Volume 11, No. 3 July 2005 Journal of Public Affairs...

Journal of Public Affairs EducationVolume 11, No. 3

July 2005

National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

1120 G Street, NW • Suite 730

Washington, DC 20005-3801

(202) 628-8965 • Fax: (202) 626-4978 • www.naspaa.org

J-PAEIntroduction: Symposiumon Leadership Education

Barbara C. Crosby

Leadership Education inPublic Administration:Finding the Fit BetweenPurpose and ApproachJanet V. Denhardt and Kelly B. Campbell

Public Leaders AreGendered: Making GenderVisible in Public AffairsLeadership EducationDeLysa Burnier

Challenges of IntroducingLeadership into the PublicAffairs Curriculum: The Case of the Humphrey InstituteBarbara C. Crosby and John M. Bryson

Should Leadership Be in the Core Curriculum?

Student Evaluations ofTeaching: How You Teachand Who You Are

Heather E. Campbell, SueSteiner, and Karen Gerdes

What is Homeland Security?Developing a DefinitionGrounded in the CurriculaRobert W. Smith

Taking Social EquitySeriously in MPA EducationDavid Rosenbloom

Social Equity is a Pillar ofPublic AdministrationJames H. Svara and James R. Brunet

Guy B.AdamsUniversity of Missouri-Columbia

Danny L. BalfourGrand Valley State University

Frances Stokes BerryFlorida State University

Geert BouckaertKatholieke Universiteit Leuven

Stuart BretschneiderSyracuse University

Walter D. BroadnaxClark Atlanta University

Jonathan BrockUniversity of Washington

Jeffrey L. BrudneyUniversity of Georgia

John M. BrysonUniversity of Minnesota

N. Joseph CayerArizona State University

Robert E. ClearyAmerican University

Steven CohenColumbia University

Glen Hahn CopeUniversity of Illinois-Springfield

Ruth H. DeHoog University of North Carolina-Greensboro

Jo Ann G. EwaltEastern Kentucky University

Claire FelbingerNational Academy of Science

Irwin FellerThe Pennsylvania State University

Jane FountainHarvard University

H. George FredericksonUniversity of Kansas

Lee S. FriedmanUniversity of California-Berkeley

Mary Ellen GuyFlorida State University

Cynthia Jackson-ElmooreMichigan State University

Phillip JoyceGeorge Washington University

Pan Suk KimYonsei University

Marieka M. KlawitterUniversity of Washington

Dale KraneUniversity of Nebraska-Omaha

David LandsbergenOhio State University

Kuotsai T. LiouUniversity of Central Florida

Laurence E. Lynn, Jr.University of Chicago

Steven R. MaxwellEdison Community College

Kenneth J. MeierTexas A&M University

Curtina Moreland-YoungJackson State University

Kathryn E. NewcomerGeorge Washington University

Dorothy OlshfskiRutgers University, Newark

Sonia OspinaNew York University

Laurence J. O’Toole, Jr.University of Georgia

James L. PerryIndiana University–PurdueUniversity–Indianapolis

Hal G. RaineyUniversity of Georgia

Mitchell RiceTexas A & M University

Ann-Marie RizzoTennessee State University

Saundra SchneiderMichigan State University

Sally Coleman SeldenLynchburg College

Shui-Yan TangUniversity of Southern California

Thomas Vocino Auburn University at Montgomery

Charles W. WashingtonClark Atlanta University

Barton WechslerUniversity of Missouri-Columbia

David WeimerUniversity of Wisconsin

Louis WeschlerArizona State University

Harvey L.WhiteUniversity of Pittsburgh

Michael WisemanThe Urban Institute

Samuel YeagerWichita State University

BOARD OF EDITORS, 2001-2005

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF SCHOOLSOF PUBLIC AFFAIRS AND ADMINISTRATION

Eugenia Toma, PresidentDaniel Mazmanian,Vice President

B. J. Reed, Past President

J-PAEJournal of Public Affairs Education

Journal of Public Affairs Education is published quarterly by the National Association of Schools of Public Affairs andAdministration.

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Educators and Copy Centers: ©2005 National Association ofSchools of Public Affairs and Administration.All rights reserved.Educators may reproduce any material for classroom use only andauthors may reproduce their articles without written permission.Written permission is required to reproduce J-PAE in all otherinstances. Please contact Jacqueline Lewis, NASPAA, 1120 G StreetNW, Suite 730,Washington, DC 20005, phone: 202-628-8965, fax:202-626-4978, email: [email protected].

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ISSN 1523-6803 (formerly1087-7789)

Edward T. Jennings, Jr.Editor-in-ChiefUniversity of Kentucky

Vera Vogelsang-CoombsAssociate EditorCleveland State University

Linda deLeonAssociate EditorUniversity of Colorado–Denver

April HarmonEditorial AssistantUniversity of Kentucky

Laurel McFarlandGazette EditorNASPAA

Jennifer C.WardProduction Editor

H. George Frederickson, Founding Editor

FROM THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ii

INFORMATION FOR CONTRIBUTORS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iv

SYMPOSIUM

Introduction: Symposium on Leadership Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .167Barbara C.Crosby

Leadership Education in Public Administration: Finding the Fit Between Purpose and Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .169

Janet V. Denhardt and Kelly B.Campbell

Public Leaders Are Gendered: Making Gender Visible in Public Affairs Leadership Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .181

DeLysa Burnier

Challenges of Introducing Leadership into the Public Affairs Curriculum: The Case of the Humphrey Institute . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .193

Barbara C.Crosby and John M.Bryson

Should Leadership Be in the Core Curriculum? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207

ARTICLES

Student Evaluations of Teaching: How You Teach and Who You Are . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .211Heather E.Campbell, Sue Steiner,and Karen Gerdes

What is Homeland Security? Developing a Definition Grounded in the Curricula . . . . . . . .233Robert W. Smith

Taking Social Equity Seriously in MPA Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .247David Rosenbloom

Social Equity Is a Pillar of Public Administration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .253James H.Svara and James R.Brunet

GAZETTE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .259

People in Public AffairsPrograms and EventsAbout NASPAA

Journal of Public Affairs EducationJULY 2005 VOLUME 11, NUMBER 3

Journal of Public Affairs Education i

Cover Photo: Atrium of the Hughes Justice Complex in Trenton, New Jersey. This large, compelling space shows how in somejurisdictions the judicial function of government is able to achieve powerful architectural expression in a contemporaryidiom. Photo and caption courtesy of Charles T. Goodsell, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.

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ii Journal of Public Affairs Education

From the Editor-in-Chief

I attended the annual meeting of the Association of University Programs in Health Administration inBoston. It was an interesting experience for many reasons, one of which was the chance it gave me to seehow leaders in health care administration approach the professional education of their students and com-pare it to how we proceed in public policy and administration. Several things stood out. One was the asso-ciation of health care delivery with corporate language and corporate models. While there seemed to beunderlying agreement that we need to find ways to deliver health care to everyone who needs it, it wasdiscussed as a corporate product, rather than a public service. At least in the sessions I attended, I heardnothing about differences in purpose or delivery models for public, nonprofit, and profit-seeking hospitalsor care providers. Everything seemed very generic. Second, I was struck by a presentation on curriculumredesign and competency-based management education. It led me to wonder what challenges we wouldface in defining a common set of competencies for graduates of public affairs programs. That path isalready being pursued by other professional groups, including the accrediting body for healthcare manage-ment programs. NASPAA’s standards for graduate programs in public affairs and administration incorporatevery broad curriculum guidelines. Could we translate those into a set of specific competencies while sus-taining diverse missions and approaches to public affairs education? The third thing I noticed was a widelyshared sense of mission that I perceived to be clearer, narrower, and more strongly shared than is the casein public affairs education. But, perhaps I read too much into my observations and conversations at onemeeting.

This issue of J-PAE contains a useful symposium on leadership education. In it, the authors examine themeaning of leadership education, the varied ways in which it might be delivered, the process for develop-ing a leadership curriculum in a public affairs program, and the role of gender in public affairs leadershipeducation. It is an important symposium for a variety of reasons. Leadership is supposed to be central topublic affairs education. NASPAA standards say they “apply to individual master’s degree programs whosepurpose is to provide professional education for leadership in public affairs, policy, administration”(emphasis added). Despite this, there is a fair amount of evidence that leadership is not central to manypublic affairs programs. Of course, some scholars maintain that leadership cannot be taught, a familiarrefrain of longstanding conflicts over the teaching of hard versus soft skills. Leadership scholars and educa-tors need to respond to that challenge, and this symposium is a step in that direction.Third, as a survey byNASPAA staff reveals, there is considerable interest in leadership education among NASPAA institutions.Programs are assessing how they address leadership in the core curriculum, including the question of howtheoretical versus experiential and skill-based to make such teaching.This symposium may offer someguidance.

We also have a set of articles examining other questions. Heather Campbell, Sue Steiner, and KarenGerdes examine what affects student evaluations of teaching. They look systematically at a wide range offactors, including student perceptions, professor attributes, class attributes under instructor control, andclass attributes not generally controlled by the instructor. They base their analysis on evaluations of morethan 130 classes taught during a single semester by 100 instructors at a major state university. They pro-duce an array of interesting findings. Most importantly, they raise questions about the use of course evalua-tions in judging teaching quality, given findings suggesting bias against female teachers, older teachers, andperhaps minority teachers.

Robert Smith examines the treatment of homeland security at a large number of universities to developan understanding of how it is being treated in the curricula of public affairs programs. He finds that it isbeing covered under courses that could be variously labeled as homeland security, emergency manage-ment or preparedness, military affairs, terrorism, and national security. His content analysis suggests that

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Journal of Public Affairs Education iii

—Edward T. Jennings, Jr.

“homeland security is a system of emergency preparedness that requires military and civilian response toperceived, potential, or imminent terrorist threats against U.S. citizens and interests at home.”

We conclude with an exchange on the meaning of social equity, its role and place in public administra-tion, and its integration into MPA curricula. In clearly defined terms, David Rosenbloom challenges theauthors of the recent J-PAE symposium on social equity in public affairs education, suggesting a lack of def-initional clarity, insufficient attention to the rule of law, a failure to consider how attention to social equitymight create inequities, and overreaching by those favoring a social equity approach. James Svara andJames Brunet offer a cogent response grounded in the legal and policy responsibilities of public adminis-trators. Readers are invited to join the discussion.

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iv Journal of Public Affairs Education

The Journal of Public Affairs Education (J-PAE) is dedicatedto advancing teaching and learning in public affairs broadlydefined, which includes the fields of policy analysis, publicadministration, public management, and public policy. J-PAE pur-sues its mission by publishing high-quality theory, empiricalresearch, and commentary. The core values of J-PAE are rigor, rel-evance, clarity, accessibility, and methodological diversity.

Articles: J-PAE welcomes contributions from all public affairseducators who seek to reflect on their professional practice andto engage J-PAE readers in an exploration of what or how toteach. J-PAE articles are intended to influence experienced edu-cator-specialists but also to be comprehensible and interesting toa broad audience of public affairs teachers.Articles appropriatefor publication in J-PAE include comprehensive literature reviewsand meta-analyses, carefully constructed position papers, criticalassessments of what we teach and how we teach it, thoughtfulessays about commonly shared teaching challenges, experimentaland quasi-experimental assessments of students’ learning, evalua-tions of new curricula or curriculum trends, and field studies ofparticular teaching methods.

In addition to articles, the editors welcome proposals for sym-posia. Proposals that are accepted will be announced in the jour-nal and will be accompanied by a call for papers. Submissions forsymposia will be considered through the normal review process.

Decisions about the publication of all articles are based onthe recommendation of members of the editorial board using ablind review process. Substantive content, writing style, andlength are all relevant to a decision to publish a manuscript.Depending on the type of manuscript, the review process takesinto account the following criteria:

• Research based: adequacy of theoretical grounding; reliabili-ty and validity of findings; significance of the topic; signifi-cance of the findings.

• Interpretive, reflective, critical, theoretical: significance ofthe topic; quality of the argument; quality of the supportingevidence.

• Creative Pedagogy: creativity of the approach; soundness ofthe explanation; evidence of effectiveness; utility for faculty.

• Case Studies: pedagogical value; scope of potential use;clear teaching purposes.

• In all cases, writing quality is an important consideration.Manuscripts that are obviously inappropriate or insufficiently

developed will be returned without formal review. Interestedauthors can better understand the journal’s audience and itsexpectations for content, quality, and focus by examining what J-PAE has published in recent years or by contacting members ofthe editorial board or staff.

Manuscripts submitted should not have been published andshould not be under consideration elsewhere. Papers presentedat a professional conference qualify for consideration. In fact, thesubmission of manuscripts that have been thoroughly revised following presentation at a professional meeting is encouraged.In general, authors are strongly encouraged to have their workreviewed and evaluated by colleagues prior to submission for formal review in order to facilitate the editorial process.

Manuscripts should be sent to Edward T. Jennings, Jr.,Editor-in-Chief, J-PAE, The Martin School of Public Policy and

Administration, 419 Patterson Tower, University of Kentucky,Lexington, KY 40506-0027, e-mail:[email protected].

In order for manuscripts to be reviewed as quickly as possi-ble, authors are asked to observe the following requirements:

• It is preferred that authors send their manuscripts to theeditor as an attachment via e-mail (send the title page in aseparate attachment).

• Alternatively, please send four printed copies or the manuscript. These will not be returned.

• Ensure that the manuscript is anonymous by leaving offyour name and putting self-identifying references on a separate sheet.

• Use margins of one and one-half (1-1/2) inches at the left, right, top, and bottom of the page.

• J-PAE uses the in-text parenthetical reference system withall references at the end of the text in alphabetical order.Notes are to be kept to a minimum. See the ChicagoManual of Style for guidance.

It is important that you identify the type of manuscript youare submitting: (1) research based; (2) interpretive, reflective, crit-ical, or theoretical essay or position paper; (3) creative pedagogy;(4) teaching case study.

Creative Pedagogy: The purpose of Creative Pedagogy is tofeature innovative approaches to teaching specific public affairssubjects or concepts.The goal of this feature is to present experi-mental exercises, simulations, role plays, or other creative teach-ing technologies in a format that colleagues can readily use.Submissions are peer reviewed.

Contributions to Creative Pedagogy must include substantivedetails (e.g., text for the case, role descriptions for a role playexercise) and a narrative discussion about how the pedagogy isused, student response to it, suggestions for instructors who maywish to use it, and results associated with its use.The presenta-tion of the pedagogy should be thorough and lively so that teach-ers reading the article will be stimulated and able to use theinformation.

Submissions for Creative Pedagogy should be sent to EdwardT. Jennings, Jr., Editor-in-Chief.

Review Essays: Reviews will commonly use a cluster formatin which several books, videos, software programs, cases, CD-ROMs, Internet sites, or other instructional materials will be com-pared and contrasted in an essay. Review essays should offer apoint of view but should seek to treat each item in the clusterfairly. Essays could be structured around a comparison of relatedresources, resources related to the public affairs education enter-prise, or resources that directly or indirectly have something tosay about public affairs education. Review essays should strive forclarity, brevity, and timeliness. Inquires regarding review essaysshould be sent to Edward T. Jennings, Jr., Editor-in-Chief.

Copyright Notice: Manuscripts will not be published unless acopyright transfer agreement has been signed by all the authorsof a manuscript and has been received by J-PAE. Copyright trans-fer forms are sent out by the NASPAA office. Educators mayreproduce any material for classroom use only and authors mayreproduce their articles without written permission.Written permission is required to reproduce J-PAE in all other instances.

Information for Contributors

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Leadership education, at least in any comprehensive view, necessarilyembraces public affairs.At the same time, teaching leadership in schools ofpublic affairs—compared with, for example, business schools—logicallyhas a different emphasis and methodology.

Some questions remain the same when scholars attempt to incorporateleadership into the teaching and research agenda of any university depart-ment or school that is not itself mainly devoted to leadership studies: Howdo we define leadership, and what body of theory and research is applica-ble? What is the right mix of theory and practice? Should leadership cours-es be integrated in core or concentration courses? Is leadership a stand-alone core or topics course? What is different about teaching undergradu-ates, graduates, and professionals or community groups? These questionsare similar to those that beset efforts to internationalize the curriculum orensure that the curriculum deals thoroughly with gender or multiculturalviews and issues. Indeed, once leadership has been introduced or as it isbeing introduced into the public affairs curriculum, faculty often must con-sider how and how much attention to give to global leadership and toleadership by and of people who have traditionally received little attentionin leadership studies.

The three main articles in this symposium explore the ways in whichparticular public affairs faculty and schools have incorporated leadershipinto their courses and degree programs.The fourth article reports theresults of a NASPAA survey that asked member schools about the role ofleadership in their curricula.

First, Janet Denhardt and Kelly Campbell of Arizona State Universityfocus on a particular leadership approach—values-based leadership—thatthey consider highly appropriate for public affairs education and describea pedagogy—studio teaching—that supports this approach.They contrastvalues-based leadership and studio teaching with three other approaches—

Introduction:Symposium on Leadership Education

Barbara C. CrosbyUniversity of Minnesota

J-PAE 11 (2005):3:167-168

Journal of Public Affairs Education 167

SYMPOSIUM

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trait, situational, and transformational—and relatedinstructional methods.

DeLysa Burnier of Ohio University highlights theimportance of understanding how the very conceptof leadership has been gendered—that is, traditional-ly associated with men and their experiences.Burnier describes in helpful detail how, in her ownteaching, she successfully integrated different viewsof public leadership that embrace women and theirexperiences. She traces the emergence of relationalleadership as a distinctive leadership approach.

John Bryson and I offer a case study of the suc-cessful effort, beginning in the 1980s, to make lead-ership a prominent part of the curriculum at theHumphrey Institute of Public Affairs at theUniversity of Minnesota.We use the Leadership forthe Common Good framework to analyze the leader-ship challenges involved in this case and to offerlessons for other advocates of leadership educationin public affairs.

The final piece in this symposium,“ShouldLeadership Be in the Core Curriculum?” reports theresults of NASPAA’s look at whether or not its mem-ber schools include leadership in their MPA or MPPprograms. The schools are divided into four cate-gories: schools with leadership in the core, schoolswith courses about leading change, schools requir-ing leadership for some concentrations, and schoolswith leadership as an elective. The examples withinthe categories reveal some general trends: a focus onpersonal development and organizational leadershipand a move to experiential instruction, in whichpractical application is foremost. Few schoolsemphasize community and societal leadership; evenfewer strongly attend to global leadership.Womenand diversity are specific topics within some cours-es, but very few schools have stand-alone courses onthese topics. Schools seem still to be sorting out therelationship or distinction between leadership andmanagement.

The articles in this symposium and a more recentstudy by Montgomery Van Wart and Kevin O’Farrell(“Organizational Leadership and the Challenges inTeaching It,” 2005, forthcoming) reveal that leader-ship is increasingly prominent in the public affairs

curriculum.At the same time, public affairs scholarshave very little agreement on how to draw on con-temporary leadership theories from multiple fieldsto develop a body of knowledge specific to leader-ship in public affairs.While the leadership of womenin public affairs is receiving increasing attention,crosscultural leadership is still underemphasized,given its importance.The good news, though, is thatmany faculty are introducing public affairs studentsto a rich array of leadership theories and literatureand are using innovative teaching methods.Additionally, public affairs educators who want tomake leadership a stronger part of the public affairscurriculum can learn a lot from their many peerswho now have considerable experience in leadingleadership education.

Introduction: Symposium on Leadership Education

168 Journal of Public Affairs Education

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What are the goals of leadership education? What do future public lead-ers need to know? Do we want to teach students about leadership or helpthem to become leaders? What skills and abilities will they need to be suc-cessful? As we make decisions about the viability and effectiveness of dif-ferent approaches to leadership education, these are among the mostimportant questions we should debate. Such questions, while they may bedifficult, offer an opportunity to open a constructive and useful dialogueabout the nature of and the need for leadership education and how it canbe best designed to meet the goals set forth by a particular program.

We argue here that leadership education programs can be strengthenedby questioning our assumptions about the nature of leadership and theskills it requires and by using pedagogical approaches that are a good fitwith the knowledge and skills we want our students to master. Put simply,differing views and assumptions about leadership and how it can be prac-ticed successfully may suggest different educational approaches. In orderto highlight some of these differences and the issues involved, we considerfour approaches to understanding and teaching leadership for the publicsector: the trait approach, the situational approach, the transformationalchange approach, and the value-based leadership approach.We comparethese approaches in terms of the assumed skills and abilities needed, repre-sentative literature, and associated teaching techniques.We then make anargument for why we think the last of these approaches, value-based lead-ership, is particularly important in developing a model for public leader-ship education. In doing so, we consider whether special leadershipresponsibilities and approaches derive from the public sector context, and,if so, how public affairs educators might infuse leadership education withthese elements. It is not our intent to provide a comprehensive review ofall of the possible ways to approach leadership education or to claim thedefinitive answer, but rather to consider how the way we view leader-ship—and particularly how we view leadership in the public sector—canand should inform our choices about curriculum and different pedagogicalapproaches.

Leadership Education in Public Administration: Finding the Fit

Between Purpose and Approach

Janet V. Denhardt and Kelly B. CampbellArizona State University


J-PAE 11 (2005):3:169-179

ABSTRACT

This article asserts that leadership educa-tion programs can be strengthened by ques-tioning assumptions about the nature ofleadership and the skills it requires and byusing pedagogical approaches that are agood fit with the knowledge and skills stu-dents are expected to master.The authorsargue that differing views and assumptionsabout leadership and how it can be prac-ticed successfully may suggest differenteducational approaches.The authorsaddress four approaches to public sectorleadership—trait, situational, transformation-al, and value-based—and compare the skillsand abilities, representative literature, andteaching techniques associated with eachapproach; they argue that value-based leadership is particularly important indeveloping a model for public leadershipeducation.They also consider whether spe-cial leadership responsibilities andapproaches derive from the public sectorcontext, and, if so, how public affairs educa-tors might infuse leadership education withthese elements.

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THE CHALLENGES OF LEADERSHIP EDUCATION

Any discussion of leadership education shouldbegin by acknowledging that, despite literally hun-dreds of years of study, there is very little consensusabout the scope and character of the subject matter(Dentico, 1999; Mello, 1999). Debates continue aboutthe purposes of leadership, how it can be recog-nized and studied, if it is different from management,whether public and private leadership are different,if and how it can be learned, and many other ques-tions.This lack of agreement can make course devel-opment, goal setting, and measurement in leadershipeducation both difficult and complicated.This articlebegins by exploring two specific challenges: 1) iden-tifying alternative perspectives on the nature of lead-ership and determining how it can best be defined,identified, and studied; and 2) how to match differ-ent perspectives on leadership with appropriatepedagogical approaches. How we address these chal-lenges plays an important role in determining howand whether leadership education fits in publicadministration education, how it should be designedand delivered, and by whom.

Given the abundance of literature on leadership,the amount of money organizations spend on leader-ship training, and the growing number of leadershipcourses offered in higher educational settings, theprevailing assumption seems to be that leadership issomething that can in fact be taught (Liberty andPrewitt, 1999; Dentico, 1999). Some empirical sup-port for this assumption exists as well.A KelloggFoundation study showed that “students who partici-pated in leadership training had an increased likeli-hood of demonstrating growth in civic responsibili-ty, leadership skills, multicultural awareness and com-munity orientation, understanding of leadership the-ories, and personal and societal values” (Zimmerman-Oster and Burkhardt, 2001, 12).

First Challenge: Conceptualizing LeadershipEven with the general consensus that leadership

is something that can be taught, the content anddesign of leadership courses and decisions involvingwho will teach them can be contentious. Because ofthis, the first challenge for leadership educators is to

make explicit what we mean by leadership beforewe begin teaching. In other words, having an under-standing of our own conceptualizations of leader-ship is the necessary starting point in determininghow best to teach it. Leadership education can bedrawn very broadly or very narrowly. If, for example,the essence of leadership is determined to be goalsetting, then a curriculum can be built around meth-ods that are best suited to help students becomegood goal setters.Alternatively, a more comprehen-sive approach may draw on several schools ofthought and assist learners in developing their ownviews and/or improving practice. Or leadership edu-cation could be designed to serve as a way to inte-grate learning from a range of other courses and sub-ject matters, such as in a capstone course.Thesedecisions, by necessity, involve complex value andphilosophical judgments on behalf of those develop-ing and teaching these courses.These are questionsthat cannot be answered empirically, but must beaddressed nonetheless.

As one indication of this complexity, a review ofhow National Association of Schools of Public Affairsand Administration (NASPAA) accredited programscurrently address leadership education gives someindication of the variability among approaches. Ofthe 142 NASPAA-accredited schools in 2004, 59 (41.5 percent) had formally listed leadership coursesin their MPA curriculum, but only 13 (9 percent) had leadership courses as core requirements.Whilecourse titles can be misleading, it is interesting tonote the variation in course titles used across theinstitutions that have core course requirements inleadership. For example, some programs linked lead-ership with management (2), others with ethics andmorals (2), and still others with democratic govern-ment/public service (2). Courses tied leadership tothe changing workplace and interconnected world(2), policy politics or political institutions (2), organi-zational dynamics (1), decision-making (1), or somecombination thereof.The variations among electivecourses were even greater, ranging from policy lead-ership to leadership and facilitation, from strategicleadership for communities to leadership for innova-tion and change, and from total quality leadership to

Leadership Education in Public Administration: Finding the Fit Between Purpose and Approach





executive leadership.At a minimum, this suggeststhat there is a fairly broad variation in the ways inwhich public leadership education is currentlydefined and delivered. It also suggests that there area number of choices to make, not the least of whichis what view or views of leadership a given programwill reflect in its curriculum.

This article makes no claim for the correct viewof leadership, and therefore leadership education,but instead suggests alternative ways of thinkingabout leadership curriculum design based on a care-ful consideration and reflection by the faculty aboutwhat leadership is and what we want students tolearn.While we make an argument for an emphasison a consideration of public and democratic valuesin leadership education in public administration programs, certainly it is appropriate that differentprograms and different faculties will approach thesubject differently.

Second Challenge:Matching Perspectives and Approaches

The second challenge for public affairs educators,then, is to find the pedagogical approaches andmaterials that are well suited to teaching leadershipas they define it.An incredible amount of leadershipmaterial is available, as are a wide variety of instruc-tional approaches. In the discussion to follow, weattempt to address this challenge in detail and makethe task of selecting the appropriate material andapproaches modestly easier.We do this by offering a way to think about the fit between alternative perspectives on leadership, the representative literature associated with these perspectives, and the pedagogical approaches that may fit best withthese materials.

ALTERNATIVE PERSPECTIVES ON

PUBLIC SECTOR LEADERSHIP

To begin this discussion, a quick overview ofsome of the different approaches to understandingleadership found in the literature is useful. Likewise,it is important to examine how each of these per-spectives highlights components that are unique toleadership in the public sector. For the purposes of

this article, we consider four common perspectiveson leadership that can inform the development ofpublic leadership education courses and programs.Although they are not mutually exclusive, these per-spectives can be distinguished by their primaryemphasis on traits, situations, organizational transfor-mation, and values. These categories were chosen forheuristic purposes only, not as an attempt to catego-rize or uniquely identify all existing approaches toleadership. Because most of this material has beendealt with in more detail in a wide variety of booksand articles, these perspectives and the key literaturewill be described in a very summary fashion.

Trait TheoriesTrait theory is based on the idea that the charac-

teristics of leaders can be identified and distin-guished from those of nonleaders. In its early form,trait theory was based on the study of individualleaders in order to identify a list of traits that couldbe found among actual leaders in practice. Popularduring the 1940s, trait leadership theories “werelargely designed to try and predict whether an indi-vidual would manifest leadership abilities” (Mello,1999). One implication of this approach is that someindividuals are born with certain characteristics thatmake them intrinsically better leaders, and that,although education and experience are important,unless a person already has the raw material forthese personal characteristics, a person cannot betaught to be a leader.

Recently, leadership scholars have taken arenewed interest in trait theory, although in some-what different form than the earlier work.Thesescholars argue that, although traits may not be deter-minants of effective leaders, traits and behaviors canhave an effect on people’s perceptions of leadership(House and Podsakoff, 1994; Mello, 1999). Newertrait theory tends to emphasize such things as ten-dencies towards certain behaviors, qualities of mind,personality, and charisma.Whereas previous trait theorists saw leadership traits as fixed and inherentwithin individuals, more recent scholars (Bennis1984;Yukl 1998; Kirkpatrick and Locke, 1991) shiftthe focus to traits and competencies that can be


developed and learned. For example, after studyingpracticing leaders, Bennis (1984) identifies fourareas of competence and seven characteristics ofeffective leadership performance. Similarly,Yukl’s(1998) Leadership in Organizations suggests partic-ular traits and skills frequently associated with suc-cessful leaders.

Writing about public service motivation, manyscholars have identified traits that are unique tothose who work within the public sector (Crewson,1997; Gabris and Simo, 1995; Houston, 2000; Perry,2000; Rainey, 1997;Wittmer, 1991). Unlike those inthe private sector, these studies reveal that leaderswithin public organizations tend to have a public-service orientation, value work that helps others andbenefits society, and possess a concern for theircommunities.

