News

Cambridge University Press
Oct 15, 2021

Why Do Bad Policies So Often Spread But Good Ones Don’t?

In their new book "Why bad policies spread (and good one’s don’t)," Batten's Craig Volden and Charles R. Shipan draw from a wide range of policy domains to examine whether states learn from another to improve the spread of good or effective policies, which policies spread for which reasons and which conditions lead to good or bad policies to spread, among other core questions.

A lump of coal sits between the railroad tracks where for decades it was delivered to generate electricity at the Yorktown Power station, where two coal powered steam turbines were shut down in 2019. (Rob Ostermaier)
Aug 18, 2021

Shobe: Net-zero emissions by 2050 are achievable, affordable in Va.

In an article for The Virginian-Pilot, Batten's William Shobe writes that with careful planning and policy design, decarbonization in the Commonwealth is achievable by 2050. Earlier this year, Shobe and his colleagues at UVA’s Energy Transition Initiative released the state's first study to analyze the actions needed to reach this goal.

Dana Laurens
Jul 21, 2021

Alum in Action: Opening Opportunities in Education

Dana Laurens (MPP ’10) knows firsthand how much good schools matter. When she was a child, she and her parents immigrated from Trinidad so she could get a better education, and she became the first in her family to go to college. This year, she was named to Washingtonian magazine’s Most Influential People list.

Garrett Hall at Sunset

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