche of the season.
• Speaking of skiers, The Denver Post had an incredibly unflattering profile of Telluride ski resort owner Chuck Horning. Among the allegations: he was booed out of an upscale restaurant, he engaged in fist fights with his son and the resort’s CEO, and he sexually harassed and/or assaulted multiple women.
• Ten million YouTube TV subscribers have lost access to Disney-owned channels such as ABC, ESPN and FX due to a financial dispute..
• Perth, Australia, beat out Denver as host for the 2030 Gay Games, an event that would have brought 12,000 athletes and $110 million in economic activity to our city. Denverite‘s Kyle Harris reported that the U.S.‘s “recent turn toward anti-transgender federal policy” and “the Trump administration’s mass deportation of immigrants” left many global leaders concerned whether Denver would be a safe destination for the event.
• Karine Jean-Pierre, the former press secretary to President Joe Biden, is having the kind of book tour that authors have nightmares about.
• An independent investigation into Denver Public Schools board member John Youngquist found he more likely than not engaged in “belittling, dismissive and condescending behavior” toward some district staff members and exhibited bias in interactions with some district leaders of color.
• Layoffs abound: UPS is cutting 48,000 jobs, Amazon is laying off 14,000, GM 3,300 employees, Paramount 2,000 employees and Capital One is cutting another 400.
• Don’t screw with a Long Island wine importer. That’s a lesson the Times of London learned the hard way. The paper wanted to get former NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio‘s take on Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic candidate seeking to be the city’s newest mayor, so a reporter apparently Googled de Blasio’s name and sent an email to the first email address it returned. Unfortunately, that address actually belonged to wine importer Bill DeBlasio who offered his expansive thoughts on the candidate. The paper printed the responses, and politician Bill de Blasio immediately disputed the quotes. The paper then claimed the wine importer “falsely claimed” to be the former mayor, but DeBlasio released the emails showing that, “I never once said I was the mayor. He never addressed me as the mayor. So I just gave him my opinion.”
• Somehow, former Colorado State University head football coach Jim McElwain received some of the stiffest penalties in the University of Michigan‘s “sign stealing” scandal. McElwain was the head coach at Central Michigan University when one of his assistant coaches allowed a UM spy on the team’s sideline in a game against Michigan State to decipher the Spartans’ signals. The now-retired McElwain apparently was not aware of the plot, and yet he received a two-year “show-cause” penalty that is essentially a two-year ban. Sherrone Moore, the UM offensive coordinator at the time who has since been promoted to UM head coach, received a three-game suspension.

Who won the week?

• Jane Dvorak received the PRSA Educators Academy‘s David Ferguson Award, in recognition of her work with educators and students to bridge professional and academic experiences. 
• Barefoot PR is celebrating its 15th anniversary.
• M&C Communications has been selected as agency of record for the national nonprofit Hope for Stomach Cancer.
• KOA NewsRadio radio announcer Dave Logan will call his 600th Denver Broncos game on Sunday.
• Stunt marketing is alive and well, as evidenced by KFC‘s ample media coverage of a Colonel Sanders look-a-like sitting behind home plate at Game 2 of the World Series. KFC was promoting one of its chicken sandwiches.
• Fun fact: Colorado has at least four Rocky Mountain bristlecone pine trees that are more than 2,100 years old.
• A.I. chip maker Nvidia is now worth more than $5 trillion. It was only seven years ago that Apple was the first company to achieve and sustain a $1 trillion market cap.