Luke (1998) points out that, in the increasinglycomplex and interconnected public sector environ-ment, three skills sets are needed: thinking and act-ing strategically, facilitating productive work groups,and leading from personal passion and inner values.About the last he states,“Catalytic leaders lead fromstrength of character, not strength of personality,”drawing attention to passion, values, credibility, andinner strength. Denhardt, Denhardt, and Aristigueta(2002) also consider intelligence, self-understanding,self-confidence, self-esteem, high energy, determina-tion to succeed, sociability, and integrity to be traitsand competencies important for leadership in thepublic sector.

Situational TheoriesSituational leadership theory also provides a well-

known perspective on the nature of leadership.Made popular by Hersey and Blanchard in the1960s, the emphasis of this model is on a leader’sbehavior in relation to his/her followers (Hersey,Blanchard, and Johnson, 2001). Other well-known sit-uational models include Tannenbaum and Schmidt(1957) and Fiedler (1967).According to situationaltheory, different kinds of leaders and leadershipbehavior are needed for different kinds of situations.To be effective, a leader must correctly assess a situa-tion in order to find leadership deficiencies.The

leader must then have the skills, flexibility, andbehavioral range to provide the particular type ofleadership needed for that particular situation (ortype of follower) at that particular time.

Given the nature of public service, leaders withinthis sector often find themselves in the middle ofcomplex and unique situations: upholding democrat-ic and constitutional requirements (Rohr, 1986;Vinzant and Crothers, 1998); shaping and developingmanagement practices and processes (Clay, 1996);serving and being accountable to multiple masters(Barth, 1996); working within a political context(Rohr, 1989); and addressing the public interest(Goodsell, 1990; Barth, 1996;Wamsley et al., 1990).In other words, public sector leaders typically facesituations in which they are “attempting to deal withthe multiple ramifications of an issue rather than aselect few; seeking to incorporate the long-rangeview into deliberations, to balance a natural tenden-cy toward excessive concern with short-termresults; considering competing demands and require-ments of affected individuals and groups, not oneposition; proceeding equipped with more knowl-edge and information rather than less” (Wamsley,1990, 40).

Transformational Change TheoriesCurrently, a dominant perspective on leadership

is what we call the transformational change modelof leadership.While Burns (1978) was the first touse the term, the transformational change view ofleadership currently is based more heavily on thework of Bernard M. Bass (e.g., 1997).This model ofleadership suggests that leaders are those who havethe vision, energy, and insight to institute and man-age significant, and even profound, organizationaltransformations.This emphasis on the leadership oforganizational change and the centrality of theleader’s vision of the future is pervasive in academicresearch (Bycio et al., 1995; Den Hartog et al., 1997;Tracey and Hinkin, 1998;Alimo-Metcalf and Alban-Metcalf, 2001; Kotter, 1996; Kotter and Cohen, 2002)and in the extraordinarily large number of tradepublications and popular literature books on leader-ship.




Typically, this literature focuses on executive-levelleadership in business, but it has been influential inpublic administration as well. In fact, in our experi-ence, over the past ten to fifteen years, when wehave asked people in the public sector to thinkabout the words that they associate with leadership,vision is one the first words that is mentioned.Transformational change scholars commonly linkthis notion of vision with a discussion of charismaticleadership (House and Shamir, 1993; House, 1973;Conger and Kanungo, 1987;Tichy and Devanna,1986).The transformational change model of leader-ship relies on strategic planning and managementtechniques, seeks to maximize strategic advantage,views organizational culture as a lever to achievechange, and uses significant organizational change or transformation as its measure of success.

As Clay (1996) noted,

Although organizational ambiguity and instabil-ity have become the norm for most moderncomplex organizations, these factors are exac-erbated for public organizations because theyexist within and serve a political and social sys-tem that itself is in a state of flux” (96).

Unique to the public sector are the calls for entre-preneurial leadership and organizational changewithin a context of democratic and constitutionalaccountability and responsiveness. Likewise, organi-zational change efforts and visionary leadership inthe public sector are further constrained by elec-toral politics, revenue generation and budget limita-tions, and public opinion.

Value-Based TheoriesThe fourth perspective is a value-based leadership

approach. Drawing from a variety of sources, thisapproach combines normative leadership theories(Burns, 1978; Schein, 1997; Greenleaf, 1977, 1998;Covey, 1990), with recent developments in the fieldof public administration (King and Stivers, 1998;Terry, 1998; Denhardt and Denhardt, 2003). Insteadof locating leadership strictly within a solitary indi-vidual, position, or situation, value-based approaches

define leadership as “a complex moral relationshipbetween people, based on trust, obligation, commit-ment, emotion, and a shared vision of the good”(Ciulla, 1998, xv).This view builds upon transforma-tional leadership as conceptualized by Burns (1978),the post-industrial leadership of Rost (1993), and thecollaborative/shared leadership models advocated byFoster (1989), Dentico (1999), and Bradford andCohen (1998). For this reason, the value-based per-spective focuses on the leader-follower relationshipand, in the public sector, requires an examination offundamental questions of democratic values, citizen-ship, and public service.

APPLYING THE PERSPECTIVES TO

PUBLIC SECTOR LEADERSHIP EDUCATION

Although they are not necessarily mutually exclu-sive, to some extent each of these perspectives sug-gests different goals and purposes for public sectorleadership education, relies on different types of lit-erature and other materials, and necessitates differ-ent approaches to teaching. In some cases, theseassumptions and purposes are not explicitly stated,yet they are nonetheless present in how we designand deliver leadership education. These differencesare more explicitly considered in the sections thatfollow and are depicted in Table 1.

Teaching Leadership as Traits and Personal Qualities

Leadership education based on the trait perspec-tive would have the goal and purpose of providingstudents with an understanding of the qualities andcharacteristics of successful leaders.The learningobjectives of teaching leadership as traits wouldinclude having students be able to identify the traitsof successful leaders; recognize the commonalitiesof those who have been successful in leading; gain aworking familiarity with the literature on leadershiptraits and behavior and an understanding of thosethat are unique to public service; and explain whateffective leaders do and how they do it.

The idea here is to teach students about the quali-ties and characteristics of public leadership and toreview and develop research and observations about






leaders. It is not necessarily to train or provideopportunities for students to become leaders them-selves.When such approaches are used, the class-room can be likened to a think tank, where the par-ticipants’ main focus is on studying issues and prob-lems in order to increase understanding.Althoughbehavior may change as a result of that understand-ing, the primary focus is on careful study, observa-tion, and research so that students learn about lead-ers and leadership.Therefore, one assignment couldbe to have students read biographies of renownedleaders in addition or as an alternative to traditionaltexts. If more active learning approaches are desired,

those teaching from this perspective could incorpo-rate assignments that involve studying the lives andwork of practicing leaders. One example of thisapproach is to use Mello’s (1999) leadership profile.In this semester-long project, students select a com-pelling leader, either real or fictional, and develop aprofile that includes individual qualities and motiva-tions among other variables that the student finds tobe integral to the leader’s effectiveness. Integratingquizzes and instruments geared toward measuringstudents’ own personality traits or personal qualitiesmay be of use in helping students apply trait theoryto their own experience.

Leadership Goals and Learning Associated PedagogiesPerspective Purpose Objectives and Sample Approaches

Trait To identify the To observe, synthesize, Classroom as think tank.Teacher-led, traditional traits of effective and report the pedagogy based on empirical research and study leaders characteristics of the literature. Students may analyze biographies,

and behaviors of prepare profiles of leaders, or assess their own successful leaders. traits.

Situational To understand To diagnose different Classroom as laboratory.Traditional pedagogy forleadership style organizational situations content and the use of short case studies todifferences and and choose appropriate practice correct organizational diagnosis, the use ofthe situations for behaviors based on leadership style inventories, role play.which they are model.best suited

Transforma- To create To create a compelling Classroom as flight simulator. Content based on tional Change and implement vision, to strategically traditional pedagogy with experiential/empirical

planned change plan and manage individual applications. Students conduct analyses ofand organizational multiple management organizations based on SWOT or other integrativeimprovements. systems and culture. model, evaluate organizational change processes,

and/or use simulations.

Value-based To create shared, To engage in and Classroom as studio.Teacher and student shareLeadership moral leadership facilitate a collaborative responsibility for course discussion and direction.

based on shared leadership process, to The interaction in the classroom is used as part ofvalues and inspire and empower the educational experience. Instructor both modelsdemocratic leadership at all levels, and provides opportunities for feedback and studentnorms. to enact democratic self-reflection and awareness, engages students in

and public service dialogue, and practices shared leadership throughvalues. collaboration and facilitation of process.Action

research may be used.

Table 1:Alternate Perspectives and Approaches to Leadership Education




Teaching Situational Leadership The purpose and goals of leadership education

based on a situational perspective are to enable stu-dents to be able to distinguish between differenttypes of organizational situations unique to the pub-lic sector and to identify the leadership behaviorsbest suited to, or most effective in, those circum-stances. This approach is explicitly based on the ideathat leadership behavior can be learned. Of particu-lar importance are the development of skills in diag-nosing the characteristics and needs of organizationsand individuals using certain specified criteria.Although such material could be taught simply ascontent using traditional pedagogical approaches, sit-uational leadership is often taught with an emphasison skill building as well. In the latter, the objective isto help students master the skills necessary to distin-guish between different types of leadership behav-ior, to demonstrate that behavior, and to have theability to be flexible and to adapt to differentapproaches. Students may be given alternative orga-nizational scenarios and asked to diagnose the char-acteristics of the situation and define the most effec-tive leadership approaches in each case.

With the situational approach, the classroom canbe likened to a laboratory in which students aregiven the opportunity to try different things andlearn the right and wrong answers through the useof role-playing, leadership exercises, in-class casestudies, and leadership style inventories. For themost part, these activities are individual in natureand emphasize encouraging students to developtheir diagnostic ability, become familiar with theirown leadership style, and assess their task and rela-tionship behaviors (Hersey, Blanchard, and Johnson,2001).

Teaching Leadership as Transformational ChangeLeadership education developed within a transfor-

mational change framework is intended to developstudents’ abilities to create and implement plannedchange and organizational improvements in the pub-lic sector. The goals of transformational leadershipeducation would be to afford students an opportuni-ty to learn about the change process, to identify themethods of developing and communicating inspiring

vision statements, to overcome barriers and resis-tance to change, and to achieve shifts in organiza-tional culture. Moreover, the goal would be to assiststudents in understanding the importance of devel-oping a compelling organizational vision and pro-vide them with the tools necessary to implementsuch a vision.To do this, educators would seek toincrease student competence in team building,strategic planning, the coordination of consistentmultiple management systems, and organizationalculture.

The content of teaching leadership as transforma-tional change would be based on traditional peda-gogy with experiential/empirical individual applica-tions. Given the fluid nature of transformationalchange, student learning is more active in thisapproach. For this reason, the classroom can belikened to a flight simulator where there is anattempt to simulate the complexity of organizationsand the multiple factors involved with organizationalchange.This can be done with the use of preparedsimulations or by having students study real organi-zations. For example, students may be assigned toconduct a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportuni-ties, and threats) analysis of an organization or todocument and evaluate an organizational changeprocess. Simulations typically are either content- orprocess-based with the goal of determining how andwhy a particular decision was made (Dentico, 1999).The increasing availability of computer-based tech-nology makes these kinds of problem-based simula-tions a realistic possibility in the classroom.Asopposed to traditional case studies for which theoutcomes are already known, simulations are real-time works-in-progress that “can provide opportuni-ties for decision makers to foment understandingswhich develop confidence in leadership relation-ships” (Dentico, 1999, 179).

Teaching Leadership as Value-based The purpose of leadership education using a

value-based model would be to engage in and facili-tate a collaborative leadership process, to inspire andempower leadership at all levels, and to enact demo-cratic and public service values. Because this view ofleadership is explicitly based on values, it offers a




significant opportunity to focus on the aspects ofleadership that are unique to the public sector con-text. In fact, while other approaches can be adaptedto include public sector applications and examples,the value-based approach virtually requires the con-sideration of public sector values and norms. Thegoal would be to help students become capable ofcreating shared, moral leadership based on collec-tively determined values and democratic norms in apublic or community setting. In doing so, studentswould come to recognize and act on the idea thatleadership can and should happen at all levels of anorganization and society (Vinzant and Crothers,1998). Like Densten and Gray’s constructivistapproach, the process of learning using the value-based leadership model “empowers students to takeresponsibility for their own learning” (2001, 121).

In order for these goals to materialize, a classroomenvironment that can be likened to a studio is need-ed. In a studio, the interaction between students andinstructors, as well as between students and stu-dents, is part of the educational experience. Giventhe espoused values of shared leadership and collab-oration, these values must be enacted in the class-room setting through interaction, feedback, model-ing, and dialogue.This approach involves real-timepractice, with the teacher and students sharingresponsibility for course discussion and direction.Students can be responsible for leading class discus-sions and creating activities and assignments.Theinstructor provides opportunities for feedback andstudent self-reflection and awareness and engagesstudents in dialogue. Moreover, through the collabo-ration and facilitation of process, the instructor ulti-mately models and practices this shared and value-based leadership approach.

CHOOSING AN APPROACH

As public administration educators, we readilyacknowledge that one size does not fit all.The aim ofthis discussion is to begin moving leadership educa-tors closer to a unification of espoused theories withtheories in use (Argyris and Schön, 1974). Choosingan approach should be based upon thoughtful self-reflection and analysis from those of us attemptingto educate leaders for public service.

Does the orientation of the instructor or theapproach taken make a difference in student out-comes? Little has been written in this regard aboutleadership education, but one can look to the ethicsliterature for an indication. Studies examining “theeffect of leaders’ ethical orientation upon their fol-lowers” reveals that “followers tend to shift their per-sonal ethical orientations to more closely align withthat of an accepted leader...in a university classroomsetting, the professor is the leader and could beexpected to exercise the same level of intentional orunintentional influence on their students’ level ofethical reasoning and consequent behavior as doleaders in other formal settings”(Jurkiewicz, 2002,264-265). Making this connection between leader-ship in a classroom and the effects upon studentoutcomes has important implications for pedagogy.

How does the way we teach about leadershipaffect students’ understanding of leadership inaction? Through our instruction, we model our pref-erences and assumptions concerning leadership. Ifwe view leadership as traits, situations, transforma-tional change, or value-based, then it is appropriatethat our instructional style fit the correspondingthink tank, laboratory, flight simulator, or studiomodel. Depending upon the model selected, stu-dents will be presented with different content, learn-ing processes, and tools that they will then take withthem outside the classroom.Without a fit betweenpurpose and approach, the effectiveness of publicsector leadership education may be compromised,most markedly as we move from understanding thetraits of leaders to actually equipping our students tobecome value-based public leaders themselves.

Unique challenges face instructors who opt for avalue-based approach to leadership education.Theclassroom as a studio necessitates a shift from tradi-tional pedagogy, which privileges the instructor andmaintains a hierarchical relationship within the class-room. Instead, as mentioned, the classroom as studiois a location where the teacher, student, and possiblyothers have the opportunity to practice and experi-ence shared leadership.This approach may be diffi-cult and uncomfortable for those who prefer moretraditional teaching techniques.


IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS

There is no one best way to conceptualize leader-ship, nor is there one best way to teach it. Publicleadership can be studied and taught by analyzingthe characteristics of great leaders, by examininghow to effectively alter leadership behavior to fit thedemands of differing situations, by considering howthe leadership function serves to create and imple-ment transformational change, and/or by looking atpublic leadership as a process based on shared val-ues and democratic principles. Important learningcan take place within any of these orientations.Thequestion is not which orientation is correct, butrather which perspective(s) on leadership are bestsuited to which pedagogical approach and fits bestwithin the larger curriculum of a particular program.The ideal is to create some synergy between thepurpose, the content, and the process of what isbeing taught and with the teaching methodsemployed.

Teaching any of the different perspectives onleadership can include an active learning compo-nent. Using active learning strategies can enhancestudent engagement with the material and help thestudent apply theories and models in a way that fitswith their own style of learning and experience.Aswe move from trait to situational, transformational,and finally value-based approaches to understandingleadership, these active learning strategies becomemore and more critical.Active learning also takes ona different character as we shift our purpose fromteaching students about good leaders to teachingstudents to be good leaders.Active learning is notsimply a way to practically apply models andobserve practicing leaders; instead, it is a way toactually do and practice leadership.

Different pedagogical approaches require differ-ent types of skills of those who teach. Particularly forvalue-based education in the public service, the skillsneeded by the instructor are distinct and demandingand not well suited to all faculty.The instructor mustbe ready and able to model the behaviors he or shewants the students to learn.This requires engagingwith students in order to develop a common under-standing of shared purposes.Attention must be paidto both the process as well as the content of what is

being taught. Instructors in this kind of classroomhave to be comfortable facilitating discussion andgiving up some level of control over the directionthe class will take. If the instructor is not comfort-able or skilled in doing so, the class may be unlikelyto help students become better value-based leaders.

Instructors often model behaviors in their teach-ing. By example, we teach students to be analytical,conceptual, and precise, and to have a whole rangeof other behaviors and skills. Modeling becomes par-ticularly important in leadership education, however.Instructors are in a position of leadership within theclassroom and as such, inevitably, the ways in whichthey behave further teaches students how to beleaders.Autocratic teaching styles may teach stu-dents about using power and authority but not tohow to use interactive approaches.Autocratic con-trols over the content and process of the class seemsparticularly ill suited to teaching students to bevalue-based leaders in the public sector.A better fitbetween pedagogy and content would suggest theinstructor model self-reflective behaviors as well asactive listening, compromising, facilitating, empower-ing, inspiring, and engaging others.

So can any, or at least most, public administrationfaculty take part in leadership education? Some levelof content can be taught just like any other material,through the use of interesting lectures and activelearning strategies that allow students to engagewith the material being learned. In a very real sense,however, if the goal is to teach students to be betterpublic leaders, faculty should be selected to teachwho can model and emulate the behaviors we aretrying to teach.Accordingly, if that is our purpose,faculty recruited to teach leadership courses shouldbe evaluated based not only on their conceptualexpertise but also on their ability to model theirbehavior and depart from traditional lecture-basedstrategies to focus both on content and process andto share responsibility with their students for learn-ing to be better leaders.

The changing face of public service leadershipdoes not stop at the classroom door.The challengesinstructors face in attempting to broaden pedagogi-cal styles to include more value-based techniques arethe same challenges facing public administration stu-



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dents in their real-world experiences.As instructorsand educators, we too must be willing to respond tothe changing needs of public service leadership.Asleaders in the classroom, we are uniquely located toprovide a place for students to not just learn aboutvalue-based leadership, but to start the process ofbecoming such leaders.

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Janet V. Denhardt is a professor in the School of Public Affairs at Arizona State University. Her teaching and research interests focus onorganizational behavior, leadership, and public service values. Her most recent book, The New Public Service (with Robert Denhardt)was preceded by Managing Human Behavior in Public and Non-Profit Organizations (with Robert Denhardt and MariaAristegueta) and Street-Level Leadership (with Lane Crothers). Her work has also been published in numerous journals includingPublic Administration Review, Administration & Society, and American Review of Public Administration.

Kelly B. Campbell is a research and faculty associate in the School of Public Affairs at Arizona State University. She is currently finish-ing her Ph.D. with concentrations in public administration/democratic theory and organizational behavior. Her research interestsinclude civic engagement, democratic governance, leadership, and gender and public administration.


Public leadership scholars’ inattention to gender can be attributed tothe fact that women were largely absent from or invisible within U.S. gov-ernment leadership positions.The prevailing assumption among thesescholars was that governmental leaders were male, as the title of a 1967book makes plain: Men Who Govern:A Biographical Profile of FederalPolitical Executives (Stanley, Mann, and Doig, 1967). Such an exclusivelymale title reminds us today that, in the not-too-distant past, few womenheld formal public leadership positions in government.After years of strug-gle to remove legal, political, and organizational barriers in the UnitedStates, women have made slow, steady progress into government’s upperranks.At the federal level, for example, women now comprise about 25percent of the Senior Executive Service and 25 percent of the workforcein GS levels 13-15.

This changed picture of leadership has been acknowledged in the publicadministration scholarship that explores the glass ceiling in government,where progress made by women and the barriers that persist are the sub-jects of research (Guy, 1994; Naff, 1994; Naff and Crum, 2000; Kerr, Miller,Reid, 2002); however, scholarship that documents and interprets women’slived experiences as public leaders and managers is rare.1 Furthermore, aquick review of several public administration textbooks confirms that themultidisciplinary literature on gender and leadership has yet to be includ-ed in leadership overview chapters; the textbooks also do not acknowl-edge gender as an analytic variable or contextual factor in leadershipresearch (Denhardt, Denhardt, and Aristigueta, 2002; Cayer and Weschler,2003; Henry, 2004). Missing from both the larger scholarly account of publicleadership as well as from textbook accounts is Camilla Stivers’ (2002) cri-tique that leadership as a concept and practice “remains deeply genderedand fundamentally problematic for women” (80). Finally, a survey of gradu-ate gender and administration/management courses in U.S. public affairsprograms found that only two out of eight courses included the examina-tion of gender differences in leadership and management styles as a course

Public Leaders Are Gendered:Making Gender Visible in

Public Affairs Leadership Education

DeLysa BurnierOhio University


J-PAE 11 (2005):3:181-192

ABSTRACT

For too long, public leadership scholarshiphas overlooked women as leaders in theUnited States as well as the gender dimen-sion of leadership.This paper will arguethat public affairs leadership education inthe United States should become genderinclusive, which would entail teaching lead-ership scholarship by and about women,examining women’s and men’s concreteleadership experiences in the public sector,and making relational leadership more cen-tral to broader disciplinary discussions onpublic leadership.This paper begins by firstgendering the concepts of leader and lead-ership, and then it describes briefly thedebate over whether gender matters inleadership. It then examines the gender andleadership research within public affairs.Apivotal contribution of this research is theemergence of relational leadership, which isexamined as a distinct approach to leading.The paper concludes by discussing howgender leadership literature can inform theteaching of public leadership and in partic-ular the author’s own attempt to integratethis scholarly work into a graduate organiza-tion theory class.

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goal (Mills and Newman, 2002).These omissions arenot insignificant, for they leave public affairs stu-dents and scholars alike with the impression thatpublic leadership is gender neutral at best and, atworst, for and about male public leaders only. Thispaper will argue that public affairs leadership educa-tion should become gender inclusive, which wouldentail teaching leadership scholarship by and aboutwomen, examining women’s and men’s concreteleadership experiences in the public sector, andmaking relational leadership more central to broaderdisciplinary discussions on public leadership.

Public affairs leadership education should incor-porate gender for several reasons, the most obviousof which are that “women represent a substantialand growing share of the pool of talent available forleadership,” and that “organizations that create a cul-ture of equal opportunity are better able to attract,retain, and motivate the most qualified individuals”(Rhode, 2003, 18). Related support for these reasonsrests on research that holds that “women have dis-tinct [leadership] perspectives to contribute,” andthat “in order to perform effectively in an increasing-ly competitive and multicultural environment, orga-nizations need a workforce with diverse back-grounds, experiences, and styles of leadership(Rhode, 2003, 18). Finally, the gender and leadershipliterature should be incorporated because it intro-duces public affairs students to values and practicesthey might otherwise not encounter, and which theycan use in turn to reflect on their own leadershipexperiences as women and men. More specifically,Mills and Newman (2002) maintain that the questionof gender difference in leadership should be a “criti-cal component of gender and administration/man-agement courses,” for, if students “fail to understandtheir own gendered behavior (feminine or mascu-line), they may fail to understand their own impacton others in the workplace” (32).

Understanding the gender leadership literaturerequires clarifying what it means to gender leader-ship as a concept and practice.2

GENDERING THE CONCEPT AND PRACTICE OF LEADERSHIP

Gender has come to replace sex as the key con-cept in feminist scholarship because sex too narrow-

ly defined differences between men and women inbiological terms. Gender, by contrast,“suggest(s) thatinformation about women is necessarily informationabout men, that one implies the study of the other”(Scott, 1988, 32).Whereas sex works off the binarycategories of male and female, gender is inclusive ofboth sexes and highlights how the two sexes existrelationally. Gender is preferred as well because itprivileges the social construction of biological sexand, more specifically, explains how biological sexdifferences come to be interpreted and understoodthrough human interaction and practice (Duerst-Lahti and Kelly, 1995).

Duerst-Lahti and Kelly (1995) identify four analyt-ic dimensions to gender. First, it can be used as avariable with two, and possibly more, categories forthe exploration of gender and/or sex differences.Second, gender can be a property of individuals ororganizations that helps shape the former’s identityand the latter’s structures and ethos.Third, it is a setof practices that emerge in and through social inter-action, revealing the presence of masculinism andfeminism at the interpersonal level. Fourth, gender isa “normative stance regarding appropriate behavior,a prescribed or assumed way of behaving withinsocietal roles and structures” (Duerst-Lahti and Kelly,1995, 41). Understood in this multifaceted way, gen-der is threaded through a range of sociopolitical con-cepts, theories, and institutions.

According to Yoder (2001), leadership is genderedbecause “how women [or men] enact their role asleader is inextricably intertwined with the basic real-ization that they are women [or men], bringing withit all the stereotypic baggage that comes with gen-der roles (815). Leaders, along with followers, are inpossession of genders that, for better or worse, con-tribute to how leadership is experienced, interpret-ed, and understood by all actors involved.Yoder’s(2001) significant conclusion is that “leadership is aprocess that occurs within a social context that isgendered,” by which she means that leadershipoccurs in a series of contexts—social, political, orga-nizational, cultural—where gender meanings andpractices are deeply embedded even as they vary sit-uationally over time (815).A full understanding ofleaders and leadership must take into account the

Public Leaders Are Gendered: Making Gender Visible in Public Affairs Leadership Education


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leader’s sex as well as the gendered meanings locat-ed within the various contexts where leadership ispracticed. Gendering the concepts of leader andleadership, then, suggests that “doing leadership maydiffer for women and men, and that leadership doesnot take place in a genderless vacuum” (Yoder, 2001,815).

Important to note here is that neither leader norleadership has gender-free histories. Given theunfolding of American-Anglo-European history, it isuncontestable that the concepts of leader and lead-ership always have been influenced by gender.Witha few prominent exceptions such as queens, reli-gious figures, reformers, educators, and journalists,women historically were excluded from the publicarena and hence positions of public power. Menwere the population from which leaders weredrawn and later studied, leading to historical expla-nations founded on the actions of “great men.”Thelegacy of this enduring historical practice lingerstoday, as Hartman (1999) observes,“to the extentthat a model of the leader as a male figure remainsrooted in our collective consciousness” and “evenhigh elected officials and corporate officers who arewomen...continue to seem anomalous, never quitethe image of a real leader despite having attained for-mal leadership positions” (2).

Beginning in the late 1970s, feminist scholarsbegan to challenge the conventional view that lead-ers are mostly male and that history is made by greatmen.They argued for a broader definition of whatconstitutes a leader and leadership, contending thatleaders are not just the people who hold “formalpositions in the upper rungs of major institutionsbut also those whose ability to influence and movepeople has been demonstrated through teaching,writing, or being effective actors on a whole varietyof less prominent stages—regional sites, neighbor-hood communities, and even family households”(Hartman, 1999, 3).Women suddenly came into focusas leaders when this view of leadership was appliedto past or contemporary moments, with many morewomen recognized as critically involved in the mak-ing of history than conventional accounts acknowl-edged. By incorporating “women into historicalaccounts,” the narratives are “not simply enrich[ed],

it changes them,” and, according to Hartman (1999),“introducing women into leadership studies has thepotential to do the same for that field” (12). Oncethe concepts of leader and leadership are gendered,it becomes clear that “people of both sexes from awhole range of past and current social contexts havebeen engaged as actors making consequentialchange” (Hartman, 1999, 12).

Finally, gendering the concepts of leader and lead-ership is important, because, although women com-prise more than 50 percent of the U.S. population,they do not hold a majority of leadership positionsin the public or private sectors. Despite the pres-ence of women public leaders such as HillaryClinton and Condoleezza Rice, women are underrep-resented in government and corporate boardrooms,as military officers, and as partners in law firms(Carli and Eagly, 2001). Indeed,“although women’sstatus has risen substantially in the 20th century inmany societies, women’s subordination remainsapparent in their lack of access to positions ofpower” (Carli and Eagly, 2001, 634).That womennever seem to catch up numerically to men as toppositional leaders, and when they are in leadershippositions they are still the minority, shows that cul-turally constructed masculine meanings and prac-tices continue to define the concepts of leader andleadership.

THE LEADERSHIP DIFFERENCE DEBATE

The gender and leadership literature is large andmultidisciplinary. Much of the scholarship is concen-trated in management studies and educationaladministration and, to a lesser extent, in political sci-ence (Hartman, 1999).Additional research is locatedin sociology, social psychology, and gender studies.Because of this disciplinary diversity, a range of per-spectives and methodologies has been used to inves-tigate the phenomenon of women as leaders. Forexample, the social psychological gender leadershipresearch is largely experimental, whereas qualitativeinquiry is prominent in education administration.Case studies of women leaders in nontraditionalorganizational settings can be found in gender stud-ies, while traditional social science approaches suchas surveys and statistical analyses are largely the nor-

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mative methods in management studies, political sci-ence, and public administration.

