Chris Mathias ’04

State Representative, House Seat B representing Idaho’s 19th District; and veteran

School of Public Service

After serving in the U.S. Coast Guard and earning an Arctic Service Medal and two Antarctic Service Medals, Chris Mathias came to Boise State University. In addition to getting to watch the Broncos football team beat the University of Idaho Vandals at the turn of the millennium, Mathias took this opportunity to engage with Boise State to the fullest, serving as student body president and on the 2002 search committee that hired Dr. Bob Kustra as the university’s president. He is Boise State’s first TRiO McNair scholar, and as a senior he co-authored an article that appeared in the Idaho Law Review. Mathias graduated from Boise State cum laude in 2004 and pursued his JD and Ph.D in Law and Public Policy.

Since then, he has taught at the graduate and undergraduate levels, worked in the U.S. Senate, and in 2012 he returned to his alma mater to work in Kustra’s office as Boise State’s policy manager, eventually becoming its chief academic officer.

Mathias continues his service to Boise State by serving on the Andrus Center Board of Directors, and is the incoming chair of the School of Public Service Advisory Board. Working with Boise State is a family affair — his wife Katie works in the College of Education.

He says he learned four life lessons at Boise State: 1) Opportunities matter; 2) Work smarter so there’s more time to work harder; 3) Don’t try to manage things that need to be led; and 4) Don’t let people tell you what you can and can’t do.

Mathias currently serves in the Idaho House of Representatives, where he champions Boise State and “confronts his legislative challenges like it’s always 4th and 18.”