November 2025

Matthew May, Lantz McGinnis-Brown, Maria Onaindia, Hannah Lang

IPI researchers recently completed the Idaho Alive at 25 Young Driver Education Program Evaluation in partnership with the Idaho Transportation Department. Implemented in 2009, the Idaho Alive at 25 Program is an educational program for young drivers developed by the National Safety Council (NSC). While primarily utilized by young drivers involved in traffic crashes or by those who have received citations, the course is available to all young drivers aged 24 and younger. After 13 years of implementation, the Idaho Transportation Department was interested in evaluating the effectiveness of the course.

Presenting their findings on November 20th, the IPI team found:

• The Alive at 25 course is viewed favorably by both instructors and participants. Instructors mainly see the course as a way to provide learning opportunities for young drivers and to reduce risky driving behavior, while course participants indicate that the course is “very useful” to them as a driver immediately following the course.
• Evidence suggests that Alive at 25’s impact on citations and crash occurrences is short-term. Analysis of secondary citation and crash data suggests that individuals exhibit changes of behavior change in the short term (0-6 months following course completion), but these improved behaviors do not extend outside of this immediate time window.
• Alive at 25 curriculum is in needed-flux. The National Safety Council (NSC) is currently piloting a new version of its Alive at 25 curriculum, with an anticipated implementation by the end of 2025. Most course instructors identified elements of the current curriculum in need of revision or refinement. It will be necessary to evaluate the degree to which the new curriculum addresses these concerns, so that effort is not made to correct something already in the process of being fixed.

The final report will be published on the Idaho Transportation Department website in the coming months.

IPI Researchers Receive CEPSI Grants

Maria Onaindia, Hannah Lang

Research Associates Maria Onaindia and Hannah Lang were each recently awarded $7500 grants via the Community-Engaged Public Scholarship Initiative at Boise State. Onaindia and SPS Faculty Lisa Meierotto will be partnering with the Idaho Commission on Hispanic Affairs to analyze results from IPI’s 11th Annual Public Policy Survey, with a special focus on how Hispanic Idahoans are feeling. Lang and Criminal Justice Faculty Laura King are partnering with the Idaho Network of Children’s Advocacy Centers to identify what is working well in the current model and where additional support is needed. Projects will begin in early 2026.

DMV Customer Satisfaction Report Published

Matthew May, Lantz McGinnis-Brown, Maria Onaindia, Hannah Lang

In June, IPI’s research team completed the 2025 DMV Customer Satisfaction Survey. Recently published on the Idaho Transportation Department’s website, the full report is now available to the public. Key findings include:

• Idahoans indicate an openness to additional online service enhancements, such as willingness to use a mobile driver’s licenses (56%) or authenticating their identities in-person once in their life and completing all other transactions online thereafter (78%).
• Idaho DMV customers rated the organization highly, with most rating it “excellent” (22%), “good” (51%), or “fair” (21%), and very few rating it “poor” (4%).
• Wait times are the strongest driver of DMV satisfaction ratings, with most Idahoans agreeing (75%) that current wait times are reasonable.

Read the full report, which includes information about attitudes towards online services.

Vanessa Fry, REP4 National Fellow for Evaluation, attends Alliance-Wide Gathering

Representatives from Boise State University attended the REP4 Alliance-Wide Gathering, where the student team participated in the Inaugural Student Design Accelerator Showcase. Students Zaudi Guzman (College of Arts and Sciences) and SayedBahuddin Mirbacha (School of Public Service) were joined by Lisa Phillips, vice provost for community engagement and belonging; Esperansa Aguilera, program and projects coordinator for community engagement and belonging; and Vanessa Fry, faculty member and REP4 National Fellow for Assessment.

REP4 (Rapid Education Prototyping for Change, Learners, Community, Equity) is higher education’s first and only student-led innovation movement. Since its launch, more than 1,500 learners have developed and tested ideas to improve educational access, engagement, and outcomes. Boise State is a founding member of the REP4 Alliance and held its 3rd regional summit in June 2025. At the showcase, students were challenged to respond to the prompt: “How might we create real-world experiences through technology and AI?” Guzman and Mirbacha presented their prototype, UConnect, an app designed to help students connect their purpose with mentorship and career pathways. Their innovative work earned them the Catalyst for Innovation Team Award.

Boise State’s Idaho Policy Institute and University of Washington’s Evans Policy Innovation Collaborative Research Collaboration Present at APPAM

Vanessa Fry

Earlier this month, Vanessa Fry co-led a session at the 2025 Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management’s (APPAM) Fall Research Conference in Seattle: Reimagining Policy Analysis in the Pacific Northwest: Findings from Idaho and Washington. The session highlighted a collaborative research effort between Boise State University’s Idaho Policy Institute (IPI) and the Evans Policy Innovation Collaborative (EPIC) at the University of Washington.

The workshop built on a series of policy analyst convenings held in Boise and Olympia in May 2025, which brought together analysts working across different political and institutional contexts. Using participatory Art of Hosting methods, the convenings—and this APPAM session—explored how core values shape policy analysis, how analysts are trained (and where gaps remain), and how emerging forces such as artificial intelligence and political turbulence are reshaping the field.

October Realty Report

Maria Onaindia, McAllister Hall, Anika Cathcart

Our October Realty Report is out! 🏡 Take a look at the latest market trends – from median home prices to the number of houses sold and more. 

• Boise State students recognized at national gathering, Boise State News, November 7, 2025
• The Big Tent: Special Guests – Maria Onaindia & Lantz McGinnis-Brown, KRBX, November 7, 2025
• As Idaho Grows Ever Redder, Boise Worries About Its Isolation, The New York Times, November 7, 2025
• A creative’s path to policy: How one PhD student is helping shape Idaho’s creative economy, Boise State SPS News, November 17, 2025