Within this literature, a complicated debate hasemerged over whether women in leadership posi-tions matter because they bring to their positions adifferent leadership approach that draws on valuesand practices gendered feminine.Typically, thosearguing that women make little or no difference inleadership positions rely on traditional social scienceresearch, while those arguing that women do make adifference rely on qualitative case study research andfeminist theory. Because the side of the debate main-taining that women do make a difference is relative-ly underexplored in public administration, this paperwill only touch briefly on the traditional social sci-ence research that claims the contrary.

Much of the traditional social science researchtreats gender as biological sex in the form of a two-category (e.g., male/female) variable analytic thatcan be tested with various leadership measures (e.g.,style).After reviewing this research,Alvesson andBilling (1997) concluded that the “majority of theacademic empirical work supports the no or littledifference thesis” on leadership styles (145).Returning to this literature three years later, theyagain found that “women and men in managementroles have similar aspirations, values and other per-sonality traits as well as job-related skills and behav-iors” (Billing and Alvesson, 2000, 148). Of course, thisresearch mostly looks at hierarchical organizations.In an even more recent review of the traditionalsocial science literature, Rhode (2003) offered themore qualified two-fold conclusion that “some of thetime, some women differ from some men” and that“sex is sometimes linked to leadership styles and pri-orities, but more often it is not” (Reskin, 2003, 59).Similarly, Eagly and Carli (2003) found that “womenpossess both advantages and disadvantages as lead-ers, with the disadvantages arising primarily in rolesthat are male-dominated or otherwise defined inmasculine ways” (825).3 Finally,Yoder (2001) sug-gests the importance of paying attention to organiza-tional context, or culture, associated with genderand leadership styles. For example, a “hierarchical,performance-oriented, power-expressive” culture

requires a more masculine approach to leadershipthan a culture that is “transformational” and con-cerned with employee empowerment (Yoder, 2001,815).

Before discussing the perspective that women aredifferent from men as leaders, it is necessary first toexplicate its feminist theory underpinnings.Difference feminism recognizes the importance ofthe equal treatment of men and women, whileembracing the differences that exist betweenwomen and men, as well as among women.Theissue, according to this perspective, is not that gen-der differences exist but that the qualities and expe-riences typically associated with women have beendevalued by society. Because of their experiences aschildbearers, mothers, and caregivers, and theirknowledge of what it means to be formally power-less, women have developed capacities to connect,nurture, and empathize with others. Moreover, theyhave developed alternative “ways of knowing” basedon emotion and intuition, which are just as impor-tant as objectivity and reason. Difference feminismhas been criticized for its tendency to assume anessential female experience based on biological orsocialization processes and for its assertion of afemale voice and female ways of knowing, neither ofwhich describes all women or excludes all men.

Qualitative research suggests that women havepioneered in the development of interactive leader-ship style—an alternative to the traditional com-mand-and-control leadership style—which draws onmany of the qualities (e.g., care, empathy) and skills(e.g., listening, interpersonal communication) previ-ously dismissed as feminine in the leadership litera-ture (Rosener, 1990; Helegesen, 1990; Lipman-Blumen, 1992; Fletcher, 2001).According to the latterauthors, elements of this alternative style may vary,but they include encouraging active participation,sharing power and information, enhancing other’sself worth, and creating genuine excitement aboutpeople’s work in the organization. More specifically,the style is collaborative, consensual, and involvesactively working to make one’s interactions withsubordinates positive for everyone involved.Interactive leaders do not treat everyone the same



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and instead work to acknowledge and manage indi-viduals’ specific needs within the organization. Suchan approach dovetails with current organizationalemphases on teamwork and networking and hasbeen adopted by men as well as women (Luke,1998; Denhardt, Denhardt, and Aristigueta, 2002).

Although some scholars have been reluctant toembrace a “feminine style of leadership” or“women’s ways of leading,” this research is impor-tant, especially for teaching, because it describescontextually and in concrete detail differentwomen’s experiences as leaders.4 Such descriptionsare missing in the acontextual, highly abstract, tradi-tional social science research.Within the body ofqualitative research, women leaders describe, ana-lyze, and reflect on their leadership experiences, giv-ing voice to such dilemmas as managing one’s gen-der identity in the workplace, balancing family andwork, and crafting a leadership style.This researchalso is important because it can be used to challenge“traditional notions of organization, hierarchy, man-agement, and leadership” in a way that “problema-tizes male domination...[and] may contribute to thede-masculinization of management” (Billing andAlvesson, 2000, 151). Finally, this literature can belinked to contemporary leadership scholarship thatemphasizes communication, listening, empower-ment, multiple rather than single leaders, networksover hierarchies, and fluid organizational boundaries(Lipman-Blumen, 1992; Billing and Alvesson, 2000;Kellerman, 2003).

GENDER LEADERSHIP SCHOLARSHIP

IN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

Although a great deal of scholarly attention hasbeen paid to the barriers that impede women’sprogress into the government’s upper ranks, muchless has been paid to women as public leaders andmanagers (Naff, 1994; Naff and Crum, 2000; Mani,1999, 2001. From the research that has been con-ducted, however, it can be inferred that women dolead differently.Two studies of high-level state admin-istrators found clear differences in female and malemanagerial/leadership styles (Duerst-Lahti andJohnson, 1990; Kelly, Hale, and Burgess, 1991).

Duerst-Lahti and Johnson (1990) found in Wisconsin,for example, that women, like men, wanted to beeffective in their jobs but were less likely to “com-pete and control” in doing so (117).5 Edlund (1992)uncovered among mid- and upper-level managementwomen in local, county, and school governments “adistinct style of management” that is “unique, practi-cal, and descriptive” and “shares the characteristicsof service, nurturance, balance, and empowerment”(33-34).

Little (1994) found that caring was a key charac-teristic that helped Senior Executive Service careerwomen executives be successful. More recently, Foxand Schuhmann (1999) discovered that “women citymanagers are more likely than male managers toembrace a style of management that relies on citizeninput,” and they also are more likely to define “publicservice in terms of helping to improve the commu-nity” (231, 235).The authors concluded that thereappears to be a “distinct ‘feminine voice’ in the poli-tics of city management” (Fox and Schuhmann,1999, 240).

Moving beyond leadership differences betweenmen and women in government is Gender Power,Leadership, and Governance (Duerst-Lahti andKelly, 1995), which is a comprehensive treatment ofpublic leadership from a gender perspective thatlooks not just at the number of women representedin government or whether women are differentfrom men as leaders and policymakers. It beginsfrom the premise that leadership as a concept isgendered masculine, as are our governing institu-tions such as bureaucracy.The volume’s contributorsall emphasize examining men and women’s govern-ing experiences in relation to the other, as well ashow masculinist ideologies are interwoven into thevery fabric of leading, managing, and governing.Stivers (2002) similarly views leadership as a mas-culinist concept in its meanings and practices andsays it puts women aspiring to public leadership in adilemma—they must “look like a lady but act like aman” (63). Stivers (2000) also argues that, during theProgressive Era, the “bureau men’s” masculinistmeanings and practices of leadership prevailed inAmerican public administration over the feminine



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leadership meanings and practices associated with“settlement women.”

Scholarship exploring women leaders’ actual,lived experiences in government is scarce. Cooper’sExemplary Public Administrators (1992) is theexception and an excellent source because itincludes three women administrators.6 Two of thewomen, as they reflected on their own managingand leading experiences, came to an understandingof leadership different from that of their male peers.Stivers (1992), writing about Beverlee Myers, notesthat her “story, then, both in its living and in itstelling amounts to a different narrative than the onewe are used to” (168). It “suggests a new way ofthinking about public virtue: one shorn of its cultur-al masculinity” (Stivers, 1992, 168). For Elsa Porter, asRadin (1992) reports, being a woman was one of thethree elements that contributed to the “subtext” ofher formal career (200). Porter was guided “explicit-ly by feminist values,” and her “identity as a woman”formed a big part of who she is” (Radin, 1992, 204).Additionally, Brunner (2000) explores women’s actu-al experiences as administrators. Specifically, sheexamines twelve women school superintendentswhose success stems from their abilities to “solve‘the riddle of the heart’” (Brunner, 2000).7

This review underscores the imperative that pub-lic leadership research use gender as an analytic andinterpretive category. It affirms that the concepts ofleader and leadership are not gender neutral butinstead are defined in terms of masculinist images,values, and practices.This review also makes clearthat the scholarly and textbook accounts of publicleadership are not gender balanced simply becausewomen leaders are added as examples, and that lead-ership theories and perspectives themselves may bemade problematic by adopting a gender perspective.

Future research certainly should avoid turningpossible differences between genders into reifiedcategories of leadership. Such research also shouldpay closer attention to the structural and culturallimitations and opportunities of specific bureaucra-cies that may account for perceived leadership dif-ferences between men and women (Newman,1994). Most importantly, more research into the

actual experiences of women in the senior ranks ofgovernment is needed.All too often, it is the maleadministrator’s story that is told through interviews,anecdotes, and formal study. Recent memoirs bypublic leaders such as Madeleine Kunin (1994),Madeleine Albright (2003), and Jane Alexander(2000) help to fill this gap, but more scholarly workis needed.As feminists have argued, it matters thatwomen be able to read about, listen to, and discussother women’s lives and experiences. Not only isthis empowering, but such research gives womenadministrators and students a chance to learn fromother women’s work experiences as they strive tomake sense of their own lived realities.Taken as awhole, these ideas and perspectives on gender arecohering into an alternative, relational conception ofpublic leadership.

RELATIONAL LEADERSHIP

Relational leadership is an approach that emergesfrom Mary Parker Follett’s work and women schooladministrators’ leadership experiences.8 It empha-sizes the development of caring relationships bothinside and outside the organization.This approachassumes the “intrinsic value of all persons” and holdsthat people “deserve a supportive, nurturing” workenvironment (Beck, 1992, 472). Regan and Brooks(1995) describe the approach in terms of the multi-ple and fluid relationships and processes a leadercultivates over time in support of collaboration, car-ing, courage, intuition, and vision within an organiza-tion. In collaboration, for example, a relational leaderis willing and able to work in and through groups toaccomplish organizational goals. Specifically, thismeans “eliciting and offering support to group mem-bers and “creating a synergistic environment foreveryone (Regan and Brooks, 1995, 26).They devel-oped this approach from their own, and like-mindedwomen colleagues’ experiences, as school adminis-trators over a twenty-year period.

Relational leaders care about the people theywork with and are willing to “act on behalf of oth-ers” while remaining open to the perspectives ofothers (Regan and Brooks, 1995, 27). Indeed, therelational leader “understands the activities of care

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to be receiving the other’s perspective, respondingto the awareness that comes from this perspective,and remaining in caring relationships over time”(Regan and Brooks, 1995, 27).Additionally, relationalleaders recognize that caring must be reciprocal inthe sense that they both give care and receive it(Regan and Brooks, 1995, 27). In this way, caring rela-tionships cultivate mutuality and connection.

Relational leaders also exhibit courage, in thatthey are open to “testing new ideas in the world ofpractice” (Regan and Brooks, 1995, 29). Because theyare open to new situations and contexts, such lead-ers are not locked into repeating past practices sim-ply because they are customary and conventional.Relational leaders also are intuitive and able to bal-ance expert, professional knowledge with knowl-edge gained through emotions and experience.Finally, relational leaders both possess vision and areable to foster it in others.They are “able to defineand achieve specific goals arrived at collaboratively”(Regan and Brooks, 1995, 41). It is a vision that isinclusive of people, ideas, and perspectives through-out an organization.

Regan and Brooks (1995) view relational leader-ship as a fluid set of processes and practices thatpromote the aforementioned values.The educationaladministrators in their study were flexible and opento learning from what worked for others, withoutlooking for a structure, program, or process thatwould work across administrative settings or uni-formly for all administrators. In fact, the administra-tors regularly met over a period of years for the pur-poses of “collaborative reflection, leading to the con-struction of understanding, leading in turn to praxis,which in turn creates the experience, which informsanother cycle of reflection, and so on” (Regan andBrooks, 1995, 78).This approach to generatingadministrative knowledge, situated in experience anddialogical reflection, contrasts markedly with themore traditional approach of the expert professionalimparting objective and scientific knowledge toother professionals. Nonetheless, most administratorsin public settings, even caring ones, find themselvesworking in traditional bureaucratic organizations thatreward individuals for following the expert model.

Sernak’s (1998) study of a caring leader—anAfrican-American, woman, urban high school princi-pal—is noteworthy for its recognition of the difficul-ties and resistance encountered when that leadertried to introduce the values of the care perspectiveto a traditional, bureaucratic organization. Sernak(1998) shows why it is imperative for a caring leaderto practice caring power, which requires viewingpower in Follett’s way as relational and reciprocal(see Note 8). Sernak (1998) also maintains that, forrelational leaders to be successful in bureaucraticsettings, care must be more than a personal valueassociated with the relational leader.The relationalleader must model caring power and communicatethat care is an organizational value to be embracedand practiced by individuals throughout the organi-zation. If care is perceived to be strictly the personalcommitment of the leader and not an organization-wide commitment, then it can be dismissed orignored by those claiming to act from a different setof values. However, such oppositional claims becomemuch harder to make if care becomes part of anorganization’s culture and structure.

Writing about the state of public leadership today,Denhardt, Denhardt, and Aristigueta (2002) claimthat “increasingly, the skills needed for leadership inthe public service will be the skills of shared leader-ship,” and that “this way of thinking about leadershipsuggests a reciprocal relationship through whichmembers of the group express, in word or deed, theshared interests of all in an open and visibleprocess” (210-211).While shared leadership may benew to the public service, women school administra-tors have been advocates and practitioners of suchan approach for some time.Their experiences illus-trate that relational leadership offers a way to estab-lish a reciprocal process that is not just open andvisible, but also caring, nurturing, and supportive.Equally important is that the school administrators’experiences confirm that relational leadership can be practiced in traditionally organized bureau-cracies.9 In sum, relational leadership represents afresh way of theorizing and enacting leadership,which is why I find it so worthwhile to teach.

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TEACHING LEADERSHIP/TEACHING GENDER

Our public administration graduate program hastwo different leadership courses, both now required,and they each emphasize public leadership’s strate-gic, political, and moral dimensions.As the soleinstructor of the required organization theorycourse, I teach leadership as a part of the humanresource theory unit. I also teach leadership as a unitin the introductory undergraduate public administra-tion course. Looking around my program severalyears ago, I realized that gender was largely missingfrom our leadership course offerings, including theunits I taught.This changed, however, after I partici-pated in a seminar on gender integration across thecurriculum, offered by the Women’s Studies Programat my university.The seminar’s central idea was thatfor students to take gender—especially scholarshipby and about women—seriously, they would have toencounter it in an array of courses on all levels andsubjects. Moreover, gender, and specifically scholar-ship about women, should appear on a course syl-labus as more than an add-on at the end of the term.Rather, gender should be integrated as fully as possi-ble into an entire course, including multiple topicson the syllabus, lectures, reading assignments, andwithin class discussions.The course I chose for thegender integration project was the undergraduateintroduction to public administration.

Some of the more insightful gender research Iencountered for that project was in organizationaltheory in the area of leading and managing.Especially provocative was the claim in a number ofstudies that men and women tend to view managingand leading differently (Duerst-Lahti and Johnson,1990; Kelly, Hale, and Burgess, 1991; Edlund, 1992;Duerst-Lahti and Kelly, 1995). Because of differentlife experiences and socialization processes, womenwere developing approaches to leadership thatwere, in contrast to those of men, less hierarchicaland that emphasized the transformation and empow-erment of employees. Furthermore, women weremore likely to view organizations in terms of websand networks where they occupied the center posi-tion, rather than organizations as hierarchical ladderswhere they held the top rung. After incorporating

some of this research into the introductory course, Ifound it difficult to teach my graduate-level organiza-tion theory course without a gender dimension aswell.

Organization theory is a required course for allgraduate students seeking the master of publicadministration degree. Sometimes it is taught as agraduate-only class and sometimes it is taught as across-listed undergraduate/graduate course.Enrollment can vary from twelve students to forty.Although women comprise about 40 percent of ourtotal graduate student population, organization theo-ry is usually split evenly between male and femalestudents. I became especially interested in addinggender to the human resource theory/leadershipunit in this course, because this class often has anumber of men and women who want to obtain adegree for career advancement reasons, whichmeans that, as a group, they have a range of experi-ences with leaders and managers from the public,private, and nonprofit sectors. Often they are alreadyin leadership positions as agency directors, nonprofitheads, or university administrators. For undergradu-ate students, gender and leadership can seem like anabstraction, but, for nontraditional adult students,gender in the workplace—for better or worse—is aconcrete, lived organizational reality. In addition, thisclass has a significant number of international stu-dents who bring different cultural perspectives tobear on gender leadership issues.Without expectingit to turn out this way, I had a quasi-laboratory set-ting for investigating whether men and women dolead and manage differently and whether we associ-ate certain values and practices with one sex andnot the other, as well as other topics and questionsrelated more broadly to gender.

Gender now is a major theme within the humanresource theory/leadership unit.Time is devoted todiscussing in some detail Follett’s concepts ofdynamic administration, order giving, and “powerwith” not “power over,” and students read a selectionfrom her work. I note how her view of power antici-pates contemporary understandings of power asempowerment. In moving on to leadership, I some-times read the class a Douglas McGregor quotation

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that embodies the older, stereotypical view of whywomen could not be effective leaders.According toMcGregor (1967),“the good manager is aggressive,competitive, firm, just. He is not feminine, he is notsoft or yielding or dependent or intuitive in thewomanly sense.The very expression of emotion iswidely viewed as feminine weakness that wouldinterfere with effective managerial processes” (23).I ask the class for their reaction to the quotation, andthen I ask them what their own experiences havebeen with male and female leaders and managers.

This discussion serves as a platform from whichto begin the presentation of contemporary researchon women and leadership reviewed earlier in thispaper. Specifically, I introduce them to the leadershipapproach developed by women and discussed earli-er in the paper, which includes material on leadingfrom the center, as well as relational leadership cen-tered on care (Helgesen, 1990; Regan and Brooks,1995). Often I supplement this class material withcopies of Rosener’s (1990) article,“Ways WomenLead.”10 I also present the main arguments of Stivers’(1994) “The Listening Bureaucrat” because of itsemphasis on deep listening and reciprocal communi-cation.

In teaching this material, I make clear that theidea of a distinctive leadership style based onwomen’s experiences inside and outside the organi-zation has generated a great deal of debate, and Iremind students that these findings are based oncase study research. I urge them to be careful aboutgeneralizing from these findings to all women ororganizations different from those in the cases, and Ialso observe that “essentialism” can be a problemwith this kind of gender research.The lesson here isto be careful about claims made that women, eitherby nature or experience, are essentially more caring,connected, and nurturing than men, or that suchqualities belong to one gender and not the other. Ialso emphasize that I am not assuming that allwomen should or do lead in this manner, just as I donot suggest that men cannot lead along these lines.

As part of the human resource theory/leadershipunit, I assign Luke’s (1998) Catalytic Leadership.Luke’s approach fits well with the nonhierarchical,

empowered, multiple-voice view of leadership thatemerges throughout this unit. His view of the leader-ship process as being “leader full” reinforces the ideathat a wide range of people with diverse skills canbe leaders. I also have assigned Stout’s (1996)Bridging the Class Divide and Other Lessons forGrassroots Organizing.This book explores Stout’sexperiences in building a grassroots social justiceorganization in the South, and it describes herencounters with gender, class, and sexual orientationbiases in other organizations before creating herown. Stout details the nonhierarchical, participatoryapproach to leading and organizing that she devel-ops for her organization. Her blunt but inspirationalstyle tends to generate heated discussion among thestudents.

Just this year I added Sernak’s (1998) SchoolLeadership—Balancing Power with Caring.Because students read Luke’s book during thehuman resource theory/leadership unit, I assignedthis book for the organizational culture unit. SchoolLeadership is a case study of an African-Americanwoman school principal’s attempt to create a careculture in her school. It describes in detail the dilem-mas she faced as a caring leader working to createchange in a traditional, hierarchical, bureaucraticorganization. Besides being an illuminating accountof the care approach to leadership, the book provid-ed the class with the opportunity to discuss race andgender in the context of leading.

Class discussion divided around whether studentswere sympathetic to her attempt to create a careculture and those who felt she tried to accomplishtoo much too quickly. Students also discussed thepragmatics of implementing care values and prac-tices within a bureaucracy. Interestingly, several stu-dents actually worked for a male agency directorwho is a caring, relational leader, and their reportedexperiences helped other students come to see thatmen and women can practice such an approacheffectively. I asked the students to write a paper,based on this book, considering whether they wouldlike to work in a care culture and what they per-ceived its strengths and weaknesses to be. I waspleasantly surprised by many of the students’



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nuanced responses to the possibilities of care leader-ship.

Overall, the introduction of gender to organiza-tion has enriched the class. I base this claim on stu-dent comments made to me directly, the high evalua-tion numbers the class receives, and my own senseof how the class works now as compared to when itlacked a gender focus. No longer is leadership beingtaught as though it were gender neutral, nor do maleexperiences as leaders and managers stand in forboth genders.Additionally, students gain some expo-sure to female scholars’ writing on leadership, andthey come to see that women’s organizations andfemale leaders have crafted alternatives for dealingwith problems relating to hierarchy and power.

The introduction of gender to the humanresource theory/leadership unit allowed us as a classto discuss whether gender matters in leading andmanaging, and how it matters. Not surprisingly,depending on students’ age, work, and life experi-ences, different classes have produced differentanswers to the question. For example, students whoare in their early twenties are more willing to arguethat gender is not a barrier to leadership than arestudents who are in their late thirties and early for-ties. Furthermore, introducing gender to leadershiphas given me a means to reach women students byasking them directly what they think about thematerial we have just learned and whether it fitswith their own experiences. It also has created anopportunity for nontraditional women students whoalready are leaders or managers in the workplace toserve by example and through their class commentsas immediate role models for students just beginningtheir work lives. For men students, this material pro-vides an opportunity to discuss male leadershipstereotyping and, for example, whether a relational,caring leadership approach could work in organiza-tions such as the campus police department.

CONCLUSION

Today, women are visible as public leaders in gov-ernment and a range of other organizations thatserve the public.The experiential and theoreticalimplications of this change, however, have yet to

make their way fully into public leadership teachingand scholarship.This article argues that gendershould be incorporated into public affairs leadershipeducation by first gendering the concepts of leaderand leadership.After reviewing the scholarship thatexplores gender leadership in public administration,it then highlights relational leadership as a distinctapproach to leading that is rooted in women admin-istrators’ leadership experiences.The article con-cludes with a discussion of how I incorporated gen-der leadership scholarship into organization theory.It is worth noting that as important as it has been tochange the content of this course, changing myteaching approach has been just as important.

From my own classroom experiences, it has beenworthwhile to teach gender leadership because, asHill (2003) observes,“leadership development is fun-damentally about self-development” (146).Thismeans that it is critical for our students to beexposed to a wide array of leadership models, val-ues, and practices that reflect the experiences ofmen and women as leaders. Public administrationhas long emphasized the leadership skills and quali-ties associated with more traditional leading, and itshould now begin emphasizing the skills and quali-ties associated with relational leading so that sharedleadership becomes a reality in the public service.

NOTES

1. For more empirical social science research see Newman (1994) andGuy’s (1992) Women and Men of the States.

2. Definitions of leadership abound. For the purposes of this paperHartman’s (1999) definition will be used: leadership is an influencerelationship among leaders and followers who intend real changesthat reflect their mutual purposes.There is also a debate in the litera-ture over whether leading is managing and managing is leading. Forthe purposes of this paper the two terms will be used interchange-ably. For more on this debate, see Klenke (1996).

3. Klenke (1996) provides a thorough review of the problems with tra-ditional social science research. She discusses problems with tempo-rality and methodology among others.

4. For criticisms of this position see Billing and Alevesson (2000) andStivers (2002).

5. For additional research on men and women in state government seeGuy (1992), Women and Men of the States.

6. Riccucci (1995) includes two profiles of women administrative lead-ers in Unsung Heroes, and Hartman (1999) includes Christy ToddWhitman among the leaders she interviews.

7. On a historical note, Jane Addams should be mentioned. She helpedfound the American settlement house movement, which creatednumerous opportunities for women to gain hands-on administrative



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and political experiences. She also wrote about how her leadershipexperiences were shaped and reshaped through direct contact andfirst-hand experience with the very people she was trying to help(Addams 1910/1961; 2002). See Stivers (2000) for a full discussion.

8. Mary Parker Follett pioneered in the view that leading and adminis-tering are situational and relational practices, and she argued thatpower should be understood as power with, not over, subordinates.

9. For additional discussion on relational leadership see Lipman-Blumen(1992).

10. More recent work by J. B. Rosener includes America’s CompetitiveSecret: Utilizing Women as a Management Strategy (1995) andAmerica’s Competitive Secret, Women Managers (1997).

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Politics. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Books.Alvesson, M., and Y. Billing. 1997. Understanding Gender and

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Billing,Y., and M.Alvesson. 2000.“Questioning the Notion of FeminineLeadership:A Critical Perspective on the Gender Labeling ofLeadership.” Gender, Work, and Organization, 7(3):144-157.

Brunner, C. 2000. Principles of Power:Women Superintendents and theRiddle of the Heart. Albany: State University Press of New York.

Carli, L., and A. Eagly. 2001.“Gender, Hierarchy, and Leadership:AnIntroduction.” Journal of Social Issues, 57(4):629-636.

Cayer, N. J., and L.Weschler. 2003. Public Administration: Social Changeand Adaptive Management. San Diego: Birkdale Publishers.

Cooper,T., ed. 1992. Exemplary Public Administrators. San Francisco:Jossey-Bass.

Denhardt, R., J. Denhardt, and M.Aristigueta. 2002. Managing HumanBehavior in Public and Nonprofit Organizations. Thousand Oaks,CA: Sage.

Duerst-Lahti, G., and C. Johnson. 1990.“Gender and Style in Bureaucracy.”Women and Politics, 10(1):67-120.

Duerst-Lahti, G., and R. M. Kelly, eds. 1995. Gender Power, Leadership,and Governance. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.

Eagly,A., and L. Carli. 2003.“The Female Leadership Advantage:AnEvaluation of the Evidence.” The Leadership Quarterly, 14:807-834.

Edlund, C. 1992.“Humanizing the Workplace: Incorporating FeminineLeadership.” In M.T. Bailey and R. Mayer, eds., Public Management inan Interconnected World. New York: Greenwood Press.

Fletcher, J. 2001. Disappearing Acts: Gender, Power, and RelationalPractice at Work. Cambridge, MA:The MIT Press.

Fox, R., and R. Schuhmann. 1999.“Gender and Local Government:AComparison of Women and Men City Managers.” PublicAdministration Review, 59(3): 231-242.

Guy, M., ed. 1992. Women and Men of the States: Public Administratorsat the State Level. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe.

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DeLysa Burnier is an associate professor at Ohio University, where she teaches public administration in the Department of PoliticalScience. She is a Presidential Teacher at Ohio University, and she publishes in the areas of gender and public administration and inter-pretive policy analysis. Her doctorate is from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

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Leadership education in public affairs schools is itself leadership work.That is, academic entrepreneurs continue to be challenged to clarify justwhat leadership in public affairs is and to develop a widely shared commit-ment and other resources to give leadership an important place in the cur-riculum. In part, this challenge stems from the connection of public affairsto its two main antecedents, policy analysis and public administration.

Public affairs education necessarily has a broad focus—emphasizing, butgoing beyond, the attention to policy analysis and public administration toa major concern with politics and public engagement. Increasingly, publicaffairs educators recognize that public affairs is about governance, ratherthan government; accordingly, public affairs education must question bothhow governments should operate and how the roles of government, non-profit organizations, business, and philanthropic organizations can andshould intertwine.

Notions of leadership are altered in this move from policy analysis andpublic administration to politics and public engagement. Public administra-tion traditionally has paid attention to leadership, but in what is now beingcalled the traditional mode.That is, leadership within public administrationwas confined to the men (usually) who headed government agencies anddepartments (see Selznick, 1957). Initially, these administrative leaderswere viewed as politically neutral—that is, their leadership was in someways separate from and subservient to the political process. Political lead-ers made policies, and administrative leaders operated within bureaucraticstructures to make sure the policies were effectively implemented. Morerecently, scholars have recognized that administrative leaders are hardlyapolitical and play crucial roles in the policy making process (see, forexample, Doig and Hargrove, 1987).

Policy analysis, meanwhile, was hardly concerned with leadership at all.In the traditional policy analysis paradigm, political and administrative lead-ers are the clients or recipients of policy analysis.The ideal role of an ana-lyst is not to lead anyone but to offer leaders factual and statistical analysisof alternative means of responding to a public need. Nevertheless, the ana-

Challenges of Introducing Leadershipinto the Public Affairs Curriculum:

The Case of the Humphrey Institute

Barbara C. Crosby and John M. BrysonUniversity of Minnesota


J-PAE 11 (2005):3:193-205

ABSTRACT

Public affairs practitioners need leadershipskills that can be deployed at various orga-nizational levels and in the various sec-tors—nonprofits, charitable organizations,and business, as well as government.Theyneed leadership skills that help them workcollaboratively across levels and sectors andinvolve diverse stakeholders in publicwork. Helping students of public affairsgain these skills is a leadership challenge,partly because the traditional paradigms ofpublic administration and policy analysisare still potent, even as they are being chal-lenged by newer, more expansive views.This case study traces the successful effort,beginning in the early 1980s, to introduceleadership into the curriculum of theHumphrey Institute of Public Affairs.Theeffort is analyzed using the Leadership forthe Common Good framework and lessonsare offered for others seeking to make lead-ership a prominent part of public affairseducation.

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lyst might provide a role-modeling type of leadershipby reaching high standards of excellence in his orher role.The analyst also might be labeled an intel-lectual leader, one who influences others by theforce of his or her well-crafted ideas and arguments,based on empirical and political analysis.

The public affairs paradigm is much broaderbecause it acknowledges that many public affairspractitioners must recognize and even engage in pol-itics, electoral and otherwise, within and beyondtheir organizations.These practitioners need leader-ship skills that can be deployed at various organiza-tional levels and in the various sectors—nonprofits,charitable organizations, and business, as well as gov-ernment.They need leadership skills that help themwork collaboratively across levels and sectors andinvolve diverse stakeholders in public work.

Helping students of public affairs gain these skillsis a leadership challenge, partly because the tradi-tional paradigms of public administration and policyanalysis are still potent, even as they are being chal-lenged by newer, more expansive views.This situa-tion is mirrored in leadership studies generally. Olderviews of leadership focus on the man, and some-times woman, at the top—of a corporation, a coun-try or other political unit, a nonprofit organization,an agency, or a department. Newer views insist thatleadership can be or should be shared and ubiqui-tous in order to respond to the challenges of leadingorganizations and communities in today’s world (seePearce and Conger, 2003).

The field of leadership studies is still relativelynew and continues to be rife with debates over lead-ership definitions and theories (Osborn, Hunt, Jauch,2002;Alvesson and Sveningsson, 2003; Burns, 2003;Van Wart, 2005). Scholars in schools of publicaffairs—for example, Ronald Heifetz, Robert Terry,and Barbara Kellerman—have made major contribu-tions to these debates.This unsettled quality of lead-ership studies certainly makes the field interesting,but at the same time contributes to difficulty inexpanding the leadership views of public affairs col-leagues who are still attached to leadership conceptsembedded in old public administration and policyanalysis paradigms.

One option for those who want to introduce abroader view of leadership into the public affairscurriculum is to smuggle it in through courses onpublic management. For example, instructors may beable to tack leadership onto the course title andincorporate leadership theory and tools into classsessions.Another approach is to establish coursesdirectly focused on leadership in public affairs.

The remainder of this article is a case study of thesuccessful introduction of leadership directly intothe public affairs curriculum at the HumphreyInstitute of Public Affairs, starting in the early 1980s.We, the authors, have been thoroughly involved inthe case as faculty and administrators.After a briefhistory we will analyze the leadership challengesfaced by the supporters of the initiative. Our aim isto draw lessons from this experience that seem tooffer guidance for any champion of leadership edu-cation in public affairs.The analysis will use theLeadership for the Common Good framework, whichwe formulated as we worked with our HumphreyInstitute colleagues in the 1980s and 1990s to makesense of the disparate ideas and research about lead-ership that seemed to have relevance for publicaffairs education.

INTRODUCING LEADERSHIP EDUCATION

AT THE HUMPHREY INSTITUTE, 1980S

Harlan Cleveland, former University of Hawaiipresident and former ambassador to NATO, wasnamed the first dean of the Humphrey Institute ofPublic Affairs in 1980.The institute was establishedin 1977 as a living legacy to former Senator and VicePresident Hubert H. Humphrey and as a successor tothe School of Public Affairs at the University ofMinnesota. Cleveland argued that the instituteshould offer leadership education, based on his per-ception that people who had risen to levels of majorresponsibility in government, nonprofits, and busi-nesses often were expected to lead within and out-side their organizations with little formal preparationfor leadership. Partly based on his own experiencein such positions, Cleveland believed that these peo-ple could benefit from opportunities to think broad-ly and systematically about their organizations, social

Challenges of Introducing Leadership into the Public Affairs Curriculum





and political trends, and public policy issues.As aveteran activist public administrator, Cleveland wasvery aware that capable, thoughtful administrators,analysts, and program managers could have greatinfluence on public policies and certainly on theirimplementation. He wanted to take these often busypeople and slow them down—give them a chanceto listen to insightful thinkers and reflect on how toapply new ideas in their own practice.

Cleveland launched the Education for ReflectiveLeadership Program, which began with a noncredit,year-long Leadership in Public Policy Seminar, sup-ported by tuition and a major foundation grant. In1981, Robert Terry was appointed director of theprogram, which he would rename the ReflectiveLeadership Center. Over the next decade,Terryexpanded seminar offerings, added workshops andconsultations, and convened local and national schol-ars, including ourselves, to debate leadership defini-tions, frameworks, and instructional approaches.(One of us, Barbara, became a part of the centerstaff. John participated in some center activities, butmainly served as faculty for Humphrey Institutedegree programs.)

During the 1980s, Reflective Leadership seminarswere offered on a credit and noncredit basis; theflagship Leadership in Public Policy Seminarremained open to general enrollees, but we orga-nized many other seminars for specific groups, suchas clergy, arts educators, legislators, and schoolsuperintendents.The approach was interactive andexperimental: we used a combination of large andsmall group discussion, we assigned reflective exer-cises, and we invited renowned leadership scholarsas presenters, but we also encouraged the learnersto take responsibility for shaping sessions.Appropriately, the Reflective Leadership instruction-al programs were aimed at reflective practitioners(see Schön, 1987); we viewed participants as noviceor experienced practitioners who sought newknowledge and opportunities to experiment withand reconstruct that knowledge so it would be use-ful in their leadership practice.A key role of instruc-tors in these programs was to help participantsreflect on their own leadership gifts, or calling, in adiverse and often messy and ambiguous world. In

order to design the programs, we had to adopt atleast a working definition of leadership.At the sametime, we prompted participants to develop theirown definitions.

This leadership activity at the Humphrey Institutewas part of the broader ferment in the developingfield of leadership studies.At the end of the 1970s,James MacGregor Burns had published his seminalbook Leadership (Burns, 1978). He argued, contro-versially, that a fundamental task of leaders wasmeeting followers’ authentic needs and contributingto their moral development. He focused particularlyon political leaders and placed social ethics at theheart of leadership. For a school of public affairs,Burns’ arguments meant that the instruction of aspir-ing public servants should focus on more than theefficient administration of a government or nonprof-it agency, careful assessment of costs and benefits ofalternative policy options, or constructing winningelectoral campaigns. People who aspired to be lead-ers of government and nonprofit organizations or ofa society would need opportunities to study andreflect on the moral and ethical requirements ofbuilding a better world. During the 1980s, people inthe Reflective Leadership Center developed our ownleadership frameworks that also gave preeminenceto social ethics.These frameworks provided the basisfor Authentic Leadership (Terry, 1993), Seven Zonesfor Leadership (Terry, 2001), and Leadership for theCommon Good (Bryson and Crosby, 1992; Crosbyand Bryson, 2005).

INSTITUTIONALIZING LEADERSHIP EDUCATION

AT THE HUMPHREY INSTITUTE, 1990S

As Robert Terry prepared to leave the center inthe early 1990s, the two of us teamed up withSharon Anderson, who also had longstanding involve-ment with the center, to ensure that ReflectiveLeadership programs continued at the HumphreyInstitute.As a start, we partially redesigned theLeadership in Public Policy Seminar and renamed itthe Leadership for the Common Good Seminar.

The team understood that leadership educationand research would have to become more promi-nent both at the Humphrey Institute and at theUniversity of Minnesota if this work were to be sus-


tained.That is, we had to become more attentive tointegrating with and shaping the organizational envi-ronment of which the center was a part.Werenewed our efforts to bring together University ofMinnesota colleagues from other professionalschools, collegiate departments, and student affairsto explore leadership theory, to share best practicesin leadership education, and to develop new cross-disciplinary courses. Out of this initiative grew anundergraduate leadership minor, a partnership of theHumphrey Institute, the College of Education, andthe Office for Student Affairs. Now in its sixth yearof full operation, the minor helps students developas citizens and leaders at the campus, community,and global levels.

The Reflective Leadership team also played aprominent role in convincing other institute facultyand administrators that the time was finally right inthe late 1990s to launch a midcareer degree.The uni-versity administration was putting pressure on col-leges to develop revenue-generating programs, andhad made the decision to move from a quarter to asemester system, a move that opened opportunitiesfor curriculum innovation.The new midcareer master of public affairs (MPA) program could takeadvantage of this shift in the Humphrey Institute’sorganizational environment.The university’s Board ofRegents approved the new degree program in 1998,and it was launched in fall 1999.

Leadership would be the theme of the first ofthree core courses in the new MPA program, whichwould also incorporate much of the curriculumalready being used in the main seminar offered bythe Reflective Leadership Center.The first corecourse is called Leadership for the Common Goodand introduces participants to numerous leadershiptheories while emphasizing the development ofstrategies for their own leadership work.The plansfor this course and for the second core course,Transforming Public Policy, are shaped by theLeadership for the Common Good framework.Thefirst course covers leadership in context and person-al, team, organizational, visionary, political, and ethi-cal leadership.The second emphasizes policy entre-preneurship and the phases of the policy changeprocess.The third core course is a client-focused

workshop in which participants apply what theyhave learned about leadership and policy change tospecific policy problems.

In addition to the importance of leadership in theMPA program, several leadership courses are nowincluded in the leadership and management concen-tration for the Humphrey Institute’s Master of PublicPolicy (MPP) degree.Additionally, leadership receivesexplicit attention in one of the MPP core courses.

To launch and sustain the leadership minor andthe MPA program and to give students in the insti-tute’s other degree programs a chance to take lead-ership courses, the Reflective Leadership team need-ed to ensure that additional faculty and graduate stu-dents were prepared to teach these courses.Twoadditional faculty members now teach theLeadership for the Common Good course, and twograduate students have cotaught courses in the lead-ership minor.

The team also brought the Humphrey Institute’sinternational fellows into the Reflective LeadershipCenter, where they participated in the Leadership inPublic Policy Seminar and the successor Leadershipfor the Common Good Seminar.The presence ofinternational fellows in these seminars facilitatedconsiderable mutual learning between U.S. and inter-national participants and also placed intensedemands on seminar designers to make readings anddiscussions relevant for people from many differentsocieties.

As the Reflective Leadership Center prepared tocelebrate its twentieth anniversary in 2001, it heldfocus groups of alumni to consider future directionsfor the Humphrey Institute’s leadership programs.One important result was the Advocacy Leadershipfor Vital Aging Program, now in its second year andsponsored by the Humphrey Institute, College ofContinuing Education, the Vital Aging Network, andother partners.

Leadership education in public affairs is nowinstitutionalized at the Humphrey Institute and theUniversity of Minnesota.Although such institutional-ization is vital to sustaining policy change, there is adownside. Some of the distinctive attributes of theLeadership for the Common Good seminar havebeen lost in its transition to becoming a core course




in the MPA program. For example, the seminar nolonger includes opening and midterm off-campusretreats as it did in the pre-MPA years. For the firstfive years of the MPA program, some elements of theold retreats, such as personal leadership assessmentsand reflection, were built into the MPA orientation.Now that orientation has been combined with theorientation for the Institute’s other degree programsand no longer includes attention to leadership devel-opment.

Additionally, the Reflective Leadership Center was folded into the new Public and NonprofitLeadership Center in 2003. On the up side, thischange broadens and heightens the visibility of lead-ership research and teaching at the HumphreyInstitute. More faculty, fellows, and graduate studentswill collaborate on research about leadership andmanagement in public affairs. On the down side, theReflective Leadership brand is lost, and the newname provides less information about the center’sguiding view of leadership.

THE LEADERSHIP CHALLENGES

We developed the Leadership for the CommonGood framework in order to help public affairs prac-titioners tackle public problems effectively in today’sshared-power world (Cleveland, 1973; Cleveland,1985; Bryson and Einsweiler, 1991). Based on ourstudy of leadership theory and practice, we definedleadership as “the inspiration and mobilization ofothers to undertake collective action in pursuit ofthe common good” (Bryson and Crosby, 1992, 31).The framework highlights eight main leadershipcapabilities:

• Leadership in context—understanding thesocial, political, economic, and technologicalgivens and taking advantage of opportunitiesfor change.

• Personal leadership—understanding self andothers and deploying that understanding in aleadership effort.

• Team leadership—building effective workgroups.

• Organizational leadership—nurturing humaneand effective organizations.

• Visionary leadership—creating and communi-

cating shared meaning in forums.• Political leadership—making and implementing

decisions in legislative, executive, and adminis-trative arenas.

• Ethical leadership—adjudicating disputes incourts and sanctioning conduct.

• Policy entrepreneurship—coordinating leader-ship tasks over the course of policy changecycles.

We will now consider how supporters of leader-ship education at the Humphrey Institute dealt withthe challenges of exercising these capabilities andsuggest how their experience might be helpful toothers seeking to make leadership a major part ofthe public affairs curriculum.

LEADERSHIP IN CONTEXT

To successfully launch a major change effort, lead-ers must be attuned to social, political, economic,and technological forces and trends. Harlan Clevelandunderstood and took advantage of important social,political, and economic aspects of the context heencountered at the University of Minnesota. He rec-ognized a new opportunity to serve midcareer learn-ers, whom the university had not previously consid-ered to be a particularly important audience.As thedean of the Humphrey Institute, he knew that, giventhe school’s name, people with liberal Democraticleanings would most likely be drawn to Instituteprograms, but he also knew that a school of publicaffairs needed to reach out to at least moderateRepublicans in order to retain broad support for theInstitute and to achieve credibility as a nonpartisan,academic institution. He saw the Institute as both sit-uated in Minnesota and in the world. He worked tobuild support for the institute’s new building and itsprograms at the state legislature; he also recognizedthe need to involve the institute in national andinternational policy debates and sometimes to be aleader in shaping those debates.The creation of theHumphrey Institute, along with its accompanyingendowment, gave Cleveland an economic base toproceed with innovations and helped him raisefoundation funds for his projects.






Robert Terry, partly because of his experiencewith community organizing in inner-city Detroit, alsowas attuned to the increased visibility and impact ofleaders from communities of color.Those of us inthe Reflective Leadership Center made ethnic diver-sity an important criterion as we recruited seminarparticipants and group leaders.An additional impor-tant force in the social context was the growth ofwomen’s interest in leadership. Many womenenrolled in the early Reflective Leadership seminars,but they were dismayed that much of the seminarcontent (drawing on dominant leadership literature)related poorly to their own experiences and aspira-tions. Similarly, very little of the leadership literaturein the early 1980s focused on people of color andpeople outside the United States.As a result,Reflective Leadership staff strove to identity andincorporate examples of leadership by women andpeople of color, as well as to critique “in-charge” defi-nitions and models of leadership.We also workedwith several women at the Humphrey Institute toestablish specialized leadership programs forwomen, including Leadership for Black Women anda multi-year seminar series cosponsored by theJunior League.

Like the founders of the Humphrey Institute’sleadership program, those who currently seek tomake leadership education a central part of the cur-riculum at a public affairs school must attune theirefforts to the unique context in which they findthemselves.Additionally, they must deal with a moregeneral set of environmental forces and trends thatare different from those of the early 1980s.They maybe hampered by the harsh funding realities for pub-lic universities and by foundations’ pullback fromfunding leadership education.At the same time,demand for public affairs leadership educationremains strong among midcareer learners; under-graduates are enrolling in leadership majors andminors, which often promote active citizenship, andnew immigrant groups and older adults are growingaudiences.Additionally, the organizers of publicaffairs leadership education now can draw on a sub-stantial literature about women in leadership and asmaller but growing literature on leadership by peo-ple of color and people outside the United States.

Attention to the effects of class and other differ-ences—such as religion—on leadership is still mini-mal, although grassroots leadership is increasinglyrecognized and researched.The initiators of publicaffairs leadership education also can learn fromother schools’ best practices in designing leadershipprograms that serve diverse participants.They maystill need determination to incorporate fully and ade-quately attention to leadership by diverse groupsand to equalize power in the classroom so that peo-ple from marginalized groups have an opportunityto safely air their questions and perspectives.Participants in Humphrey Institute leadership cours-es often say that the opportunity to hear from adiverse group of classmates and diverse speakers is aprime component of their learning.They note, how-ever, that conservative perspectives are still under-represented in the courses.

Technological developments had relatively little importance in the launch of the ReflectiveLeadership program. Instructors relied on face-to-face teaching, overhead projectors, and flip charts.Since the mid-1980s, however, the rise of the Internetand other instructional technology have raisedexpectations that instructors will use multiple mediain their courses, from PowerPoints, to computer-assisted simulations, to course-related Web sites.

PERSONAL LEADERSHIP

The chief challenge of personal leadership is howto identify and use personal assets and overcomepersonal liabilities related to the leadership work.The founders of the Reflective Leadership programsdrew on their personal qualities and resources tolaunch and develop the seminars and discussiongroups. Harlan Cleveland deployed his experienceand credibility as someone who had served in topdiplomatic and policy positions in several presiden-tial administrations. He had written about the gener-alist skills (such as intellectual curiosity, a taste forcomplexity, willingness to take risks) that executiveleaders need (Cleveland, 1973). He also was able toconsult his extensive Rolodex to invite thoughtfulfuturists, policy analysts, and other academics to beguest speakers at the early Reflective Leadershipseminars. Cleveland’s own persistent curiosity and




concern about finding solutions to crucial publicpolicy challenges (such as international security)provided an example of how personal passions andpublic needs are linked in leadership. Finally, by thetime he came to the Humphrey Institute, Clevelandhad an almost Olympian aura—his carefully chosenwords could easily be heard as pronouncementsfrom the high peaks of public administration andpolicy making.When he spoke at Humphrey Instituteseminars, participants listened, sometimes worship-fully.At the same time, Cleveland did not have a Ph.D.and lacked the record of scholarly academic researchthat counted a great deal with many institute faculty,who themselves had had to build a outstandingresearch records in order to obtain tenure. Many faculty were skeptical of a subject area—leadership—that was being brought into institute programmingby someone without the kind of academic creden-tials they respected.

Robert Terry did have a string of academic cre-dentials, but they were somewhat unusual for aschool of public affairs. His Ph.D. studies were insocial ethics at the University of Chicago; he also hada master of divinity degree from Colgate Rochesterand was an ordained minister.After completing hisPh.D., he had engaged in community organizing inDetroit. He came to the Humphrey Institute as asenior fellow, a category for practitioners with anacademic bent who could bring their own publicaffairs experience to bear on research and teaching.Terry’s intellectual curiosity was even more wide-ranging than Cleveland’s. His persona was optimistic,hearty, humorous, charismatic. He pressed peoplewho worked with him and participated in his semi-nars to think hard; he enjoyed pushing them out oftheir comfort zones. He was an engaging speakerand insisted that Reflective Leadership seminars belively and participative. He was ready to experimentwith new ways of fostering learning, from outdoororienteering experiences to movement exercises inthe classroom. He insisted that those interested inhelping him design and present the seminars alsoparticipate in developing a solid theoretical founda-tion for leadership practice and teaching.

The founders’ personalities marked the ReflectiveLeadership programs, in most cases generating sup-

port and in other cases skepticism or worse.The dis-tinctive qualities that they fostered in the programsmarked them as different from the institute’s regularcurriculum, even though some Reflective Leadershipseminars were offered for graduate credit.The teamthat succeeded Cleveland and Terry consciouslyworked to mitigate the problematic aspects of thefounders’ legacy. Crucially, one of us was a tenuredprofessor with a strong research record; additionally,we increasingly invited other members of thetenured faculty to be guest presenters or partners inleadership courses and seminars.

The supporters of leadership education in publicaffairs should think carefully about how to use theirpersonal assets and overcome personal liabilities asthey fight for new courses and programs.Theyshould be aware of the lasting impact of founders’characteristics. In the Humphrey Institute case,scholarly reputation and leadership experience wereimportant assets of the two founders.At the sametime, they did not have some of the academic cre-dentials that were respected by the public affairs fac-ulty.Today, an increasing number of scholars havewritten Ph.D. dissertations and published books andjournal articles on leadership, so curriculum reform-ers may come from—or certainly recruit from—theirranks. Nevertheless, organizers of leadership pro-grams may still need significant leadership experi-ence in order to have credibility with program par-ticipants.To institutionalize these programs, reform-ers probably will need to give tenured faculty a verysignificant role.

Among the personal qualities that appear to havebeen crucial to the success of the HumphreyInstitute reformers are a zest for innovation and will-ingness to take risks, courage, broad thinking, anintense interest in practical big ideas, and a talent forbuilding bridges to diverse groups.These qualitiesare likely to be important for anyone who seeks tofollow in our footsteps.

TEAM LEADERSHIP

The central challenge of team leadership is howto recruit and retain a group of people who are com-mitted to a shared purpose and who have or devel-op needed interpersonal and task-related skills.An




additional challenge is how to develop the leader-ship capacity of team members so that all the leader-ship tasks do not fall on one person and so newleaders are prepared to step into formal leadershiproles when initial leaders leave. Early on, RobertTerry instigated a team approach to designing andconducting the leadership seminars. He was adept atgenerating excitement about the mutual work andallowing individuals to assume responsibility formajor tasks. He could also be scathing in his cri-tiques of team members’ performance and madden-ingly inattentive to detail, but in general he was veryskilled at motivating people to work well beyondwhat could have been explained by paychecks andjob descriptions.

In the early years of Reflective Leadership pro-grams, Robert Terry welcomed a variety of people tojoin teams that were exploring the nature of leader-ship and organizing instructional programs.Thesepeople typically brought needed assets—such ascritical thinking, entrepreneurial spirit, or under-standing of particular audiences—and they oftenwere willing to work with the center for little or nopay.As his successors attempting to institutionalizeleadership education, we had to pay more attentionto developing more formal arrangements with ourpartners and to reduce the hidden costs associatedwith volunteer labor.

The team that succeeded Terry—that is, SharonAnderson and us—had developed a great deal ofconfidence in each other’s skills and a commitmentto Reflective Leadership programs over the previousdecade.That level of trust enabled us to stay on thesame page, to back each other up, to take turnsbeing in leadership roles, and to readily acceptassignments from each other.The support weobtained from each other, from satisfied participants,and from University of Minnesota colleagues inter-ested in leadership sustained our spirits despite thecontinued, somewhat marginal status of leadershipstudies at the Humphrey Institute.We struggled tosecure the funding and legitimacy that were neededto keep the center afloat and to sustain leadershipteaching and research.

We thought of everyone who worked regularlywith our leadership programs as a team member and

convened weekly and special meetings to keep eachother informed, do strategic planning, celebrateaccomplishments, and make decisions about whichprograms to pursue.We organized social events ateach other’s homes or as part of planning retreats inorder to foster interpersonal connections beyondjob descriptions.We also relied on numerous special-ized teams to organize and conduct particular semi-nars, service activities, or research projects.

The Humphrey Institute experience indicates thatreformers should assemble a team that is entrepre-neurial and fascinated by leadership and publicaffairs (whether or not they begin with a lot ofknowledge about the subject), and deeply commit-ted to intellectual exploration and effective leader-ship education. The inclusion of tenured faculty islikely to enhance the team’s legitimacy and help sus-tain its work over the long haul. Providing opportu-nities for team members to develop and test curricu-lum, organize new seminars, or undertake researchprojects helps ensure that they will be prepared tocontinue the work of the team even after initial lead-ers leave.Attending to the social life of the teamenhances trust and spirit, which contribute to highteam performance (Crosby and Bryson, 2005).

Organizational LeadershipThose who seek to make major changes in an

organization face the challenge of linking theirreforms to the organization’s mission and overcom-ing barriers to change that are embedded in theorganization’s design. The reformers will need toshow how their initiatives help the organization dealwith shifts in external and internal environment anddemonstrate their organizational citizenship.

The supporters of leadership education at theHumphrey Institute could easily link their work tothe institute’s mission of education for publicresponsibility. Overcoming organizational barrierswas a significant challenge, however. The institute’sdesign primarily facilitated offering professionaldegrees to people in their twenties, whereas theReflective Leadership program was aimed at mid-career learners, many of whom were not interestedin degrees. Moreover, the design of the institute’sdegree programs placed little to no emphasis on


leadership.The faculty was dominated by policy ana-lysts who were adept at using sophisticated analytictools to assess public policies; they tended to seeleadership as a soft, process-dominated field, com-pared to their rigorous, content-oriented field.

The transition from the School of Public Affairs(which was within the College of Liberal Arts) to theexpanded, freestanding Humphrey Institute of PublicAffairs, along with the appointment of the first dean,provided an opportunity to introduce new program-ming—in this case, leadership education for midca-reer audiences. Later, the supporters of leadershipeducation were able to take advantage of pressurescausing the institute to seek other sources of rev-enue and win approval for the MPA degree programand the leadership minor.The launch of the MPAprogram coincided with major curriculum reformthat accompanied the university’s shift to semestersfrom a quarter system.Throughout the efforts to sus-tain leadership education at the institute, the peoplein the Reflective Leadership Center were constantlyaware of the need for leadership programs to paytheir own way and if possible to contribute revenuesto the institute as a whole.

Meanwhile, the leadership education advocates atthe Humphrey Institute were intensely engagedalong with a host of national and global colleaguesin enhancing the status of leadership studies as alegitimate topic of scholarly research. (See additionaldiscussion in the next section.) Making sure that theHumphrey Institute’s leadership programs werebased on and included solid scholarly research wasimportant for obtaining support from faculty col-leagues but also for attracting many participants.

Additionally, our team attempted to familiarize fac-ulty colleagues with leadership by inviting them tobe presenters in Reflective Leadership seminars.Aswe and other Humphrey faculty began teachingundergraduate leadership courses, we also had tochange our style to fit the interests and expectationsof students who were still making the transition toadulthood.

The Reflective Leadership team did marketresearch to provide evidence that adequate demandfor an MPA Humphrey degree existed and to ensurethat the program would meet participants’ needs.We

also were able to build evidence of quality andimpact through continual evaluation of our pro-grams.The evaluations enabled us to make mid-course corrections and improve the next iteration ofseminars, workshops, and the like.

The Humphrey Institute experience indicates thatleadership education can be made more prominentin the public affairs curriculum at times of transi-tion, such as changes in top positional leadership ora sweeping curriculum review. Reformers shouldcontinually emphasize the importance of leadershipeducation in carrying out the mission of a school ofpublic affairs.They should demonstrate how leader-ship education can help the school better meet theneeds of existing and new audiences and thus be amore sustainable enterprise. Moreover, reformersshould find ways to foster more widespread under-standing of leadership and appropriate teachingmethods among their colleagues.

Visionary LeadershipThe visionary challenge for advocates of leader-

ship education in public affairs is to create sharedunderstanding of leadership and how it fits in publicaffairs education.They must develop specific, com-pelling visions for leadership education.The groupof scholars and practitioners convened by RobertTerry embarked on our own journey of explorationto figure out what was really going on in leadershipstudies, to put names on different types of leader-ship, and to develop coherent, comprehensive theo-ry that could form the foundation for our teachingand further research.We had to admit our own igno-rance and listen carefully to others who had alreadythought deeply about leadership definitions andpractices.Through our teaching and publications, wecreated and communicated a new shared meaning ofleadership and leadership education.We envisionedleadership as a practice accessible to people at alllevels of organizations, in all walks of life, and indiverse cultures, though we recognized that leader-ship would be enacted differently in different envi-ronments.

After Robert Terry left the institute, the ReflectiveLeadership team concentrated on a vision of leader-ship education as a major part of graduate education




at the Humphrey Institute and of undergraduateeducation at the University of Minnesota.The teamwas able to see what a mid-career program empha-sizing leadership would be like and could help oth-ers incorporate the vision into their idea of the insti-tute’s future.The vision was based in the real experi-ence of having taught leadership to mid-career audi-ences.We communicated our vision of how the pro-gram could work and why we believed it wouldstand out from competing programs.While somecolleagues were skeptical that we could succeed, wewere not, and with an all-out effort and the assis-tance of numerous supporters, we enacted the reali-ty we envisioned.

The designers of the undergraduate leadershipminor had a vision of combining for-credit coursesand cocurricular leadership and service programs togive undergraduates a coherent, credit-bearing lead-ership development experience.The design teamsaw the unusual possibility of creating an academicprogram that would include two collegiate units andthe office of student affairs as equal partners.Theteam also was able to translate its ideas into a specif-ic set of core and elective courses that fit the univer-sity’s liberal education principles and requirementsfor an undergraduate minor.

Today, reformers should not have to work so hardto ensure that leadership is seen as academicallylegitimate.They may still have to help colleaguesunderstand the links between leadership and policyanalysis and to broaden the definition of leadershipbeyond the work of elected officials and top admin-istrators.

POLITICAL LEADERSHIP

The challenge of political leadership is to obtainneeded decisions from policy makers. Curriculumreformers may not find this so difficult when a topdecision maker is a prime supporter of reform. Long-term survival, however, is likely to require building acoalition that includes supportive faculty. During the1980s, the Reflective Leadership programs wereinsulated from the other parts of the HumphreyInstitute, especially the degree programs.This isola-tion permitted experimentation, but it also kept

many faculty from knowing much about the center’swork. Generally, faculty attitudes ranged from skepti-cism about the notion that leadership could orshould be taught to outright opposition to devotingresources to a program that was not obviously con-nected to the disciplines and fields then at the heartof the public affairs curriculum. Since then, facultyand staff who argue that leadership education iscentral to public affairs education have come a longway in legitimizing leadership as an instructionaland research emphasis, but they still have a way to go.

The Reflective Leadership team was able toassemble a dominant coalition to launch the MPAprogram. John Brandl, who became the HumphreyInstitute’s dean in 1998, had been convinced of thevalue and distinctiveness of midcareer educationthrough his involvement in the institute’s summerprogram for legislative staff from around the coun-try. He also recognized the importance of respond-ing to pressures from central administration for newrevenue-generating programs. Nancy Eustis, the asso-ciate dean and the director of graduate studies, pro-vided considerable help in securing funding tolaunch the program, navigating bureaucratic require-ments for establishing a new degree program, andconvincing other faculty of the importance of pro-ceeding with the new degree.

Also helpful was support for leadership educationat the highest levels of the university. RobertBruininks, the university executive vice presidentand provost who approved start-up funds for theMPA program, was a supporter of the ReflectiveLeadership Center, and he is now president of theuniversity.A vice provost, Eugene Allen, also provid-ed funds for an all-university affinity group thathelped launch the leadership minor, which also hashad strong support from vice presidents who over-see student affairs.

Those who seek to make leadership educationmore central in schools of public affairs certainlyshould seek to build a coalition of supporters amongfaculty and others within the schools.They shouldalso build alliances with satisfied alumni of their pro-grams and powerful people elsewhere in their uni-versities.




ETHICAL LEADERSHIP

The challenge of ethical leadership is to ensurethat people operate programs in ways that honor rel-evant ethical principles, laws, and norms. Critical toethical leadership is commitment to, and educationof others about, basic ethical principles.The mainprinciple upheld by the Reflective Leadership teamis that education, in this case leadership education,should meet the needs of a diverse set of participants.We enacted our commitment to this principle byrecruiting participants from diverse backgrounds andtrying, with mixed success, to provide scholarshipsfor low-income participants.Additionally, we workedhard—often at the insistence of participants—tomake seminar content and delivery methods mean-ingful and accessible to people from different cul-tures, genders, physical abilities, and nationalities.

Another important ethical principle espoused bythe Reflective Leadership team was a commitmentto learners’ development.Thus, we promoted a class-room environment in which learners could safelydisagree with each other, question their own beliefs,and encounter radically different views.We werecommitted to open academic inquiry about thenature of leadership, and we strove to join this withan emphasis—in keeping with James MacGregorBurns’ views—on working with people to maketheir organizations both more efficient and humane,to build communities that benefit all citizens, and toproduce a more peaceful world.

A key enforcement mechanism for ensuring thatour actions adhered to these principles was theinformal court of public opinion; that is, if partici-pants and potential participants in our programsthought that instructors were violating these princi-ples, they could punish the instructors by notattending or by organizing a classroom revolt. Ofcourse, formal bodies within the university rewardthose who uphold—and punish those who violate—principles like learner security and freedom ofinquiry. More immediately, however, the evaluationswe conducted ourselves, often of every course ses-sion, and evaluations by others highlighted gapsbetween the espoused ethical theories and theories-in-use (Argyris, 1993), and we were prompted tomake changes to remedy those gaps. On more than

one occasion, evaluations revealed such serious dis-satisfaction that we knew we had to make substan-tial changes or face the possibility that our coursesor even our center could fail.

The Humphrey Institute experience indicates thatsupporters of leadership education should explicitlyidentify and publicize the ethical principles thatunderlie their own practice.They should stay awareof the formal and informal mechanisms that rewardand punish violations of the principles and associat-ed rules and norms. Finally, they should use both in-house and independent evaluations to find outwhether they are living up to their own philosophyof leadership education, as well as ethical and legalrequirements mandated by the institutions in whichthey exist.

POLICY ENTREPRENEURSHIP

Policy entrepreneurship is the practice of think-ing systematically about policy change and bringingall the other types of leadership to bear on the changeeffort. Stakeholder analysis and involvement is proba-bly the most fundamental ongoing task in this work.In the Humphrey Institute case, advocates of leader-ship education had to pay close attention to existingor potential program participants, faculty colleagues,funders, competitors, university administrators, andalumni.We focused on finding where stakeholders’self-interests intersected with an overarching interestin establishing leadership education as a strong com-ponent of public affairs education at the HumphreyInstitute. (For more in-depth explanation of how self-interest, supra-interests, and the common good arelinked, see Bryson, Cunningham, and Lokkesmoe,2002; Bryson, 2004.) The Humphrey Institute experi-ence certainly underscores the practical wisdom ofalways paying attention to stakeholders.

Of course, policy entrepreneurs must carefullyanalyze their own involvement in a change effort.For example, they must be strategic about when andhow to move into and out of visible leadership roles.Perhaps paradoxically, in order to institutionalizeleadership education at the Humphrey Institute, thethree-person Reflective Leadership team that suc-ceeded Bob Terry has needed to reduce its stake inthis work. Although we continue to be prime




movers in the MPA and minor courses and continueto champion leadership teaching and research, wehave drawn other faculty into teaching these cours-es. Both of the authors of this paper served as direc-tors of the MPA program, but now another facultymember has that job. Sharon Anderson has nowretired from the institute, although she serves as aconsultant on several institute projects. Part of theinstitutionalization process of a new policy regime isreducing the identification of the regime with itsfounders. Expanding the leadership team beyondfounding members also increases the likelihood thatnew projects and programs will survive the depar-ture of the founders.

Also key to institutionalization is finding ways tobring what was marginal into the mainstream. In thiscase, making leadership a central component of anew degree program enhanced its staying power inan organization that is in the degree-granting business.

CONCLUSIONS AND LESSONS LEARNED

Leadership, as many scholars emphasize, isrequired to help groups identify or renew theirshared purposes, tackle complex problems, and sum-mon resources—including especially energy andcommitment—for pursuing a path that offers thepromise of producing beneficial outcomes for thegroup and broader communities.The leadershipwork of establishing leadership education as a vitalpart of research and teaching at the HumphreyInstitute has helped the institute invigorate andexpand its mission of educating graduate studentsfor public service and conducting useful researchinto public policy and the democratic process. Inthis case, the problem was how to respond to a newenvironment (the move from the School of PublicAffairs to the Humphrey Institute, the growing pres-sure on the University of Minnesota to serve moreconstituencies, the need to find new revenuesources).Various entrepreneurs, starting with HarlanCleveland, marshaled their own resources, alongwith the resources of participants in ReflectiveLeadership programs, of foundations, and of the uni-versity to take up this challenge.

Earlier in this paper we have presented severallessons from this experience in connection with the

key leadership capabilities.We will add four generallessons:

1. Seek excellence in teaching and research. Inorder to gain respect and legitimacy at an academicinstitution, the leadership curriculum must be basedon well-crafted theories and research about leader-ship practices. In an institution like the University ofMinnesota that highly values research and teaching,anyone promoting leadership education in publicaffairs should strive for excellence in teaching andpublished research.

2. Find ways to stay energized. Our account ofthe Humphrey Institute case is somewhat dispassion-ate, especially when compared to the intense feel-ings we experienced as a classroom erupted infierce debate about racism or as colleagues harshlyor subtly argued that leadership is unimportant orunteachable.We and our allies were sometimes emo-tionally and physically drained by the effort to buildnew, sometimes controversial, programs.We some-times wanted to give up. Our energies wererenewed, however, by colleagues at the HumphreyInstitute, elsewhere in the university and at otheruniversities who appreciated and supported ourinnovative teaching methods and attention to aneglected area of professional development.We alsoare continually renewed by the response of publicaffairs students hungry for this attention to theirown and others’ leadership development.

3.Accept the need to lead and build in account-ability. Leadership education is an especiallydemanding vocation. If you’re going to teach aboutleadership, you logically accept the imperative tolead.We and our Humphrey Institute colleagueshaven’t always been the wisest, most dedicated lead-ers.We’ve procrastinated, made flawed decisions, andcut corners.When our feedback systems haverevealed these flaws, we have had to change our ways.

4. Pay attention to the bottom line. Leadershipprograms that generate substantial revenues appealto diverse academic factions. Conversely, programsthat financially drain their organizations are vulnera-ble no matter how stellar the programs are.

Institutionalizing leadership education in publicaffairs at the University of Minnesota has taken morethan two decades.The field of leadership studies has




come of age during the same period. Now theNational Association of Schools of Public Affairs andAdministration (NASPAA) is launching a discussionabout whether leadership should be part of the rec-ommended core public affairs curriculum.

Giving leadership prominence in the publicaffairs curriculum should no longer be as difficult asit was when Harlan Cleveland, Robert Terry, andtheir colleagues began this work in the 1980s.Leadership education is now well established at public affairs schools such as the Sanford Institute at Duke University, Harvard’s Kennedy School ofGovernment, and the Humphrey Institute; moreover,the field of leadership studies has attained consider-able academic respectability; and the need forthoughtful leadership in public affairs continues tomount. Nevertheless, the supporters of leadershipeducation will still encounter barriers in buildingstronger leadership programs in schools of publicaffairs, and they should be able to benefit from thelessons learned from their predecessors, such as theReflective Leadership team.

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Anderson, S. R., J. M. Bryson, and B. C. Crosby. 1999. Leadership for theCommon Good Fieldbook. St. Paul, MN: University of MinnesotaExtension Service.

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Burns, James M. 1978. Leadership. New York: Harper Collins._____, James M. 2003. Transforming Leadership:A New Pursuit of

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Barbara C. Crosby is an associate professor at the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, and a member of the Institute'sPublic and Nonprofit Leadership Center at the University of Minnesota. During 2002-2003, she was a visiting fellow at the Universityof Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland. She has taught and written extensively about leadership and public policy, women in leadership,media and public policy, and strategic planning. She is the author of Leadership for Global Citizenship (1999) and co-author withJohn M. Bryson of Leadership for the Common Good (2nd ed., 2005).A frequent speaker at conferences and workshops, she has con-ducted training for senior managers of nonprofit, business, and government organizations in the United States, the United Kingdom,Poland, and Ukraine. She has a an M.A. degree in journalism and mass communication from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Shehas a Ph.D. in leadership studies from the Union Institute.

John M. Bryson is professor and associate dean for research and centers in the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs at theUniversity of Minnesota. He works in the areas of leadership, strategic management, and the design of organizational and communitychange processes. He wrote the best-selling book Strategic Planning for Public and Nonprofit Organizations and co-wroteLeadership for the Common Good. Bryson has received many awards for his work, including the General Electric Award forOutstanding Research in Strategic Planning from the Academy of Management. He serves on the editorial boards of the LeadershipQuarterly, Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Public Management Review, and Journal of Public AffairsEducation.


NASPAA queried member schools about the roleleadership plays in their MPP or MPA curriculum andtheir views on whether it should be in the core cur-riculum. Most schools address leadership somewherein their programs, but its treatment in the core variessignificantly across institutions and even within aschool because of rotations of teachers and syllabi.Course topics and classroom methodologies differsignificantly among programs, and leadership coursesseem to be given significant curricular freedom.Thismay reflect the possibility that a flexible academicapproach is valuable to leadership development, orsimply imply that there is less consensus on methodsfor approaching leadership in the curriculum.

One of the most noticeable debates about leader-ship in the core concerns the differentiation of leader-ship and management.The key questions are whetherthese topics can and should be academically separat-ed, and whether an undifferentiated course in manage-ment (perhaps including elements of leadership) pro-vides an adequate leadership background for theMPP/MPA graduate.While some schools have distin-guished leadership from management in their core,others provide modules or lessons on leadership intheir public management courses. Each program’s defi-nition of leadership in the curriculum dictates thelevel of independence it receives from other elementsof the core.While some leadership courses focusspecifically on traditional organizational theory, othersgo further to include history and theory of leadership,ethics and democratic theory, skills-based approaches,and/or case studies.

Several dozen schools responded to our inquiry ofhow leadership is represented in their core require-ments, and a few themes emerged from their submis-sions. First, many programs are currently examininghow they address leadership in the core and haverecently created courses or have specific plans fornew offerings. Based on the responses, a number ofschools are shifting away from a strictly theoreticalapproach and are moving toward a more experientialand skills-based methodology, focusing on role-playing,classroom exercises, conflict resolution, and negotia-

tion.The other common thread appearing in many ofthe responses is the significance of managing and lead-ing change.A few schools offer courses explicitly onleading change, and several others listed the topic as aprincipal theme in a required or elective course. Hereare some of the approaches.

Schools with Leadership in the CoreEducating principled leaders is a central mission of

the George Bush School of Governmentand Public Service at Texas A&MUniversity. Their program offers students an exten-sive leadership curriculum both in and out of thecore, focusing on five key competency areas to createcommitted, principled, skilled, experienced, and edu-cated public servants.The core leadership course,Leadership and Public Administration, comparesadministrative leadership in practice with alternativetheories of leadership. Students examine the relation-ship between leadership, management, and administra-tive roles in public service. In addition to the core, theBush School requires students to complete theLeadership Program. Leadership assessments andworkshops run concurrently with classes and providestudents with an experiential and skills-based back-ground. Students participate in three separate self-assessments, a semester-long capstone project, and apersonal leadership plan. Guest speakers and a strongprofessional development program supplement theskills-based seminars.

The Maxwell School of SyracuseUniversity addresses leadership lessons through itsExecutive Leadership Seminar requirement. Studentscan take the three-week capstone course offered inthe summer or take an alternate course, such asManagerial Leadership in the Public Sector.This courseintroduces the changing role of leadership andencourages students to address their own leadershipskills. It begins by building an understanding of leader-ship theory and then guides students through experi-ential activities intended to examine their leadershipcompetencies, culminating in a personal leadershipaction plan.



6leadershipbox.207-210 7/6/05 4:26 PM Page 207

The Humphrey Institute at the Universityof Minnesota has a particularly strong leadershipcomponent in its midcareer MPA core curriculum.Thefirst of two required leadership courses is Leadershipfor the Common Good, organized around the bookof the same name. Course topics include leadership intheory and context, as well as personal, team, organi-zational, visionary, political, and ethical leadership.Thesecond course,Transforming Public Policy, stressespolicy entrepreneurship though team projects.Students decide on a policy problem, identify solutions,and devise a political strategy for implementing andprotecting those solutions.The Humphrey core cur-riculum also includes a leadership class titled PublicManagement and Leadership for its early-career MPPstudents.The course largely uses case studies to illus-trate leadership challenges for discussion and analysis.

The core curriculum at the University ofMaryland School of Public Affairs includesPublic Management and Leadership, a course thatemphasizes leadership concepts and frameworks forcomplex public organizations.The goal of the courseis to introduce students to these leadership conceptsand encourage interactive discussion. Case studies anddiscussion of management tools are heavily empha-sized. In all sections, students are required to give anoral presentation on a leadership topic of their choice.Maryland also requires a course on the politicalprocess and public sector organizations titled PoliticalInstitutions and Leadership.This course focusesbroadly on political interaction and decision-making incontrast to the more personal leadership develop-ment emphasis of Public Management and Leadership.

MPA students at Florida InternationalUniversity College of Health and UrbanAffairs are required to take a course on leadershipmechanics.The course strongly emphasizes appliedleadership;“it is designed to teach students to lead.”The curriculum includes the discussion of leadershiptheory and visioning skills; however, the primaryemphasis is on decision-making, group problem-solv-ing, supervisory skills, conflict resolution, and negotia-tion. Games and exercises are a significant componentof classroom activity, allowing students to practice theskills and learn to modify their approaches.

Auburn University also offers a comprehen-sive leadership class in the core for all MPA students.Auburn’s Seminar on Administrative Leadership,Responsibility, and Democratic Government addressesleadership, democratic theory, and ethics for publicadministration.

The School of Public and EnvironmentalAffairs at Indiana University-PurdueUniversity Indianapolis is considering a newcore course, Governing and Leading in a GlobalSociety. Pending final approval, it will be offered begin-ning in Fall 2005. The course is the gateway to thegraduate MPA curriculum and serves several func-tions. It seeks to help students identify their profes-sional competencies as they embark on the graduatepublic affairs degree curriculum and strives toenhance participants’ professionalism by identifyingnorms associated with effective practice and develop-ing skills to support these norms.The course alsoseeks to prepare students substantively to lead andgovern in a global environment. Students develop anunderstanding of globalization as an international sys-tem, models of governance emerging within the newglobal order, and leadership strategies aligned withglobalization and governance.The school also offersan elective course titled Executive Leadership, whichis effectively a requirement for all students in theexecutive program.The course examines factors thatcontribute to successful executive leadership practicein a wide variety of organizational settings.Topicsinclude what leadership is, what impact leadership has,and how leaders use various approaches and powersto achieve their goals. Recent topics have includedleadership and technology, leading different genera-tions, the star performing leader, and leading change.

Walden University offers two MPA courseson leadership. Leadership and Ethics is a required corecourse in Walden’s program for all MPA and PPA stu-dents. Students learn to analyze individual decision-making strategies and organizational programs froman ethical perspective.The course examines complexethical decisions in both the public and private sector.The second offering,Third Sector, Entrepreneurship,Governance and Social Change, focuses specifically onnonprofit leadership and is a requirement of theNonprofit Management and Leadership Specialization.






The MPA core curriculum at ClemsonUniversity includes the course AdministrativeLeadership, which provides a comprehensive overviewof leadership theory, techniques, and approaches withan emphasis on ethical leadership. Special attention isgiven to values influencing the decision process inpublic service.

The MPA program at Ohio University includesa seminar, POLS 523: Political Leadership, which is sep-arate from the strategic management course and is acore requirement of the program.

The University of Memphis MPA programfocuses its required capstone course on leadership,beginning the semester with a review of the classicleadership literature often covered initially in some ofthe other core courses.The middle part of class takesa personal leadership development focus with reflec-tive exercises and a reflective/goal setting paperassigned.The final third of the course emphasizesshared leadership, integrating research and practicalapplication through a case analysis final.

Schools with Courses about Leading ChangeAt Duke University’s Sanford Institute of

Public Policy, students select two modules to satis-fy core management requirements. In the courseLeading Change, students explore processes of changein policy-oriented private organizations with theobjective of increasing their personal leadership effec-tiveness.They participate in experiential activities,including a significant leadership project involving thecampus community. Classroom work involves casestudies and leadership theory along with frequentguest speakers.The students are also required tomeet occasionally outside of class to continue theleadership discussions.The other modules vary butmay include negotiation, nonprofit management, bud-geting, and information technology.

The LBJ School of Public Affairs at theUniversity of Texas offers two leadership courseseach year. Principles and Practices of EffectiveLeadership introduces students to major theories ofleadership from philosophy, history, and the modernsocial sciences. Special emphasis is placed on ethicsand values as students discuss applications of the con-cepts to real leadership situations.The second offer-

ing, Leading Change, complements LBJ’s policy devel-opment courses. Students learn to reduce and over-come resistance to change and to become leaders ofchange.Again, ethics and values are discussed as stu-dents explore these issues. LBJ also had a corerequirement called Public Administration andManagement.While it does not wear leadership in thetitle, some sections heavily emphasize development ofleadership skills.Topics include multiculturalism, com-munication, motivation, vision, negotiation, listening,team building, leadership styles, improving perfor-mance, restoring trust, shaping organizational culture,and developing human capital. Some of the learningtools used in the courses are psychological and per-sonality analysis, experiential learning components,case studies, group work, and role play.

As part of its mission of “empowering leaders for ajust and humane world,” Seattle University pre-sents an elective leadership option—Leadership,Learning, and Change Management.This courseexplores contemporary theories of leadership bothconceptually and experientially. Students are intro-duced to dynamics of learning and change on an indi-vidual level and for public and nonprofit organizations.

The University of Hawaii offers a leadershipcourse popular with MPA students titled Strategies ofChange: Leadership. It is an applied class that encour-ages students to address their self-perceptions byexperiencing leadership issues.The students examinetheories of change, action research, organizational cul-ture, and interventions for change.This course is sepa-rate from Hawaii’s core curriculum, which is a one-year program organized by modules.

At the University of Arkansas, students cantake a policy leadership course intended for the Ph.D.that emphasizes the differences between policy, indi-vidual, and organizational leadership.Arkansas alsooffers a nonprofit class that addresses leadership andchange.

Schools Requiring Leadership for Some Concentrations Jackson State University emphasizes a

unique multicultural and servant leader approach intheir Seminar in Executive Leadership.This course isrequired for Ph.D. students and for several of themaster’s-level concentrations.The seminar presents


leadership from both a theoretical and applied per-spective.

Texas Tech has required students in its publicmanagement track to take a survey of leadership the-ory.That course is currently being redesigned toinvolve more skills-based and experiential lessons.Theproposed course,“Managerial Leadership in PublicAdministration,” would address negotiation, conflictresolution, networking, communication, leadershiproles, and problem solving.

Schools with Leadership as an ElectiveArizona State University’s elective course,

“Leadership Skills in Public Organizations,” spotlightsnew approaches to leadership.The students exploreleadership from a scientific viewpoint, studyingobserved leadership styles and qualities, and from anartistic perspective, focusing on performance, creativeuse of time and energy, and learning to lead.Thecourse examines how the study of leadership ischanging from the traditional top-down model con-centrating on a powerful individual legitimated by ahierarchical structure to an emphasis on leadership asa process at all level of organizations. Key ideasinclude shared leadership, the servant role of leader-ship, and personal growth. Students are required togive a presentation of their written work.

The University of Tennessee,Chattanooga, is changing the name of its leader-ship elective, Executive Process in Public andNonprofit Agencies, to Leading Public and NonprofitAgencies to better reflect the focus of the course,which is on applied leadership challenges such ascommunity relations, institution building, and symboliccommunications.

At DePaul University’s Public ServicesGraduate Program, a women-focused leadershipcourse is currently under planning. In the meantime,the program offers its M.S. students Leadership andManagement, a course offered both in the traditionalsemester format and in a one-week intensive programat either DePaul’s Chicago campus or its partnerschool in Dublin, Ireland.The objectives of the course are to understand the main conceptualapproaches to organizational leadership, to under-

stand the key principles and practices of leadership inorder to improve leadership skills, to apply organiza-tional leadership concepts through critical thinking, toevaluate the effectiveness of particular organizationalleadership styles, and to improve personal leadershippractices through leadership assessments and coach-ing. In depth analysis of psychological systems, inter-personal relations, and the relationship of rewards toperformance are addressed through case studies, role-play, and readings.

Rutgers University, Newark, offers a lead-ership class that is nearly always full.They credit thisin part to the ability of their instructor to blend thetheoretical and practical aspects of management.Course readings are supplemented by a series ofguest lecturers from the public and private sectors.Rutgers supports a strong theoretical foundation sup-plemented by managers’ practical experiences.

The University of Baltimore addresses lead-ership theory as a subject in its core course, PublicPersonnel.The program also offers a popular electivecourse on leadership that combines a review of litera-ture and theory with case discussions.

Oakland University in Michigan offers MPAstudents three leadership choices: Public SectorLeadership, Criminal Justice Leadership, andLeadership and the Media.The University ofSouthern California covers leadership in two oftheir core courses, Human Behavior in PublicOrganizations and the capstone Professional Practiceof Public Administration. Northern KentuckyUniversity provides an elective, ExecutiveManagement, and students discuss leadership in theirculminating experience, the Public AdministrationCapstone. Northern Illinois University has anelective public sector leadership course.TheUniversity of Maine offers Community Power,Leadership, and Administration. Medgar EversCollege, CUNY, does not have an MPA degreeprogram—they currently offer a bachelor’s and asso-ciate degree in public administration—but a profes-sional master’s degree in leadership within the busi-ness school is planned.




The primary method of assessing faculty members’ effectiveness in theclassroom is the student evaluation of teaching, or SET (Cranton and Smith,1990; Seldin, 1989). Because SET scores play a major role in determiningacademic personnel decisions, including promotion and tenure (Lueck,Endres, and Kaplan, 1993;Whittington, 2001), it is both understandable andsomewhat unnerving that professional educators debate their accuracy andvalidity. Critics argue that SET scores do not necessarily reflect real teach-ing effectiveness and that they may be heavily influenced by factors otherthan the teacher’s actual in-class performance.

This article describes a study done in a social science college in a large,public university to examine the variables that potentially play a role indetermining SET scores. The college is comprised of a public affairs pro-gram and a number of related schools, departments, and programs, includ-ing nonprofit management and leadership, recreation management, andsocial work.There is a significant literature on SETs, though much of itfocuses on a single discipline such as economics (see, e.g., McPherson,2003; Cohen, 1982).Very little attention has been paid to the relationshipbetween how instructors teach their courses, including how their time isspent in the classroom and what types of technological supports they use,and SETs.This study is aimed at examining the variables that potentiallyplay a role in determining SET scores and adds to the literature in particu-lar by including measures of teacher instructional choices.

LITERATURE REVIEW

After many years of research and hundreds of studies, there is generalagreement that SETs are reliable (Centra, 1993); however, questions aboutbias and validity remain. Studies on validity and on the various factors thatcontribute to SET scores have yielded inconsistent results (Cashin, 1995;Marsh and Roche, 1997).Additionally, the interpretation of research resultshas varied dramatically, suggesting that a more detailed understanding ofthe process is key to creating a more useful and consistent interpretivestandard. In spite of faculty beliefs that many factors other than teaching

Student Evaluations of Teaching:How You Teach and Who You Are

Heather E. Campbell, Sue Steiner, and Karen GerdesArizona State University

J-PAE 11 (2005):3:211-231


ABSTRACT

Student evaluations of teaching (SETs) havebecome an important measure of the qualityof teaching in higher education institutionsin the United States. Some research indicatesthat SETs may be systematically biased; how-ever, most studies of SETs do not includemuch measure of instructional choicesteachers make.This study includes mostvariables the SET literature identifies asimportant and also adds measures of teacherchoices, such as whether to use instruction-al technologies and what percent of time tospend lecturing.The results provide someuseful information about how better to con-nect with students but also indicate thatSETs are systematically biased against femaleteachers, older teachers, and perhaps minor-ity teachers.These findings call into ques-tion de facto higher education policy mak-ing SETs our most important measure ofteaching quality.

ARTICLES

7campbell.211-231 M1 7/6/05 4:28 PM Page 211

effectiveness influence scores (Baldwin and Blattner,2003), SETs are still the primary method of evaluat-ing instruction for use in personnel decisions(d’Apollonia and Abrami, 1997).

Whittington (2001) argued that “a well-designedteaching evaluation does seem to do a very good jobat discriminating between teachers who demon-strate the characteristics associated with good teach-ing and those who do not, at least in a given course,”and that “[t]eaching evaluations can deliver fair anduseful information” (7).Yet troubling research indi-cates that SETs may be systematically biased, withfemale and perhaps minority teachers receivinglower scores, all else equal (e.g., Langbein, 1994).

Several factors complicate the debate about SETvalidity. First, there is not general agreement aboutwhat constitutes effective instruction. Because teach-ing is a multidimensional activity, Marsh and Rochesuggest,“no single criterion of effective teaching issufficient” (1997, 1189). Additionally, one commonlyused outcome criterion for determining effectiveteaching is student learning; however, there is nogeneral agreement about what constitutes successfullearning or how to measure it.

Many studies have used a multisection design tocompare SETs with performance on an examination.The goal was to determine whether SET scores actu-ally reflected how much students learned in acourse.The inconsistent results of these studies haveprompted numerous reviews (Abrami, d’Apollonia,and Cohen, 1990; Cohen, 1982; d’Apollonia andAbrami, 1997; Marsh, 1987). A number of the reviewsfocus on the fact that measuring student learning isdifficult; effective instruction likely includes a num-ber of dimensions that are not easily measured byexaminations (McKeachie, 1997; Denhardt, 2001).For example, it can be argued that the retention ofmaterial over time, the ability to use material in real-world settings, increased self-awareness, interperson-al skills, and motivation for lifelong learning areimportant instructional outcomes unlikely to bemeasured by examinations.The difficulty in defining“student learning,” let alone measuring all its aspects,makes it particularly challenging to compare varia-tions in learning with the effectiveness of teachersreflected in student evaluations.

Adding complexity, a number of variables that arenot clearly related to teaching effectiveness havebeen hypothesized to affect SET scores. Inconsistentresearch findings about how these variables affectscores, and differing interpretations of how theymight change SETs, have made it even more difficultto assess the validity of SET scores (McKeachie,1997).Although there does not appear to be com-plete agreement on any variable, several articles sum-marizing findings from numerous validity studiessuggest that certain variables have often been foundto have an impact on scores (Marsh, 1987; Marshand Dunkin, 1992). Class size, prior interest in thesubject, expected grades, workload/difficulty,whether a course is required or an elective(Whittington, 2001, acknowledges this issue), andlevel of course (upper/lower division andgraduate/undergraduate) have all been shown tohave an effect on SET scores, although the intensityof the estimated effect has varied.The findings onthe effect of the instructor’s rank, age, years teach-ing, race, and gender, and whether a course hasquantitative content, as well as academic disciplineand time of day when the course is taught, havebeen more inconclusive.

Another important issue is the interactionbetween different variables that influence SETscores.As mentioned above, some researchers havestudied gender as a relevant factor that may affectthe validity of student evaluations (Basow andSilberg, 1987; Kierstead, D’Angostino and Dill, 1988).However, the relationship between gender and stu-dent evaluations of teaching may not be straightfor-ward.A number of authors suggest that there are dif-fering perceptions of women and men in the work-place (Kierstead, D’Angostino and Dill, 1988; Martin,1984).Women are expected to be warmer, friendlier,and more nurturing.Thus, it is plausible that womenwho are more challenging in the classroom may bejudged more harshly on evaluations than their malecolleagues. Langbein (1994) found an interactioneffect between gender of instructor and anticipatedgrade.As expected grades fell, women were moresharply penalized than were their male colleagues.

Whether or not the seemingly unrelated-to-teaching-quality variables listed above introduce

Student Evaluations of Teaching: How You Teach and Who You Are



bias is sometimes difficult to assess.There may bereasonable explanations for their impact on SETscores. For example, if students do actually learnmore in smaller classes, then it would follow thatincreasing class size should be negatively related toSET scores—though class size is rarely under teachercontrol and so teachers should not be penalized forthis effect. Similarly, if students systematically gavelower ratings to courses that were more difficult,this might suggest bias. However, the opposite hasgenerally been true: students tend to give higher rat-ings to more challenging courses; despite the higherdegree of difficulty, they may believe that they arelearning more in these classes.To further confusethe matter, McKeachie (1997) argues that, even if stu-dents rated more challenging courses lower on SETs,it might not represent bias. He suggests that anunusually high workload in a class may representineffective teaching (see also Whittington, 2001, 6).Disorganized lectures and lack of clear expectationscan mean more work for the students as they try toprepare for exams.

Expected grades have been the most studied,bias-introducing variable.There has been a generallyconsistent, positive relationship between expectedgrade and SET score. Some researchers have con-cluded that grading easily can buy better evaluationscores, and may be contributing to grade inflation(Greenwald and Gilmore, 1997; Hamilton, 1980).Others question whether grading leniency is actuallya biasing variable, and explain the relationship in various ways (d’Apollonia and Abrami, 1997; Marshand Roche, 1997; McKeachie, 1997). For example,better instructors should teach students more, thusresulting in students getting higher grades. Similarly,if instructors teach to the better students, studentswho do better should be more satisfied with the instructor. In keeping with this reasoning,McPherson (2003, 3) argues that estimates suggest-ing that higher grades buy higher SET scores may bestatistically biased due to simultaneity (also referredto as endogeneity):“while expected grade may affecthow students evaluate teachers, it is also likely thatquality of instruction (as may be measured by SETs)affects expected grade.” In this case, simultaneousequations methods of estimation, which rarely are

used in the literature, are necessary to prevent biasof the estimators.

Interestingly, some factors that are importantwhen teaching have rarely been studied. For exam-ple, there is little available research examining therelationship between method of classroom instruc-tion (e.g. lecture, small group discussion, active learn-ing) and SETs. McKeachie suggests that students mayprefer instruction that “enables them to listen pas-sively” (1997, 1219) and prepares them well for testsand therefore may rate instructors who teach in thisway more highly. He points out that cognitive andmotivational research reveals that students learn andretain more when they are actively involved in thelearning process, and that “thus some teachers gethigh ratings for teaching in less than ideal ways”(1219). However, there is minimal empirical researchon the relationship between method of instructionand SET scores. Similarly, there has been littleresearch examining other areas related to teachingmethodology, including, for example, the use of tech-nology or how instructors allocate their time in theclassroom.This paper includes several measures ofthese components of teaching effectiveness.

In summary, it is difficult to clearly interpret the results of studies on possible bias in SETs.Methodological differences make comparison across studies particularly challenging. Sample sizeshave varied greatly, with some studies basing theirfindings on only a few cases. Many studies have not controlled for relevant variables, and numerousstatistical methods have been used, some moreappropriately than others.Additionally, a variety ofvariables have been used to operationalize the sameconcepts.

Research has returned divergent results on allvariables studied, at least in part due to the method-ological issues discussed above.Taking gender of theinstructor as an example, a number of researchershave found evidence of bias. Research findings sug-gest that female instructors were rated lower thantheir male counterparts on global evaluation andcompetency measures (Sidanius and Crane, 1989),and that female faculty members are held to higherstandards than their male counterparts (Bernard etal., 1981). Some studies have found that bias exists




regardless of the gender of the students (Basow,1995), while other research suggests that it is primar-ily male students who rate their female instructorslower (Basow and Silberg, 1987). Langbein (1994)found that the relationship between instructor gen-der and SETs is a complicated one, involving interac-tions with other variables based on gender roleexpectations. On the other side, some researchershave found no gender bias in SETs (Petchers andChow, 1988). In a summary of previous research,Marsh and Roche (1997) found the gender of theinstructor and of the students to have little or noeffect on SETs. Still others have found that femaleinstructors receive higher evaluations in classeswhere the majority of students are women (Wolferand Johnson, 2003).

Articles summarizing the vast body of research inthis area have also come up with very differentresults. For example, in an article summarizingresearch on potential bias, Marsh and Roche (1997)state,“perhaps the best summary is McKeachie’s[1979] conclusion that a wide variety of variablesthat could potentially influence SETs apparentlyhave little effect” (1193). On the other hand,Hamilton (1980) states that

(c)laims for validity are not enhanced if rela-tionships can be demonstrated between ratingsand external miscellanea such as instructorpersonality, department, class size, or gradingpolicies.There is considerable evidence thatsuch relationships exists; some or all of theseeffects seem to have been found by nearlyeveryone who looked for them” (51).

Other than the variables examining what instruc-tors actually do in the classroom that have receivedlittle attention in the past, all of the variables includ-ed in this study have been examined by a number ofresearchers in the past. None have consistently beenfound to cause bias, but all have been found to beproblematic in some studies.

METHOD

The current study was conducted in a small col-lege consisting of a public affairs program and four

related schools or departments at a large, public,southwestern university. Each of the full- and part-time teachers in the college was asked to give sur-veys to their students and to complete one them-selves. Data about instructors and some course char-acteristics were gathered from a college database.More than 5,000 students completed questionnaires,and we were able to analyze more than 130 classestaught by 100 teachers, all during the spring of2003. Data were analyzed using SPSS 11.5 forWindows (2002).

We have chosen the class, rather than the individ-ual student, as the unit of analysis, because usingindividual students gives us more than 5,000 obser-vations rather than 130 when we use the class.Wechose to use the class as the unit of analysis becausewe believe it is the most policy-relevant. Teachersare not evaluated based on individual student evalua-tions but on average student evaluations per course.It is these evaluations that are used in personnelactions. Additionally, only six of the independentvariables in the model were measured at the studentlevel.Thus, using the student as the level of analysiswould add little variation over the more policy-rele-vant class as the unit of analysis.

MODEL TO BE ESTIMATED

As indicated by the literature review, in order toanalyze the causes of student evaluations of teachingquality, several types of variables must be controlledfor: student perceptions about the class (such as dif-ficulty), attributes of the professor (such as gender),attributes of the class that the professor controls(such as percent of time spent lecturing), attributesof the class that the professor generally does notcontrol (such as time of day), and possible interac-tions.The following subsections describe the depen-dent variable we use and then the independent vari-ables included to control for these broad categories.

Dependent VariableThe dependent variable used in this study was

collected from student surveys. Students were askedthe following:“Overall, how would you rate the qual-ity of instruction you received in the class?” Studentscould circle the numbers from 1 to 10, with number




1 labeled “excellent” and number 10 labeled “verypoor.” For analysis, however, all the answers for a sin-gle class are averaged, because the class is the unit ofanalysis.

Student PerceptionsUsing our student surveys, we are able to measurethe following student perceptions:

• Self-assessment of how much the student knewabout the subject upon entering the class(HowMuchKnew; 1-10, 1 = a lot, 10 = nothing)

• Self-assessment of how much the studentlearned in the class (HowMuchLrnd; 1-10, 1 = alot, 10 = nothing)

• Student perception of whether the instructorused feedback (UsedFdbck; 1-10, 1 = veryresponsive, 10 = Not responsive at all)1

• Student perception of how challenging thecourse was (Challenging; 1-10, 1 = very chal-lenging, 10 = very easy)

• Student perception of how much outside workwas required (OutsideWork; 1-10, 1 = a lot, 10 =none).

• The student’s expected grade (ExpctGrd;A-E,2

converted to 4-0).

Professor AttributesAs discussed above, some SET research does indi-

cate that various attributes of the instructor, some ofwhich they cannot control, affect student evalua-tions. Through a central database of our college, wewere able to measure the following attributes:

• Instructor race (InstrucRace; measured as non-white = 1 because we had few enoughminorities that we felt breaking out the non-white category further would excessivelyreduce statistical power)

• Instructor gender (InstrucF; measured as female = 1)

• Years the instructor has taught (YrsTeach; con-tinuous)

• Age of the instructor (Age; continuous) andTenure-track rank (ProfAssoc and ProfFull,assistant professors the omitted group)

• Other, non-tenure-track instructor classifications(InstrctNonTrk; 1 = yes).

Holding constant other factors that should berelated to quality of instruction, race, gender, and ageshould have no independent effect on the quality ofinstruction itself (as opposed to how it is measured).Years of teaching experience and faculty status, onthe other hand, might have legitimate relationshipswith instructor quality.

Class Attributes under Instructor ControlThe instructor survey included questions about

how the professor actually taught the course, allow-ing us to contribute to the literature by includingmeasures of teacher decisions about instructionalapproach. Instructors answered their surveys sepa-rately for each course they taught, so data collectiondid allow for variation in professor approach fromclass to class.

• Has the instructor participated in activities totry to improve teaching (TchImprov?; 1 = yes)

• Did the instructor regularly use PowerPoint(PowerPoint?; 1 = yes)

• Did the instructor regularly use videos (Videos?;1 = yes)

• Did the instructor regularly use overhead trans-parencies (Transpar?; 1 = yes)

• Did the instructor use MyASU (an on-line ser-vice provided by the university) to supplementthe course (MyASU?; 1 = yes)

• Did the instructor use other on-line content tosupplement the course (OtherOnline?; 1 = yes)

• Did the instructor give exams? (Exams?; 1 =yes)

• Did the instructor give review sessions beforeexams (ExamReview?; 1 = yes)

• Did the instructor offer extra credit (XtraCrdt?;1 = yes)

• What percent of the time in the course wasspent on various learning modalities, includinglecture, small-group discussion, whole-class dis-cussion, student presentations, guest speakersand/or videos, and active learning (%Lecture,%SmallGrp, %WholeCls, %StuPrsnt, %Guest/Video, %Active; all continuous).

We wished to be able to include a measure ofstrictly online courses or courses taught in a dis-




tance mode using television, but we had no respons-es for courses taught strictly online and only one fora course taught in distance mode.

Class Attributes Not Generally Controlled by Instructor

Several studies have also found that attributes ofthe class that are generally not under the instructor’scontrol affect teaching evaluations.We were able tomeasure the following:

• Whether the course is required or an elective(Elec?; 1 = elective)

• Our university has several types of undergradu-ate general studies requirements that can bemet with a variety of different classes. Thus,such classes may be thought of as “semi-required.”We are able to measure two types of such classes, general studies “C” courses,which meet a cultural diversity requirement,and general studies “L,” which meet a literacyrequirement and should be writing intensive(GenStudC? and GenStudL?; 1 = yes)

• Whether the course is a research methodscourse or other course with quantitative con-tent, such as a statistics or economics course(Quant?; 1 = yes)

• Whether the course is undergraduate or gradu-ate level (Grad?; 1 = yes)

• Class size, measured both in the level and in thesquare to allow for a curvilinear relationshipfound by other researchers (Size and SizeSQR;continuous)

• The time of day at which the class is taught,measured as start time (StartTime; continuous,twenty-four-hour time)

• The timing format, indicating whether a class isoffered three days per week for fifty minuteseach day; or twice per week for one hour andfifteen minutes; or one day per week for twohours and fifty minutes, or in an intensive for-mat (Duration; 1-8).

We do not expect that the day of the week onwhich a course is taught will be important, since thecollege in question teaches no Friday classes exceptfor graduate-level public administration “intensives”

(these meet for three days in a row, twice during thesemester).They are indicated in the Duration vari-able as 8.

Interaction TermsTo estimate whether instructor race and gender

might interact with other instructor attributes, inparticular with how tough instructors are, weinclude the following interaction terms:3

• InstrucF interacted with Challenging • InstrucRace interacted with Challenging.

As reviewed above, Langbein (1994) proposesthat the acceptable social role of females is to nur-ture.Therefore, students may reduce SETs more forfemale professors who are perceived as rigorousthan for similarly rigorous male teachers—and shedoes, in fact, find support for this hypothesis in herwork.A similar process might operate for professorsof color, leading us also to include the same interac-tion for professors of color and toughness.

In keeping with Langbein’s (1994) reasoning, weanticipate that more lecturing may be more accept-able from white male professors because an accept-able social role of white males is as authoritativeproviders of wisdom.Therefore, we also include thefollowing interaction effects:

• InstrucF interacted with %Lecture • InstrucRace interacted with %Lecture.

DepartmentsOur college is formed of a variety of academic

departments, broadly contained within the social sciences, but otherwise quite different.Therefore,this study also controlled for department becausewe anticipated that there might be qualitative differ-ences between students who select, for example,social work, versus those who select communica-tion, because the culture of social work tends toattract and support students who are more forgivingand encouraging than students in other departments(two of us are social work professors). Social workwas the omitted variable, with the expectation thatother departments’ students generally would bemore critical, all else equal.Variables were asfollows:4






• Public affairs (PubAff; 1 = yes)5

• Recreation management and tourism (RecMngt;1 = yes)

• Justice studies (Justice; 1 = yes) • Communications (Comm; 1 = yes).

The Model to Be EstimatedThe above results in the following equation to be

estimated:

SETs = β1HowMuchKnew + β2HowMuchLrnd +β3UsedFdbck + β4OutsideWork + β5Challenging +β6ExpctGrd + β7InstrucRace + β8InstrucF +β9YrsTeach + β10Age + β11ProfAssoc + β12ProfFull+ β13InstrctNonTrk + β14TchImprov? +β15PowerPoint? + β16Videos? + β17Transpar? +β18MyASU? + β19OtherOnline? + β20Exams? +β21ExamReview? + β22XtraCrdt? + β23%Lecture +β24%SmallGrp + β25%WholeCls + β26%StuPrsnt +β27%Guest/Video + β28%Active + β29Elec? +β30GenStudC? + β31GenStudL? + β32Quant? +β33Grad? + β34Size + β35SizeSQR + β36StartTime +β37Duration + β38(InstrucF)(Challenging) +β39(InstrucRace)(Challenging) +β40(InstrucF)(%Lecture) +β41(InstrucRace)(%Lecture) + β42PubAff+β43RecMgt + β44Justice + β45Comm + ε

Because of the relatively large number of vari-ables, some of which are certainly correlated witheach other, it is worth mentioning the issue of multi-collinearity, its implications if present, tradeoffs, andthe choices we have made. Omitting variables thatshould be in an equation introduces estimation bias.Including variables that do not belong in an equa-tion introduces no bias, but increases the standarderrors of the estimates and makes it more difficult toreject the null hypothesis using t statistics. Similarly,multicollinearity does not introduce any bias butdoes increase variances and standard errors andreduces computed t scores (Studenmund, 2001, 248-250). Further,“[t]he overall fit of the equation andthe estimation of nonmulticollinear variables will belargely unaffected” (Studenmund, 2001, 251).Because at least some multicollinearity exists in alldata (255), and because “every remedy for multi-collinearity has a drawback of some sort, and so it

often happens that doing nothing is the correctcourse of action” (259), we have chosen to leave invariables where there is not sufficient multicollinear-ity to make the matrix singular, even though thismay increase our standard errors and reduce our tstatistics.As Studenmund indicates,“[t]he deletion ofa multicollinear variable that belongs in an equationis fairly dangerous because it will cause specificationbias” (259).We have explicitly chosen less bias overbetter “t”s.

In addition, examination of the Pearson’s correla-tions shows that these data exhibit a surprisinglylow amount of multicollinearity.A high proportionof the variables show very low correlations forsocial science data, with Pearson’s correlations of0.1 or less. Only three correlations were higher thanthe standard of 0.8, which is generally used as a mea-sure of excessive collinearity (Studenmund, 2001).Class size and class-size-squared are correlated at the0.948 level; of course, these variables, which arefunctions of one another, are expected to be highlycorrelated.6 Whether instructors give exam reviewsessions is highly correlated with whether they giveexams, at 0.84.Again, this is not surprising; instruc-tors who give exam review sessions will be a subsetof those who give exams. It does turn out thatwhether the instructor gives exams or not, adichotomous variable, is correlated with anotherdichotomous variable, whether the instructor is aminority or not, at 0.89. For variables that are notfunctions of one another, student reports ofHowMuchLrnd and whether the Instructor UsedFeedback are also fairly highly correlated, at 0.706.Though we were willing to put up with higher stan-dard errors to avoid bias, examination of the correla-tions suggests that multicollinearity is not generallyan important issue for these data.

Methodological Issue—SimultaneityAs mentioned above in the literature review, some

scholars (e.g., McPherson, 2003) argue that standardregression techniques are not suitable for analyzingSETs.They argue that, while expected grade may bea determinant of SETs, it is likely also true that quali-ty of instruction is a determinant of expected grade.If SETs in fact are good measures of quality of




instruction, then the same underlying factor—qualityof instruction—may cause both SETs and expectedgrades.When one independent variable—oftenreferred to as a right-hand-side endogenous vari-able—is in fact caused by the dependent variable,then ordinary least squares (OLS) estimation leads tobiased and inconsistent results (Pindyck andRubinfeld, 1981).A standard solution to this situationis to use an instrumental variables technique calledtwo-stage least squares (2SLS).This method allowsconsistent estimation of the coefficients.

Theoretically, we are not convinced by the argu-ment that expected grades are caused by SETS—which are not, after all, the same as teacher quality.Review of the literature supports the idea that wecannot expect SETs necessarily to be good measuresof quality of instruction. Further, it is not clear to uswhat the relationship between expected grade andteacher quality would be, since some poor teachersgive all As, while some excellent teachers are rigor-ous graders. In other words, it is not simply that weare arguing that the relationship between teachingand grading is nonlinear, but that it is not systematic.There are also issues regarding what causes studentexpectations.We have all had students who expect-ed to receive As in the class, even though they werebarely passing.

Consider two equations, one of which includesexpected grade and one of which does not, undertwo possible scenarios. In the event that expectedgrade belongs in the SET equation and it is omitted,its omission results in omitted variable bias. In theevent that expected grade is endogenous in an SETequation, then including it causes simultaneity biasand also inconsistency in estimation (Pindyck andRubinfeld, 1981, 180).7

Here, we report estimates from two regressionanalyses, one that includes expected grade and onethat does not. Because we must expect bias in oneof the two equations, we cannot expect the esti-mates to be identical. However, if the two sets ofestimates are similar, this suggests that the inclusionof expected grade is not doing violence to estima-tion, as it might be in the case of inconsistent esti-mation. As Table 1 shows, the two estimations are

materially similar with robust results. Coefficientsare estimated in both equations for forty-four inde-pendent variables. Of the forty-four coefficient esti-mates, only two change signs between the two equa-tions (those for exams? and percent of time spent onwhole class discussion, %WholeCls), and only twoothers have estimates that are much different inmagnitude (those for TchImprov and for the interac-tion between teacher gender and how challengingthe teacher is).Therefore, we choose to maintain ourassumption that expected grade is not caused bySETs and focus on the results from the equation thatincludes it.

We did not estimate a simultaneous equationsmodel, for example using Two-Stage Least Squares(2SLS), for two major reasons. First, in order to perform either 2SLS or to estimate reduced-formequations, we would need measures of the indepen-dent variables in an equation where the dependentvariable is Expected Grade. However, we cannotmeasure appropriate student attributes for such anequation: we do not have measures of students’ rawtalent, efforts expended in the course, nor what factors cause students expectations. Second, asStudenmund explains, even with endogeneity,“Thisdoes not mean that every coefficient from a simulta-neous system estimated with OLS will be a badapproximation of the true population coefficient;indeed, most researchers use OLS to estimate equa-tions in simultaneous systems under a number of cir-cumstances” (2001, 470).

The next section presents the estimation resultsand discusses their implications.

RESULTS

Table 1 presents the results of the first OLSregression, which includes all variables includingExpctGrd, the average grade expected by studentresponders.When the equation was estimatedexcluding average expected grade, all but two esti-mates were of the same sign, and most were also ofgenerally the same magnitude.Whether the profes-sor uses exams or not is estimated in the first equa-tion to decrease SETs by 0.056, while in the secondit is estimated to improve them by 0.005, neither of




Table 1. OLS Results; Estimation 1 Includes Expected Grade, Estimation 2 Excludes Expected Grade;Dependent Variable is average student SET by class, 1 is Best SET, 10 is Worst

Concept Variable How Measured Estimation 1 Estimation 2(Data Source) (t statistics) (t statistics)

(Stndrd βs)** (Stndrd βs)

Student HowMuchKnew 1 most, 10 least -0.073 -0.074Perceptions “ (-1.37) (-1.38)

(-0.064) (-0.065)(Student HowMuchLrnd “ 0.639 0.680Surveys) (7.48)** (8.56)**

(0.542) (0.576)UsedFdbck “ 0.409 (4.70)**

(0.328) 0.404(4.63)** (0.324)

Challenging 1 most, 10 least 0.272 (2.77)**(0.264) 0.240(2.52)** (0.233)

OutsideWork “ -0.116 (-1.54)(-0.102) -0.118(-1.56) (-0.104)

ExpctGrd 4.0=A, etc. -0.317 —-(-1.26)(-0.088)

Instructor InstrucRace 1 = minority 0.275 0.195Attributes (0.33) (0.235)

(0.079) (0.056)(College Data) InstrucF 1=female 0.887 0.995

(1.67)* (1.89)*(0.337) (0.423)

YrsTeach Years 0.003 0.005(0.33) (0.603)(0.024) (0.044)

Age Years 0.015 0.014(2.22)** (2.14)**(0.151) (0.146)

ProfAssoc 1 =Associate -0.163 -0.166(-0.80) (-0.81)(-0.043) (-0.044)

ProfFull 1=Full -0.271 -0.298(-1.37) (-1.50)(-0.090) (-0.099)

InstrctNonTrk 1=Not tenure track 0.007 0.009(0.05) (0.06)(0.003) (0.004)


Class TchImprov? 1=Yes 0.063 0.039Attributes (0.49) (0.31)Instructor (0.024) (0.015)Controls PowerPoint? 1=Regularly 0.247 0.273(Instructor (1.86)+ (2.07)**Survey) (0.105) (0.115)

Videos? 1=Regularly 0.120 0.138(1.03) (1.19)(0.051) (0.059)

Transpar? 1= Regularly 0.123 0.133(1.02) (1.11)(0.051) (0.056)

MyASU? 1=Yes 0.091 0.107(0.78) (0.92)(0.039) (0.046)

OtherOnline? 1=Yes 0.064 0.068(0.53) (0.56)(0.026) (0.028)

Exams? 1=Yes 0.056 -0.005(0.26) (-0.02)(0.016) (-0.001)

ExamReview? 1=Yes -0.285 -0.269(-2.245)** (-2.12)**(-0.118) (-0.112)

XtraCrdt? 1=Yes -0.148 -0.152(-1.26) (-1.29)(-0.063) (-0.065)

%Lecture 10=10%, etc. 0.016 0.017(2.81)** (3.01)**(0.308) (0.0328)

%SmallGrp “ 0.007 0.007(1.35) (1.38)(0.084) (0.085)

%WholeCls “ 0.001 -0.001(0.14) (0.168)(0.008) (-0.10)

%StuPrsnt “ 0.006 0.005(0.839) (0.692)(0.043) (0.035)




Table 1. OLS Results, continued




%Guest/Video “ 0.011 0.010(1.10) (0.973)(0.052) (0.046)

%Active “ -0.002 -0.003(-0.40) (-0.62)(-0.022) ( )

Class Attributes Elec? 1=Yes 0.200 0.207Instructor Does (1.74)+ (1.80)+Not Control (0.085) (0.088)(College Data) GenStudC? 1=Yes 0.152 0.168

(0.90) (1.00)(0.043) (0.047)

GenStudL? 1=Yes 0.024 0.036(0.11) (0.16)(0.005) (0.007)

Quant? 1=Yes 0.109 0.132(0.65) (0.80)(0.034) (0.042)

Grad? 1=Yes 0.270 0.251(1.24) (1.16)(0.097) (0.090)

Size numbers 0.000 0.002(0.11) (0.49)(0.020) (0.081)

SizeSQR -0.000 -0.000(-0.02) (-0.34)(-0.004) (-0.054)

StartTime Time -0.034 -0.035(-2.21)** (-2.33)**(-0.097) (-0.102)

Duration Hours -0.009 -0.005(military time) (-0.23) (-0.12)

(-0.010) (-0.005)

Interactions (InstrucRace)* 0.061 0.079(see above) (Challenging) (0.33) (0.42)

(0.071) (0.092)(InstrucF)* (see above) -0.008 -0.022

(Challenging) (-0.08) (-0.24)(-0.013) (-0.38)







(InstrucRace)* -0.007 -0.007(%Lecture) (-1.01) (-1.03)

(-0.104) (-0.107)(InstrucF)* -0.014 -0.014(%Lecture) (-2.36)** (-2.39)**

(-0.330) (-0.335)

Departments Comm 1=Yes 0.048 0.112(College Data) (0.22) (0.54)

(0.020) (0.047)RecMgt “ 0.298 0.375

(1.22) (1.57)(0.090) (0.113)

Justice “ 0.100 0.140(0.45) (0.64)(0.033) (0.046)

PubAff “ -0.149 -0.191(-0.58) (-0.74)(-0.029) (-0.037)

(Constant) -1.23 -2.41(-1.05) (-3.39)




N = 132 classesEstimation 1: R-squared = 0.885;Adjusted R-squared = 0.825 .Estimation 2: R-squared = 0.883,Adjusted R-squared = 0.824.t-critical, two-tailed, 86 degrees of freedom, _ = 5% = 1.991t-critical, one-tailed, 86 degrees of freedom, _ = 5% = 1.665t-critical, two-tailed, 86 degrees of freedom, _ = 10% = 1.665+ = Statistically significant at__ = 10% or less, 2-tailed* = Statistically significant at__ = 5% or less, 1-tailed** = Statistically significant at__ = 5% or less, 2-tailed



which is policy significant. In neither estimatedequation is the coefficient estimate statistically sig-nificant, which may be due to the fact that 87% ofthe classes in our data did include exams, so there islittle variation in this variable (taken together, itseems we can assume that whether or not a teachergives exams does not affect SETs).The effect of per-centage of class time spent on entire-class discussionis estimated as 0.001 in the first equation and as -0.001 in the second, in the first suggesting thatwhole-class discussion is marginally harmful and inthe second that it is marginally beneficial.Again,both t statistics are very small.

A note of caution: Interpreting results can besomewhat confusing because positive signs do notalways mean that SETs are improving, nor do nega-tive signs.The dependent variable is measured on a1-10 scale, with 1 the best SET an instructor canreceive. Student-perception variables are generallymeasured the same way, with 1 the most, and 10 theleast (the exception is ExpctGrd, which is measuredon the standard 4.0 scale).Thus, for most studentperception variables, a positive sign does indicatethat SETs are getting better with increases in the IV.However, for variables that are measured either asdummies or as continuous variables—such as genderand age, respectively—a negative sign actually indi-cates that SETs are improving.This is because alower SET score is a better SET score.Thus, the posi-tive coefficient estimated for HowMuchLrnd indi-cates that SETs are better when students perceivethat they are learning more (as HowMuchLrndmoves toward Most, SET moves toward Best).However, the positive coefficient estimated for Age indicates that getting older worsens SETs (as Age gets bigger, so do SETs, which means SETsare getting worse).

Student PerceptionsFrom the estimates in this category, we can be

confident that students award instructors betterSETs when the students feel, all else equal, that theylearned a lot, that the instructor was challenging, andthat the instructor was responsive to student feed-back. Students award worse SETs, all else equal,

when they perceive they are spending more time onout-of-class work and when the expected grade islower.The estimates also suggest that students whoalready know more about a topic are harder on theinstructor, all else equal. However, the size of thiseffect is an order of magnitude smaller than the oth-ers in this category, at -0.073, so a change of 5 pointsis predicted to result in a loss of only 0.35 SETpoints out of 10.

Class Attributes under Instructor ControlOne factor of interest to the study team was the

value of technologies that supplement traditionalmodes of teaching.We were able to estimate theeffect of routinely using PowerPoint,Videos,Transparencies, an online support system at our uni-versity called MyASU, and other online content.Theestimated coefficient for each of these is positive,indicating that using these supplementary systemsactually make SETs worse, all else equal. Only one ofthese estimates is statistically significant at standardlevels (PowerPoint, at a significance level of 0.07,two-tailed). PowerPoint’s magnitude is small, indicat-ing that regularly using PowerPoint reduces SETs by0.2 points on our 10-point scale, but it is the largesteffect of class technologies.

Another decision that the instructor makes iswhat percent of class time should be spent in lectur-ing, small group work, whole class discussion, stu-dent presentations, guests or videos, and active learn-ing exercises.8 For all of the variables except foractive learning, the estimated signs are positive, indi-cating that increasing the percent of time spent onany of these pursuits except active learning willmake SETs worse. However, all of these estimates aresmall in magnitude. %Lecture’s coefficient is thelargest (0.016), and it indicates that increasing thepercent of time one spends on lecture by 22 per-centage points (about one standard deviation in thedata) would reduce SETs by 0.35 points, all elseequal. However, if an instructor lectures 60% of thetime—compared to never—SETs are reduced by oneentire point.The next largest estimated coefficient is0.011, for %Guest/Videos, where it is estimated thatan instructor would have to spend over 90% of the






time on guests and/or videos to lose a point on our10-point SETs.

As mentioned above, including exams as a mea-sure of student achievement seems to be unimpor-tant to SETs, but having exam review sessions is esti-mated to have one of the largest effects amongdichotomous variables in improving SETs. Offeringextra credit is also estimated to help SETs.

Whether a teacher has in the past engaged inteaching improvement activities is estimated to haveessentially no effect on SETs.

Class Attributes Not Generally Controlled by Instructor

Instructors generally cannot control variousattributes of the courses they teach, includingwhether the class is required or elective, whether ithas primarily quantitative content, whether it is grad-uate-level, how big it is, when it starts, and how longit lasts. In our data, three variables control forwhether a class is required or not, Elec?, GenStudC?,GenStudL?. General Studies C and L classes are semi-required: students must satisfy these requirements,but may choose a variety of classes in doing so.These courses are estimated to receive worse SETs,all else equal, though we cannot place much confi-dence in the estimates, because we have very fewsuch classes in our data (about 16 “C” course andabout 6 “L” classes).To our surprise, elective coursesare estimated to get worse SETs, all else equal.Quantitative classes are estimated to receive worseSETs, all else equal, though the estimated effect issmall.With a slightly larger effect, graduate classesare estimated to receive worse SETs, all else equal.

Interestingly, in our data, class size has no appre-ciable effect. However, start time has an effect, withearlier classes receiving better SETs, all else equal.Class duration seems unimportant (though the esti-mated sign is negative, an eight-hour-long class isestimated to improve an instructor’s SET by only0.07 points).

Instructor AttributesInstructor attributes that may affect teaching qual-

ity include teaching experience and faculty rank. Inour data, increases in years spent teaching are esti-

mated to have essentially no effect on SETs, holdingall else equal.The data also indicate that full profes-sors receive the best SETs, all else equal. Next bestare associate professors, then assistant professors(the omitted group).The estimates suggest that non-tenure-track instructors basically receive the sameratings as assistant professors, all else equal.The esti-mated magnitude is the largest for full professors,but is still not very large; it indicates that a full pro-fessor’s SETs will be 0.3 points higher than those foran otherwise identical (in terms of what we canmeasure) instructor who is an assistant professor.

Instructors cannot control their race, gender, orage. Further, though these attributes might be corre-lated with attributes that matter to quality of teach-ing, they themselves should have no impact. So, allelse held constant, an egalitarian perspective wouldprefer that these factors not affect SETs. However,our results suggest they do.The estimated coeffi-cients for InstrucRace, InstrucF, and Age are, respec-tively, 0.275, 0.887, and 0.015.The coefficient esti-mate of Age is statistically significant at the 0.029level and that of InstrucF at the 0.099 level (2-sided;0.0495 1-sided). Because we have few people ofcolor in our data (only about seventeen) and wereforced to combine a variety of non-white types thatstudents might respond to differently, it is not sur-prising that InstrucRace’s estimate is not statisticallysignificant.All of these estimates suggest that beingfemale, a person of color, or older, all else equal,decreases SETs. In the equation omitting ExpctGrd,InstrucF’s estimated coefficient is 0.995 with a sig-nificance level of 0.062 (two-tailed), so this effect isrobust even if you believe that the inclusion ofExpctGrd causes simultaneity bias.The estimatedeffect and statistical significance for Age andInstrucRace are also reasonably robust to the inclu-sion or exclusion of ExpctGrd.

Interaction TermsLangbein (1994) found that female instructors

were penalized more than male colleagues for beingchallenging. Our results do not support Langbein’sfindings.The estimate indicates that students do notdifferentiate between females and males when itcomes to being challenging.The coefficient estimate


is very small and negative, -0.008, meaning aninstructor would have to go from the least challeng-ing to the most to change her SET by even 0.08points, and the t-statistic is also very small.Theresults for instructors of color are estimated to be an order of magnitude larger (0.061) than those forfemales, but opposite the direction we expectedwhen we included it, meaning that a non-white pro-fessor who went from being the least challenging tothe most is estimated to increase his/her SETs by 0.6points on the 10-point scale, though, again, thisresult is not statistically significant.

The results do suggest that there is a differentialeffect when males and females lecture, but the resultsare the opposite of those we expected.When femaleinstructors lecture more, they are viewed more posi-tively. If a female instructor were to increase the per-cent of class time she spends on lecture from 47%(about the mean in the data) by 22 percentagepoints (about 1 standard deviation in the data) to69%, the net effect of this 22-point change on herSET is estimated to be a loss of only 0.04 points, aworsening of 0.352 offset by an improvement of0.308, rather than the 0.35 loss to a male teacherwho does the same thing.This estimated effect is sta-tistically significant at the 0.02 (two-tailed) level.Theestimated effect for minority professors is similar,though smaller and with a smaller t statistic.

DISCUSSION

Drawing back and looking at the overall patternof our estimates, they indicate that SETs are theaccumulation of small effects from a wide variety ofthings about a class, only some of which are underthe teacher’s control or can reasonably be thoughtto have to do with teaching quality.At 0.825, theadjusted R-squared is very high, particularly for cross-sectional data (Studenmund, 2001), indicating thatour independent variables are doing a good job atexplaining variation in the dependent variable.Table2 provides an overview of the variables that werefound to have an important effect on SET scores, andcompares them with some that have medium orvery small effects.

The results of this study offer a number ofencouraging signs about the use of SETs.All else

equal, the more students feel they learn in a course,the higher the SET score. Given that a generallyagreed-upon measure of teaching effectiveness issuccessful learning, it is encouraging that theamount students say they learned is estimated to beone of the most important predictors of SETs—andwith very high confidence. It is also encouragingthat instructors who are perceived as being challeng-ing are estimated to receive higher SET scores. Onthe other hand, students penalized instructors ofclasses where they expected to get a lower gradeand instructors that they perceived created a highworkload outside the classroom.These results implythat students want instructors to create classes thatare challenging and full of new knowledge in theclassroom, but do not carry the threat of low grades,or depend on students’ learning at home. Still, inachieving the right balance in improving SETs, it isimportant to note that students reward instructorsmore for their perception that they are learning a lot(estimated coefficient 0.639) than they punish themfor their perception that there is a lot of outsidework (estimated coefficient -0.116).

Even though some of the variation in SET scorescan be explained by students’ perceptions of howmuch they learned, a number of class attributes thatshould not be related to quality of teaching and thatare beyond the instructor’s control appear to havean impact on scores.These attributes includewhether the class is required or elective, whether it has primarily quantitative content, whether it isgraduate-level, when it starts, and how long it lasts.Though faculty may have influence over some ofthese factors, it would still be fairer if faculty werenot penalized for teaching required courses or quan-titative courses. Because all of these factors are likelyto be part of some courses taught at most universi-ties, faculty members who end up teaching suchcourses may be unfairly penalized in SETs.

Courses that were semi-required or semi-electivereceived lower SET scores than other types ofrequired courses. Unlike results from other studies,fully elective courses in our study were also found tocontribute to lower SET scores, all else equal, thoughthe effect is small. It is difficult to interpret this find-ing without further research. It may be that there is




better quality control over required courses in thecollege studied, or perhaps student’s expectationsare higher in elective courses, so they grade instruc-tors more negatively. Instructors who teach quantita-tive courses, graduate courses, and courses thatbegin later in the day all are estimated to receivelower SET scores, all else being equal. Unlike insome other studies, class size had no appreciableeffect in the current study.This may be because theaverage class size in our data is only forty-two stu-dents, with the very largestclass at 450; only a handfulof the analyzed classeshave more than one hun-dred students.Table 3gives a listing of some fac-tors identified in the litera-ture, whether those aregenerally found to have aneffect on SETs or whetherthe literature is inconclu-sive, and compares ourfindings.9

Holding constant allelse in the equation, theinstructors in publicaffairs received higher SETscores than did those inthe other departmentsstudied. There are severalpossible reasons for thesehigher scores.The ana-lyzed public affairs pro-gram is rated higher in theU.S. News and WorldReport standings thanother programs in the col-lege. This high ratingcould mean that theschool attracts better pro-fessors who do actuallyteach better in some waynot directly measuredhere. It is also possiblethat, as was hypothesized

regarding social work, the culture of those whochoose a public affairs program is more cooperativeor less critical than in the other programs. On theother hand, perhaps some other factor that is uniqueto public affairs and is not measured in this study iscoming into play.

A number of instructor attributes also seem tohave an impact on SET scores. On the positive side,the fact that full professors receive the best SETscores is encouraging. One would like to believe that

Larger EffectsHow Much Learned Learned more by 2 points Teaching evaluation(10-point scale) improves by 1.2 points

Used Feedback Used more by 2 points Teaching evaluation(10-point scale) improves by 0.8 points

Instructor Female? Instructor is female Teaching evaluation(0/1) worsens by 0.8 points

Medium EffectsChallenging More challenging by 2 points Teaching evaluation (10-point scale) worsens by 0.5 points

Age Instructor is 30 years older Teaching evaluation(Years) (e.g., 20% to 30%) worsens by 0.5 points

%Lecture Increase 30 percentage points Teaching evaluation(10=10 percent) worsens by 0.5 points

Interaction Between Increases 30 points, Teaching evaluationLecturing and Gender female instructor improves by 0.4

Smaller EffectsHow Much Knew Knew more by 2 points Teaching evaluation(10-point scale) worsens by 0.14 points

Instructor Nontenure Instructor is not tenure track Teaching evaluationTrack (0/1) worsens by 0.007 points

(compared to untenured)

Size (numbers From smallest to 450 No effectof students)


Independent Example Changes Predicted Effects,Variables in Independent All Else Equal

Variables

Table 2. Magnitudes and Meanings for Important Independent Variablesand Comparison with Some Unimportant Factors



faculty are rewarded with tenure and promotion atleast partly on the basis of their teaching and that,therefore, higher-ranked professors are, on average,better teachers, all else equal. On the other side,some of the most disturbing findings were that gen-der, age, and race all seem to have a negative impacton SETs. Even though there are increasing numbersof women and people of color teaching in mostareas, our data suggest that they are still not per-ceived equally to their male and white colleagues.

The estimated SET downgrade for being female isparticularly troubling. At 0.887, it is by far the largestcoefficient estimate for all variables measured as 0/1.On a 10-point scale, simply being female dropped aninstructor’s rating by almost one full point.Thus,while professors can control whether they regularlygive review sessions or extra credit, the decrease in

SETs caused by gender swamps the estimated effectof giving review sessions (-0.285) and giving extracredit (-0.148), combined. Depending on how it isdone, offering review sessions may entail extra work,and offering extra credit definitely does.Thus, evenworking harder—at least in these domains—cannotallow a female instructor’s SETs to come up to hermale colleagues’, all else equal.The need to workharder for equivalent SETs may also ramify bydecreasing the time a female instructor has to spendon her research.

The relative importance of the estimated effect ofinstructor gender does raise the question of whetherthe gender composition of the class may affect theSETs of female instructors.We examined this ques-tion in two ways.We performed a similar analysis to the one discussed above, but we added a measure

of the percent of the class that wasfemale and also interacted that vari-able with the variable measuringinstructor gender.10 In these data, theestimates suggested that female stu-dents are very slightly harder onfemale teachers, but the estimatedeffect was very small in magnitude(0.003), the t statistics were also verysmall (alpha levels greater than 66%,2-tailed), and adding these two vari-ables caused the adjusted R2 to fallslightly, compared to the analysis withthem excluded. In addition, we per-formed an analysis on just socialwork data (Steiner et al., 2004).Thiscase is particularly interestingbecause social work students aredominantly female, as are social workfaculty. For the social work analysis,because of the decreased sample size,we used a trimmed set of indepen-dent variables (excluding thoseshown in this study to be of smallmagnitude and statistically insignifi-cant), and we did not include theinteraction term between student and



Factors Generally Found Findings Hereto Impact SETs?

Expected Grade Yes (+) Yes (+)

Required or Elective Yes Minimal

Course Level Yes Yes

Level of Challenge Yes (+) Yes (+)

Class Size Yes (-) No

Gender Inconclusive Yes (-)

Age Inconclusive Yes (-)

Race Inconclusive Yes (-)

Instructor’s Rank Inconclusive Yes

Years Teaching Inconclusive Minimal

Quantitative Content Inconclusive Minimal

Discipline Inconclusive Yes

Time of Day Inconclusive Minimal

Students Able Claimed Yes Students prefer activeto Be Passive (not analyzed)

Note: Here “+” indicates that the variable is estimated to improveSETs, while “-” indicates that it is estimated to worsen them.

Table 3 Some Findings in the Literature Compared with Findings Here


instructor gender. In the social work analysis, theeffect of more females in the class was estimated tobe slightly positive for female faculty, but again theestimate is not statistically significant at any reason-able level, and the adjusted R2 fell with the additionof the percent female variable compared to themodel excluding that variable.We think these resultssuggest that the gender composition of the class isnot the driver of the female instructor effect.

Our college uses a 5-point teaching evaluation,with 1 the best and 5 the worst.11 Thus, scaled, beingfemale is expected to reduce SETs on this instru-ment by 0.4 points. In our public affairs program,SETs are used as essentially the only indicator ofteaching quality for tenure, promotion, annualreviews, and determination of the yearly teachingaward. Question 19 on the college form asks,“Usingthe following categories in determining your answer,how would you rate this instructor’s overall teachingability?”Available categories range from “excellent”(1) through “very good,”“good,” and “fair” to “poor”(5). In spring 2003, the range on this variable for thethirty-two courses taught in public affairs was from1.00 to 3.90, with a mean of 1.70. Often our programuses not just the raw score to assess teaching quality,but also the rank, unadjusted for any other factorsuch as the level or type of the course, as an indica-tor of teaching quality.The median in these data is1.43. If a female teacher who would have otherwiseearned a 1.00 is penalized as estimated in our data,she would earn a 1.60, putting her twenty-first out ofthirty-two courses, and thus she would be consid-ered a mediocre teacher instead of the excellentteacher that she really is. Not surprisingly, of the six-teen years of public affairs teaching awards dis-played in the office, in only three years were theyawarded to a woman.

Our study did not include enough faculty of colorto examine various racial/ethnic groups separately.This prevented us from estimating any distinctionsthat may exist in students’ minds between differentracial and ethnic groups. Grouping together mem-bers of various racial/ethnic groups that are vieweddifferently by students will increase our standarderrors and thus reduce our statistical significance inestimating how race/ethnicity affects SET scores.

However, even though the coefficient was not statis-tically significant, our best estimate is that, on aver-age, non-majority race of the instructor has a nega-tive impact on scores.

The premise that students may also engage in agediscrimination has not been well examined in the lit-erature, but our results suggest that age alone harmsinstructors. Note that the estimated effect is holdingconstant years spent teaching as well as faculty sta-tus, so it is the independent effect of age itself.Though the implications are troubling, the yearlypolicy magnitude is fairly small, making it necessaryfor an instructor to be fifty-nine years older beforethe decrease in SETs reaches the level experiencedby female instructors.12 Do note the troubling impli-cations for older female instructors, however.

Data from the current study do not support pastresearch showing an interaction effect between gen-der or race and the level of difficulty in a course. Ourresearch did not find that women or people of colorwho are perceived to be more challenging or wholecture more (thus putting themselves in the posi-tion of the expert) are penalized in SET scores.Thismay suggest some progress since earlier studies wereconducted.Taken in conjunction with the finding forbeing female alone, it may indicate that, while stu-dents do not perceive it appropriate for females to beinstructors, given that they are, they don’t have pre-conceptions about how challenging they should be.

The authors found it surprising that the specificsof what instructors did in the classroom, the amountof time spent in various modes of teaching and thetechnologies used to support their teaching, had fairly small impacts on SET scores. In terms of tech-nology, we estimate the effect of routinely usingPowerPoint, videos, transparencies, an online supportprogram, and other online content.To our surprise,the use of each of these supplemental techniqueslowered SET scores, all else equal.The effects of allof these were small, and only PowerPoint statisticallysignificant, but taken together these indicate that useof these supplementary methods cannot help SETsand may harm them somewhat.A possible hypothe-sis for a negative impact is that instructors who usethese supports may rely too much on technologicalassistance and pay less attention to content and stu-




dent interaction in the classroom. Or, perhaps anystruggles with technology are annoying to the stu-dents or provide an impression of incompetence.Though we were not able to directly examine dis-tance teaching, these results suggest that SETs mightbe lower for distance classes, all else equal.This is anissue that deserves further attention.

In terms of time spent on various modes of teach-ing, instructors generally decide what percent ofclass time should be spent in lecturing, small groupwork, whole class discussion, student presentations,guests or videos, and active learning exercises.Theonly one of these teaching methods estimated tohave a positive impact on SETs was active learning,and larger amounts of time spent lecturing had thelargest negative impact.The effect of using most ofthese methods on SET scores was small. Overall,these estimates indicate that, at least in our data,most choices about in-class learning modalities arenot particularly relevant to SETs.13 However, studentsseem to be least satisfied or learn the least withinstructors who spend most of the class lecturing.Note that this finding is in direct contrast with thehypothesis of McKeachie (1997), who thought stu-dents would reward passive learning modes andpunish active.

CONCLUSION

In terms of advice to instructors, the research sug-gests that there are things instructors can do toimprove their SETs without compromising teachingor rigor. For example, students appreciate instructorswho listen to and are responsive to student feed-back. Given the assumption that students are theones directly experiencing the learning that is takingplace in the classroom, they are in a good position tooffer instructors feedback about the course.Instructors can use this feedback to strengthen theirteaching as well as strengthen their SET scores.Instructors can also offer extra credit and examreview sessions and make sure not to spend toomuch time lecturing.

The current research suggests that how much stu-dents perceive that they learn is one of the mostimportant factors in the overall teaching effective-ness score.This fact recommends their continued

use. However, the clear presence of biasing variablesis disturbing.The fact that being female and oldernegatively affects SET scores suggests that their con-tinued use may further institutionalize existing sys-temic, society-wide biases.

These two opposing sets of findings suggest tothe authors that, if programs choose to use SETs,they should not be used as the only measure ofteaching effectiveness.This view is supported by theAmerican Association of University Professors(AAUP), who state on their Web site that assessmentof teaching should be done using multiple measuresof effectiveness (AAUP, n.d.). Other measures thatcan be used include instructor self-evaluations, peerand administrator evaluations, and evaluations bytrained outside observers. Unfortunately, there is noclear evidence that any of these measures are sub-stantially more reliable or valid than SETs.Evaluations done by colleagues and administratorshave not been found to be particularly reliable, norhave they been well correlated with student evalua-tions or other measures of teaching effectiveness(Marsh and Roche, 1997).14 Some research suggeststhat trained observers can accurately measure cer-tain aspects of effective teaching (Marsh, 1987).However, other research raises questions about boththe reliability and validity of this approach (Howard,Conway, and Maxwell, 1985).

The strong evidence that SETs and the other mea-sures of evaluating teaching are flawed leavesinstructors and administrators in a conundrum.While it is important to measure teaching effective-ness in some way, the bias that appears to exist inSETs systematically disadvantages certain facultymembers and should not be ignored. Several partialsolutions may help. One is to use a combination ofmeasures and to attempt to average their collectiveresults. Or, it might be advantageous for programs toconduct research to determine which variablesappear to impact SETs within their own institutions.Following this, SETs could be statistically adjusted tocontrol for the effect of extraneous factors.A thirdsuggestion is that SETs must not be used to rank-order faculty or to make fine distinctions betweenfaculty members (Whittington, 2001, also makes thispoint). Instead, they can provide a general guide to




teaching effectiveness. Programs can develop severalcategories based on SET scores (e.g.satisfactory/unsatisfactory), trying to ensure that thecategories are broad enough to accommodate anybias. Finally, research based in consumer behaviorsuggests that a possible improvement to studentevaluations of teaching would be random-samplesurveys, rather than the population surveys that stu-dents know will occur (see Ofir and Simonson,2001;Armstrong, 1998; Grey and Bergman, 2003, ascited in Armstrong, 2004).

Further research also needs to be conducted todetermine what students mean when they say theylearned a lot, or very little, in a course. It would beuseful to know if students and instructors see similarlearning taking place in the classroom. For example,when students say they learned a lot, do they simplymean they learned facts pertaining to the coursecontent? Do they include other areas such asincreased critical thinking or problem solving skills,increased levels of self-awareness, or how to usecourse material in the real world? Is what theylearned related to the course goals and objectives?Future research is also needed to assess what stu-dents mean by effective instruction.With these ques-tions we return to some of where we started: whatreally is good teaching, and how do we measure it?Whatever it is, student evaluations of teaching mea-sure it imperfectly, and should be used only withcare.

NOTES

1. In the survey we also asked whether the professor asked for feed-back, but almost all of those who answered said that the professordid, making this variable unusable (not enough variation).

2. Our University uses “E” as the failing grade rather than “F..”3. Langbein (1994) interacts with expected grade, but we avoid this

because of the simultaneity issues discussed by McPherson (2003).4. There are several other units in our college, but some units declined

to participate, and some are so small that there was only one classrepresented, so they were omitted.

5. Public Affairs and Recreation Management and Tourism jointly offerclasses in nonprofit management and leadership, so those classeswill be classified as within one of these two programs (dependingon whose teacher offered each).

6. When a variable takes on only positive values, as in the case of classsize (or only negative values), then the square of that variable will behighly correlated with the original variable; if the original variablethat is squared takes on both positive and negative values, the corre-lation will be less.

7. If an estimator is biased, the sampling distribution of the estimator isnot centered about the true value in finite samples. If an estimator isinconsistent, then even in infinite samples the estimator will not cen-ter on the true value. OLS estimates with omitted variables arebiased, but consistent. OLS estimates with endogenous right-hand-side variables are biased and inconsistent.

8. There is an omitted category. It was “other” activities that could notbe clustered.

9. We do want to point out, however, that the SET literature is large andinconsistent, and all reviewed factors have been supported in somestudies and not others, so Table 3 should be viewed as impressionis-tic.

10. In this analysis the independent variables measuring what percent ofthe course was spent in different learning modalities (taken from theinstructor-survey data) was clustered somewhat differently than inthe main study.

11. We chose to use our 10-point measure of teaching quality becausewe collected it on the same form and at the same time as we collect-ed the other student-perception data. However, we did check thatour measure is highly correlated with the college measure, and it is,at a Spearman’s rho of 0.817, statistically significant at better thanthe 0.01 level.

12. Of course, no instructor is 0 years old, so the difference betweenolder and younger university teachers is even less.

13. Though, perhaps an economist would argue that we wouldn’tobserve any differences in teaching modalities on SETs because eco-nomically rational instructors will choose the modalities at whichthey are best.

14. Though do note that if SETs are systematically biased, they might notbe well correlated with unbiased measures.

15. ”Stndrd _s” are “standardized beta coefficients, which are the estimat-ed coefficients for an equation in which all variables have been stan-dardized by subtracting their means from them and by dividing themby their own standard deviations.The higher the [standardized] betaof an independent variable is in absolute value, the more importantit is thought to be in explaining the movements in the dependentvariable” (Studenmund, 2001, p. 172, fn. 8). By this standard, the mostimportant independent variables are (in order) how much the stu-dents thought they learned, the instructor’s gender, the interactionbetween instructor gender and percent time spent lecturing, percentof time spent lecturing, how responsive the students thought theinstructor was to their feedback, and how challenging the studentsfound the course.

REFERENCES

American Association of University Professors. Undated. Statement onTeaching Evaluation. Accessed August 2, 2004, at www.aaup.org/statements/Redbook/rbeval.htm.

Abrami, P. C., S. d’Apollonia, and P.A. Cohen. 1990.“Validity of StudentRatings of Instruction:What We Know and What We Do Not Know.”Journal of Educational Psychology, 82:285-296.

d’Apollonia, S., and P. C.Abrami. 1997.“Navigating Student Ratings ofInstruction.” American Psychologist, 52(11):1198-1208.

Armstrong, J. S. 2004.“How to Improve Service Quality and Satisfactionor My Boss Wants You to Like My Essays, So Please Give This a GoodRating.” Discussion for the Association for Consumer Research,Wed,3 Mar. 2004,ACR-L Digest-28 Feb. 2004 to 2 Mar. 2004 (online list-serve). [email protected].

Armstrong, J. S. 1998.“Are Student Ratings of Instruction Useful?”American Psychologist, 53:1223-1224.




Baldwin,T., and N. Blattner. 2003.“Guarding Against Potential Bias inStudent Evaluations: What Every Faculty Member Needs to Know.”College Teaching, 51:27-32.

Basow, S.A. 1995.“Student Evaluations of College Professors:WhenGender Matters.” Journal of Educational Psychology, 87:656-665.

Basow, S.A., and N.T. Silberg. 1987.“Student Evaluations and CollegeProfessors:Are Female and Male Professors Rated Differently?”Journal of Educational Psychology, 79:308-314.

Bernard, M. E., et al. 1981.“Sex-Role Behavior and Gender in the Teacher-Student Evaluations.” Journal of Educational Psychology, 73: 681-695.

Cashin,W. E. 1995.“Student Ratings of Teaching: The Research Revisited.”IDEA Paper No. 32. Manhattan, KA: Kansas State University, Center forFaculty Evaluation and Development.

Centra, J.A. 1993.“Reflective Faculty Evaluation: Enhancing Teaching andDetermining Faculty Effectiveness.” San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Cohen, P.A. 1982.“Validity of Student Ratings in Psychology Courses:AMeta-Analysis of Multisection Validity Studies.” Teaching ofPsychology, 9:78-82.

Cranton, P. and R.A. Smith. 1990.“Reconsidering the Unit of Analysis:AModel of Student Ratings of Instruction.” Journal of EducationalPsychology, 82:207-212.

Denhardt, R. B. 2001. “The Big Questions of Public AdministrationEducation.” Public Administration Review, 61(5):526-534.

Greenwald,A. G., and G. M. Gilmore. 1997.“Grading Leniency is aRemovable Contaminant of Student Ratings.” American Psychologist,52(11):1209-1217.

Grey, M., and B. R.Bergman. 2003.“Student Teaching Evaluation:Inaccurate, Demeaning, Misused.” Academe, (Sept./Oct.):44-46.

Hamilton, L. C. 1980.“Grades, Class Size, and Faculty Status PredictTeaching Evaluations.” Teaching Sociology, 8(1):47-62.

Howard, G.S., S.G. Conway, and S.E. Maxwell. 1985.“Construct Validity ofMeasures of College Teaching Effectiveness.” Journal of EducationalPsychology, 77:187-196.

Kierstead, D., P. D’Angostino, and H. Dill,1988.“Sex-Role Stereotyping ofCollege Professors: Bias in Student Ratings of Instruction.” Journal ofEducational Psychology, 80:342-344.

Langbein, L.I. 1994.“The Validity of Student Evaluations of Teaching.” PS:Political Science and Politics, 27(3):545-553.

Lueck,T. L., K. L. Endres, and R. E. Kaplan. 1993.“The Interaction Effects of Gender on Teaching Evaluations,”Journalism Education,48(3):46-54.

Marsh, H.W. 1987.“Students’ Evaluation of University Teaching: ResearchFindings, Methodological Issues, and Directions for Future Research.”International Journal of Educational Research, 11:253-283.

Marsh, H.W., and M. J. Dunkin. 1992.“Students’ Evaluations of UniversityTeaching: A Multidimensional Perspective.” In J. Smart, ed., HigherEducation Handbook of Theory and Research, Vol. 8. New York:Agathon Press.

Marsh, H.W., and L.A. Roche. 1997.“Making Students’ Evaluations ofTeaching Effectiveness Effective:The Critical Issues of Validity, Bias,and Utility.” American Psychologist, 51(11):1187-1197.

Martin, E. 1984.“Power and Authority in the Classroom: SexistStereotypes in Teaching Evaluations.” Signs: Journal of Women inCulture and Society, 9:482-492.

McKeachie,W.J. 1997.“Student Ratings.” American Psychologist,52(11):1218-1225.

McPherson, M.A. 2003.“Revisiting the Determinants of StudentEvaluation of Teachers Scores.” Unpublished research paper.University of North Texas.

Ofir, C., and I. Simonson. 2001.“In Search of Negative CustomerFeedback: The Effect of Expecting to Evaluate on SatisfactionEvaluations.” Journal of Marketing Research, 38:44-46.

Petchers, M.K., and J.C. Chow. 1988.“Sources of Variation in Students’Evaluations of Instruction in a Graduate Social Work Program.”Journal of Social Work Education, 24:35-42.

Pindyck, R. S., and D. L. Rubinfeld 1981. Econometric Models andEconomic Forecasts. 2nd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill.

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Steiner, S., et al. 2004.“Evaluating Teaching: Listening to Students WhileAcknowledging Bias.” Unpublished paper, Arizona State UniversitySchool of Social Work.

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Heather E. Campbell is director of Graduate Studies and an associate professor at Arizona State University’s School of Public Affairs.

Sue Steiner and Karen Gerdes are associate professors at Arizona State University’s School of Social Work.


The purpose of this paper is to examine the treatment of homelandsecurity in the content and context of a purposeful sample of graduate andundergraduate courses ranging from emergency management and pre-paredness and planning to terrorism and disaster response to homelandsecurity and national security at selected four-year colleges and universitiesin the United States.1 The reasons for this exploratory study stem fromquestions raised by academics and practitioners about the variety of coursedescriptions and treatments of homeland security, the quandary posed bythis definitional imprecision, and possible implications of this ambiguity forthe substantive curriculum in the respective disciplines.2

This paper is not meant to be an exhaustive study that catalogs allcourses on homeland security, nor will it be a synthesis of all syllabi in thefield. Instead, this paper establishes a framework for guiding futureresearch in the field by establishing a conceptual definition grounded bywhat is being taught under the moniker of homeland security. In thisregard, definition is distinguished from content; however, content drivesdefinition.The term definition is used not so much as a concise explana-tion but as a statement expressing the essential nature of something—inthis case, homeland security. Therefore, this paper presents a somewhatnontraditional method of inquiry and reflection with the goal of definingwhat is meant by homeland security.

A PRIORI OBSERVATIONS AND RESEARCH QUESTION

To begin this type of grounded analysis, it is important to offer some apriori observations about the genre of courses that teach, treat, or evaluatehomeland security:

1.There has been a widespread recognition of courses that treat home-land security as a major theme (many begun as a response to the ter-rorist events of September 11, 2001);

2.The content of these courses is only loosely coupled under the termhomeland security; and

What is Homeland Security? Developing a DefinitionGrounded in the Curricula

Robert W. SmithClemson University

University of South Carolina

J-PAE 11 (2005):3:233-246


The purpose of this article is to examine thetreatment of homeland security in the con-tent and context of a purposeful sample ofgraduate and undergraduate courses. Thisarticle establishes a framework for guidingfuture research in the field by establishing aconceptual definition grounded by what isbeing taught under the moniker of home-land security. It illustrates the imprecise ormultifaceted nature of the definition ofhomeland security and the varied approach-es used to teach homeland security. Theresearch design in this paper employed apurposeful sampling logic, a grounded theo-ry paradigm, and a content analysis tech-nique applied to the descriptions of thecourses, topical/unit coverage, and the use of terminology in the syllabi. The study con-cludes that homeland security courses playa variety of roles in the curricula, that thereis very little agreement about what consti-tutes homeland security as a curriculum, andthat the content of the syllabi seems heavilygrounded in a variety of disciplines. Thearticle discusses the possible implications ofthe conceptual definition of homeland secu-rity that the syllabi seem to suggest; that is,a system of emergency preparedness thatrequires military and civilian response toperceived, potential, or eminent terroristthreats against U.S. citizens and interests athome.

8smith.233-246 7/6/05 4:29 PM Page 233

3.Many of these courses have either been newlyadded to the curriculum or have long beenoffered as part of a specialized knowledge basebut without any substantive contribution todefining homeland security.

In some respects, even the articulation of these apriori observations may encourage academiciansand practitioners to move beyond a rather instru-mental definition and toward the development of afuller conceptual definition of homeland security.These observations lead to the specific researchquestion posited in this paper: What is homelandsecurity as taught in the broader public affairs cur-ricula?

BACKGROUND

Homeland Security in the LiteratureThe coverage of the Congressional response to

the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, revealsan early struggle with what would constitute home-land security (McCutcheon, 2001). It was clear thatCongress and the federal government were poised to take action as part of a comprehensive counter-terrorism effort. The use of the term counter-terrorism seems the closest to capturing the intent of early efforts to both investigate and respond todomestic terrorism in the United States. However,news accounts in the period reveal a much broadercontext for the effort beyond counter-terrorism. Theensuing discussions revolved around institutionalcapabilities and the organizational and inter-jurisdictional issues that would result in a compre-hensive strategy to make sure a catastrophic attacklike that of September 11 would not occur again.

In the most lucid accounts of the chronology andevolution of the term, Kelly (2002) points out theevolutionary nature of homeland security. One of themore public pronouncements of homeland securitycan be traced to President Bush’s Executive Order13228, which created the Office of HomelandSecurity (2001). That definition identifies “the mis-sion of homeland security as implementation of acomprehensive national strategy to secure the U.S.from terrorist threats or attacks.” Kelly outlines how

National Security Strategies from 1996 through 2000under President Clinton included concepts such ascounter-terrorism, drug trafficking, organized crime,and environmental and security concerns (Kelly,2002). But it was the National Security Strategy in2000 that identified “emerging threats to our home-land....”

The U.S.Army, on a separate track, issued a whitepaper entitled Supporting Homeland Defense andoffered a definition of

protecting our territory, population and critical infrastructure at home by deterring and defending against foreign and domesticthreats, supporting civil authorities for crisisand consequence management and helping toensure the...survivability...of national assets(U.S. Department of the Army, 1999).

This definition was more inclusive and called forinfrastructure protection and overlapping responsi-bilities of jurisdictions (both civilian and military) forcoordinating homeland security.

It has been widely acknowledged that U.S.Deputy Secretary of Defense John Hamre used theterm homeland security for the first time in the year2000, interchangeably with homeland defense (Kelly,2002). However, other reports have attributed theuse of the term to a 1949 panel of experts whowere assembled to review the use of potential bio-logical weapons and who reported to the Secretaryof Defense that there was a need for home defense.3

Interestingly, the more contemporary usage of theterm is likely traceable to the public administrationacademy, because it was William Waugh, Jr., whodelivered two conference papers in 1999 using theterm homeland security. 4 The U.S.Army in turn published the Army Homeland Security StrategicPlanning Guidance Document. A new definition wasoffered as “those active and passive measures takento protect the population, area and infrastructure ofthe United States, its possessions, and territories bydeterring, defending against, and mitigating theeffects of threats, disasters, and attacks; supportingcivil authorities in crisis and consequence manage-

What is Homeland Security? Developing a Definition Grounded in the Curricula


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ment; and helping ensure the availability, survivabili-ty, and adequacy of critical national assets” (U.S.Department of the Army, 2001).

This definition focused on two distinct orienta-tions: homeland defense and domestic support.These orientations are reflected in the Joint Chiefsof Staff definition of homeland security as follows:

The preparation for, prevention of, deterrenceof, preemption of, defense against, andresponse to threats and aggressions directedtowards U.S. territory, sovereignty, domesticpopulation, and infrastructure; as well as crisismanagement, consequence management andother domestic civil support” (U.S. Departmentof the Army, 2002).

It is clear that this definition also includes a man-agerial dimension that casts homeland security aspart and parcel of broader emergency managementand preparedness efforts.

Although these definitions have a tradition ineither a military or emergency management context,more recent iterations of the meaning of homelandsecurity clearly show the problematic nature ofdefining the term. In July 2002, the National Strategyfor Homeland Security revolved around three strate-gies: a national effort to prevent terrorist attacks inthe United States; a reduction in U.S. vulnerability toterrorism; and a minimization of damage and thenrecovery from attacks that do occur (Caudle, 2003).At some levels, this is a telling evolution, because thedefinition implies a coordinated (and intergovern-mental) national effort to address homeland securityand a recognition that risk and vulnerability assess-ment are crucial components and that it is unlikelythe efforts will stop all forms of terrorism.

What this recent definition implies is that the fed-eral government takes the lead in intelligence andwarning systems, border security, traditional counter-terrorism efforts, infrastructure protection, disastermanagement, and emergency response, but with thesupport of state and local jurisdictions. In addition,the definition embraces risk assessment, concern forindividual liberty, priority of national safeguards,

attention to all program areas that improve security,an emphasis on budgetary resources, a focus on per-formance, and mission and organizational responsi-bilities.What this means is that the evolution of adefinition has come full circle to become devolu-tion, where it is almost impossible to preciselydefine homeland security without including all thepossible components.Therefore, how can practition-ers train and academics teach such courses?

Homeland Security in the ClassroomIt also is instructive to provide some brief back-

ground on the evolution of such courses as part ofthe curricula examined in this paper. Teaching aboutterrorism or emergency management is certainly notnew. Indeed, specialized courses have been offeredover the years.5 However, the content of such classeshas been largely understanding terrorism as a phenomenon, how and why terrorists operate, ortechnical aspects of terrorist planning and imple-mentation.

Because the United States is geographically sepa-rated from the international community by both theAtlantic and Pacific oceans,Americans have longbelieved themselves to be apart from the repercus-sions of international terror. Not until September 11,2001, when international terrorists flew hijackedcommercial aircraft into the World Trade Center andthe Pentagon, did the American public realize theimportance of homeland security and the immi-nence of its implementation. Before then, homelandsecurity was not a recognized term from either aninstrumental or a conceptual viewpoint.

Yet, as of June 2002, a CBS News Poll indicatedthat 70 percent of Americans were in support of thecreation of a Homeland Security Department, and 66 percent responded that such an agency wouldincrease the strength of the fight on terrorism.6

Anecdotal evidence suggests that this positive assess-ment was rendered despite a general lack of knowl-edge about what homeland security really meant.

The resulting consolidation of twenty-two sepa-rate federal domestic agencies into the Departmentof Homeland Security (DHS) in 2003 demonstratedthe U.S. government’s resolve to invigorate and main-



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tain a strong defense to ward off future domestic ter-rorist crises.With such dramatic government reorga-nization, it was clear that homeland security was ele-vated to the top of the public policy agenda in theUnited States. But it is again interesting to note thatthere was little coverage and consideration given towhat was actually meant by homeland security.

At the same time, government agencies responsi-ble for homeland security and academic institutionsnow had to confront how best to deliver homelandsecurity services and prepare current and futureadministrators for their duties and roles in homelandsecurity agencies.7 Aside from technical training toemergency managers, health officials, law enforce-ment and military or National Guard personnel, typi-cally offered as emergency management or disasterpreparedness training, there has been little guidanceavailable for what a curriculum in homeland securityand related programs should look like.Yet, as anemerging national priority, homeland security educa-tion and training for leaders, public officials, and citi-zens has also been elevated in priority.8

Although courses focusing on the narrow themeof homeland security were not in abundance untilafter September 11, 2001, courses on terrorism as apolitical or sociological phenomenon have beenoffered for many years.9 Similarly, emergency man-agement courses have also been offered, althoughthe scope of these courses have markedly changedin the last few years to focus not only on traditionalEMS topics (e.g., earthquake or tornado response),but also on the response to biological and chemicalweapons attacks and emergencies resulting from ter-rorist activities within U.S. domestic borders.

Homeland security may not have been a special-ization in the curriculum in the past because therewas not a standard body of knowledge upon whichinstructors could readily base a curriculum. More tothe point, the Federal Emergency ManagementAgency (FEMA) only recently added a prototypecourse in emergency management with a focus onhomeland security.10 In addition, many instructorsthemselves did not have the requisite expertise toteach the full range of topical coverage nowrequired in these classes. One notable exception may

be intelligence, emergency response, or counter-terrorism experts teaching courses as visiting oradjunct instructors or as guest lecturers addressingthe threat of domestic terrorism as part of anothercourse (e.g., national security, global terrorism, etc.).However, definitional issues remained.Were thesecourses emergency management courses with amodule on homeland security, or were these terror-ism courses now cast as homeland security courses?

Prior to the creation of the DHS, few homelandsecurity courses were offered in colleges or universi-ties. The establishment and organization of DHS hasprovided an institutional impetus and a frameworkfor developing a homeland security curriculum(including counter-terrorism), extended emergencymanagement response, intelligence gathering, borderand airport protection, and disaster assistance. At thegovernmental level, early experience with homelandsecurity technical education and training was largelydecentralized to the many federal agencies responsi-ble for some aspect of homeland security.An everincreasing number of consulting firms now offerspecialized training or courses in homeland securityto fill the gap.11

Given the imprecise or multifaceted nature of thedefinition of homeland security, the varied approach-es employed to teach homeland security, and thefact that there has not been much in the way ofscholarly or pedagogical examination of such cours-es, this paper seeks to fill a gap in our understandingof what is being taught in homeland security courses. In order to answer this research question,available course syllabi were reviewed for topicalcoverage, the stated objectives and goals of thecourse, and the actual definitions of homeland secu-rity. Developing a conceptual definition of homelandsecurity as grounded in the actual syllabi used toteach such courses is an important first step towardanswering the research question.

METHODOLOGY: THE SAMPLE SYLLABI

The research design employed in this paperinvolved a three-tiered strategy. My first approachwas to initiate a random Web-based survey of cours-es bearing the title (search term) Homeland Security,



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followed by a more purposeful sample of courseslisted on the FEMA Web site.12 The unit of analysisfor the study was course syllabi. Initially, I directedthe search to identify specific graduate-level home-land security courses regardless of discipline.Tomaximize the sample size, yet another sampling iter-ation included other courses that were offered at theundergraduate and graduate levels. After recognizingthat this sample would yield a limited number ofcourses, I expanded the search to include courses inwhich homeland security was a substantive topicbut for which the course title did not necessarilycontain the term homeland security.

This purposeful sampling logic facilitated theidentification of the largest possible number ofhomeland security courses pertinent for developinga conceptual definition. The rationale for purposefulsampling is the gathering of information in an effortto determine the characteristics of a population (inthis case, the syllabi). See Patton (1990) for a moredetailed explanation of the logic of purposeful sam-pling. After the initial round of random sampling, Iused purposeful sampling, driven by the a prioritheory, to guide the subsequent data gathering(Strauss and Corbin, 1990, 188-193).When dealingwith a potentially new genre of courses on home-land security, I added syllabi to the sample after ini-tial sampling pointed to key terms, topics, or defini-tions that led to a further refinement of the sampleand courses germane to the study of homeland secu-rity.

From a starting sample size of approximately onehundred course syllabi that fit the above samplinglogic, the courses were sorted according to a typolo-gy that was based upon distinguishing characteris-tics mined from the content of the syllabi and theplacement of the course by either academic disci-pline or the context of the delivery of the courseitself. The typology that emerged from this sortingprocess is identified below:

I. Courses titled as or specific to homeland secu-rity

II. Courses as an extension of emergency manage-ment (inclusive of disaster preparedness)

III.Military-oriented courses

IV. Homeland security treated in terrorism ornational security courses

V. Technical/professional ourses (coursestaught/delivered by consultants, think tanks, orspecialized institutes—e.g.,ANSER,AnalyticServices Inc.)

After the syllabi at this level were sorted, fifty-seven courses were included in the next stage ofanalysis.This further refinement of the initial sampleof one hundred syllabi was guided by a decision cal-culus that the course had to contain a primary focuson homeland security, as determined by mission orobjectives stated in the syllabi, and not a secondaryfocus or equal focus with other topics covered inthe course. This sampling technique is consistentwith criterion sampling, which is a form of purpose-ful sampling employed in this study (Patton,1990,182-183). See Table 1 for the sampled coursesused to determine a definition of homeland security.

METHODOLOGY:A GROUNDED THEORY APPLICATION

The second stage of analysis used a grounded the-ory paradigm, applying a content analysis techniqueto the descriptions of the course, topical/unit cover-age, and the use of terminology in the syllabi.13 Thepurpose of content analysis was to identify keyphrases and descriptors, using an open codingscheme, that describe the phenomenon being stud-ied. Open coding as a technique requires identifying,naming, categorizing and describing occurrences,trends, facts, and events found in the syllabi.The syl-labus text is analyzed from the viewpoint of what itis telling us and what it is in reference to. In thiscase, open coding identified terms, concepts, andthreads in the syllabi related to homeland security.The next step of axial coding further refines thesedescriptors and starts to assemble the data intogroups of similar concepts to form broader cate-gories that can be further evaluated. Axial coding isa technique that relates terms, concepts, and eventsfound in the syllabus across all syllabi. The goal atthis stage is to identify causal relationships withinand between terms and concepts. Finally, key con-ceptual labels emerge from the analysis. They are



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College or University Course Name Focus

Homeland Security Courses

Regent University Protecting the Homeland:Terrorism National Security,TerrorismThreats and National Security

Tufts University Proliferation/Counter-proliferation National Securityand Homeland Security Weapons Proliferation

University of Arizona Governance and Security and Terrorism, Law and Organizationthe Response to Terrorism

University of Homeland Security Terrorism and MobilizationCentral OklahomaVirginia Tech Design, Implementation and Evaluation and Implementation

Evaluation of Homeland SecurityGeorgetown University U.S. Homeland Security Terrorism, counter-terrorism, history, law,

organization

Emergency Management and Preparedness CoursesCalState Bakersfield Emergency Mgmt.and EMS

Homeland SecuritySanta Monica College Emergency Mgmt. of Terrorism EMS, law enforcement,

contingency planning, terrorismCalState Fullerton Emergency Mgmt. EMS, preparedness, mitigation, recoveryUniversity of N.Texas Terrorism and Emergency Mgmt. Counter-terrorism, terrorism, EMSArizona State University Terrorism,WMD Disaster Management, terrorism,WMD

and Contemporary Issues

Military-Oriented Courses

National War College Homeland Security Asymmetric warfare, terrorism, counter-terrorism, law, consequence management,

Air War College Homeland Security: Risk assessment, intelligence,Protect, Prevent and Recover national security

Terrorism and National Security Courses

Troy State University National Security Policy National Security Policy, terrorism,mass destruction, asymmetric warfare

Villanova University National Security Policy National Security, terrorismHarvard University American National Security Policy National Security, terrorism,

WMD, peacekeeping

Technical/Specialized Courses

Indiana University Seminar in International Law: Legal foundations, civil libertiesSchool of Law Homeland SecuritySouthern Methodist Homeland Security Seminar Terrorism, attack, assessment, andUniversity abatementJohn Jay College: City Terrorism Seminar Terrorism, counter-terrorism, immigrationUniversity of New YorkPrinceton University Terrorism and Homeland Security Terrorism, organizational response

Table1. Profiles of Sampled Homeland Security Courses by Institution,Title, and Focus

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used to systematically describe the phenomenabeing studied. These concepts will be used to devel-op a definition of homeland security grounded inthe curricula.

Table 2 offers a tabular presentation of the con-tent analysis of topical course coverage and relatedcoding techniques that served as the basis for a con-ceptual definition of homeland security. The fourthcolumn of Table 2 reflects the construction of core



Open Coding Terms Frequency Axial Coding Terms Selective CodingUnder 20 Over 20 Categories Used in Definition

Federalism XState Coercion XCivil Society X Impact on SocietyLegal Constraints X Legal Environment Legal Environment Organization Theory X Organizational RolesContingency Planning X Planning Budget Processes XOrganizational Analysis X Agency Focus (DHS)

(DHS)Consequence Management XCivil Liberties X Civil Liberty v. SecurityLegislation:The Patriot Act XPolicy Theory X Policy Implications Policy Design XCatastrophic Threat XFirst Responders XInfrastructure Protection X Protection of Assets Emergency Management XSociology of Disasters XEmergency Preparedness X Emergency Response Emergency Response Border/Port Control XCounter-terrorism X Response to Terrorism Response to Terrorism Asymmetric Warfare XWeapons of Mass Destruct. XCyber Attack XIntelligence Activities X Significance of

Intelligence Activity Deterrence Theory XTerrorism X Understanding TerrorismRisk Assessment X Calculating Risk Vulnerability Assessment XSecurity Policy X Overall Security Policy Military Response X Military Role Military Role Rogue States XLaw Enforcement Role X

Table 2. Content Analysis of Homeland Security Courses (Grounded Theory Coding Sequence)

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categories revealed in the axial coding stage. In theopen coding stage, thirty-three terms emerged fromthe syllabi as significant topical coverage in thecourses. Axial coding identified fifteen categoriesthat serve as the basis for understanding the home-land security curriculum. The selective coding of the course syllabi revealed four key categories thatreflected important themes stressed across all syllabi.

The final technique of selective coding helped toidentify one core category that correlated to all theother categories. In this case, the core category thatemerged was emergency response/preparedness.This was identified as the core category because allother categories related to emergency response/pre-paredness as the fundamental phenomena.All of theother emergent categories were associated in adirect or indirect way with this core category.Thesampled syllabi revealed that homeland securitycourses revolve around the consideration of proac-tive or reactive strategies, context, and techniques toprotect the citizenry from terrorism or other man-made disasters. Emergency response/preparednessconcerns the state of readiness to provide homelandsecurity and as such is the inclusive category thatsubsumes all others.The essential idea at this pointof the analysis is to develop a single storyline aroundwhich everything else is draped.Therefore, the finalstage of the analysis was to assemble a definition ofhomeland security derived from the categories iden-tified in the syllabi.

DISCUSSION OF CONTENT ANALYSIS OF COURSE SYLLABI

A grounded theory paradigm leads to a ratherfree-form, yet analytic, approach to the subject mat-ter at hand: course syllabi. The free-form element inthis analysis of homeland security courses involvedan open coding scheme that identified as manyterms as possible that emerged from a review of thesyllabi in the sample. I undertook a syllabus-by-syl-labus review, identifying key words, phrases, andconcepts that seemed to be representative of thetopical material or focus of the course. See Column1 in Table 2, labeled as open coding, for the termsthat emerged at this level of analysis. The frequencyof usage of these terms was then examined. If the

terms were used more than twenty times in the sam-ple, the term was deemed important or central tothe course. At some levels, it is important to notethat, while the frequency is important, it is the termitself that is relevant to the analysis.What wasrevealed in this level of analysis was that the coursesincluded in this sample were courses that not onlystressed direct homeland security topics (e.g., weapons of massdestruction, or counter-terrorism) but also heavilyfocused on topics like civil liberties, policy design, ororganizational analysis. This suggests that the coursestaught cover a wide array of topics related to home-land security.

The second level of axial coding was an effort torelate the open coding terms to broader categoriesthat were more inclusive and descriptive of the con-tent that was contained in the syllabi. Axial coding(analysis) involves both an inductive and deductiveapproach in an effort to relate the open codingterms to one another and to more inclusive cate-gories.The process builds connections, and hencethe axial coding categories represent a comprehen-sive synthesis of the syllabi. The focus of thesecourses seemed to fall into defined areas like emer-gency response, legal environment, intelligence gath-ering, military implications, protection of assets, andpolicy implications. This level of analysis suggeststhat courses in homeland security covered discreteareas that did not necessarily fit into one genre ordiscipline.

Because the goal of grounded theory methodolo-gy is to develop a storyline, which for the purposeof this study is the construction of a definition, thecontent—while revealing—is of secondary interest.The main interest is how these concepts fit intodeveloping a description of courses on homelandsecurity. Selective coding allows the researcher tocompare these concepts within and across syllabifor the purpose of building common threads andrelationships. This stage of analysis revealed a rolefor homeland security courses that was primarilyconcerned with emergency preparedness, terrorism,and civilian and military response. Terms identifiedin the open and axial coding phase of the analysis



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supported these key categories. For example, emer-gency preparedness subsumed concepts like riskassessment, protection of assets, planning; terrorismsubsumed concepts like response and understandingof terrorism, intelligence activity, and security policy;while civilian military interface subsumed impact onsociety, legal environment, and civil liberty versussecurity. The core category to which all the cate-gories related was emergency preparedness. Thus, itwas possible to use these concepts as part of a defin-ition based upon what is taught in the curriculum.Table 3 shows the flow of the coding scheme as itdeveloped and the connections between categories.Although a definition is constructed from this analy-sis, the descriptive summaries of courses are equallyinstructive in terms of what is being taught underthe guise of homeland security and how this mayimpact pedagogy and the broader public affairs cur-ricula.The analysis was performed through the useof the Kwalitan coding software, which facilitatesthe grounded theory research approach.

HOMELAND SECURITY COURSE DESCRIPTIVE SUMMARY

Courses offered under the moniker of homelandsecurity since 2002 have fallen primarily into the fol-lowing categories.

Homeland Security Courses. Today’s homelandsecurity courses focus not only on threats of domes-tic terrorism in the United States, but they alsoencompass other topics beyond terrorism. Many cur-ricula include discussion concerning the controversysurrounding the creation of DHS, as well as the orga-nization of the department and the implications ofits creation.These courses incorporate a variety ofthemes and concepts to define homeland security:the study of terrorism and counter-terrorism efforts,the emergency response to terrorist activities/events, preparedness for and mitigation of disasters,risk assessment of terrorist threats, law enforcementresponse and planning, monitoring and detection ofterrorist threats, legal constraints and framework foraddressing terrorism, and international, national,state, and local coordination.

Emergency Management or Preparedness. Aspreviously noted, although emergency managementcourses have been offered for some time, they have

been reinvented to focus on a wider variety of top-ics. Emergency management courses are making thetransition from traditional topics in EMS to teachingfirst responders to an emergency scene to handlebiological, chemical, and nuclear weapons attacksand emergencies. Courses also cover terrorism astechnique and process. As a result, many homelandsecurity courses still function as emergency manage-ment courses. These courses incorporate a variety ofthemes and concepts to define homeland security,including mutual aid and co-lateral support, hazmatincident management, contingency plan coordina-tion, critical infrastructure preparedness, GIS andsimulation applications, crisis communications, busi-ness and industry interface, vulnerability assessmentand risk analysis, resources allocations, the nature ofterrorism, medical response, regulatory environment,organizational and legal analysis, and emergency pre-paredness paradigms.

Military-oriented Courses. Military institutionshave placed a premium on the importance of teach-ing national security and terrorism courses in thepast.With the creation of DHS and more imminentdomestic threats, however, these courses have shift-ed their focus to include the bureaucratic and orga-nizational issues of DHS and the mobilization ofdefense capabilities. This emphasis is demonstratedby the creation of a first-of-a-kind master’s degreeprogram in Homeland Security offered by the NavalPostgraduate School in 2003–2004.These coursesincorporate a variety of themes and concepts todefine homeland security, including the study of ter-rorism, asymmetric warfare, consequence manage-ment, detection of threats, proliferation of nuclearand biological weapons, electronic surveillance andother intelligence capabilities, the Patriot Act andlegal parameters, border/port control and tradeissues, Department of Homeland Security, publichealth system response, critical infrastructure assets,and domestic use of military NORTHCOM (northernmilitary command charged with homeland security)responsibilities.

Terrorism and National Security Courses. Amongthe more longstanding courses in a variety of pro-grams have been courses exploring terrorism orcourses on national security policy. Although these



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Open Axial Selective Core Category



FederalismState CoercionLegal ConstraintsCivil LibertiesLegislation:

The Patriot ActLaw Enforcement Role

Contingency PlanningOrganization TheoryBudget ProcessesOrganizational Analysis

(DHS)

Catastrophic ThreatFirst RespondersInfrastructure ProtectionEmergency ManagementEmergency PreparednessBorder/Port ControlSociology of Disasters

Counter terrorismAsymmetric WarfareWMDCyber AttackIntelligence ActivitiesDeterrence TheoryRisk Assessment

Consequence Mgmt.Policy TheoryPolicy Design

AssessmentSecurity PolicyMilitary ResponseRogue States

Impact on SocietyLegal EnvironmentCivil Liberties v. Security

Organizational RolesPlanningAgency Focus (DHS)

Policy Implications

Legal Environment

EmergencyResponse

EmergencyResponse/Preparedness

Response toTerrorism

Protection of AssetsEmergency Response

Overall Security PolicyMilitary Role

Military Role

Response to TerrorismSignificance of IntelligenceActivityVulnerabilityCalculating Risk

Table 3. Flow of Coding Categories from Open to Axial to Selective

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courses are much broader in scope than just home-land security, they are more on the forefront ofaddressing homeland security as a response to grow-ing domestic terror events and the articulation of anational policy. These courses treat the topic ofhomeland security and include history of terrorism,weapons of mass destruction, military contingencies,risk assessments, concept of vital security, securitypolitics, decisionmaking, rogue states, asymmetricwarfare, interventionalism, noncombatants, deathsquads, dissident groups, terrorism as a politicalmethod, covert action, state terrorism, suicide bomb-ings, state sponsored terrorism, ethnic and religiousterrorism, counter-terrorism, and legal framework ofresponse.

Technical or Specialized Courses. Seminars relat-ing to the increased threats to homeland securityhave also been implemented at many institutions ofhigher education and may or may not be credit-bearing courses. Many seminars employ speakersfrom the highest levels of government to provideparticipants with comprehensive, up-to-date informa-tion relating to homeland security. In another morespecialized type of course, one component of home-land security is examined (e.g., weapons of massdestruction, risk assessment and homeland security,Islamic terrorists).While many seminars are targetedto traditional students, others are organized for prac-titioners or analysts to ensure their understanding ofhomeland security. Typical definitions of homelandsecurity in these types of seminars may includedescriptors of domestic versus international terror-ism, the culture of terrorism, profiling terrorists, theeconomic impact of terrorism, building security andmanagement, airport security, community emergencyresponse teams, legal issues, civil liberties, crimescene management, incident preparedness, personalprotective equipment, decontamination procedures,and mass fatalities incidents.

PRELIMINARY DEFINITIONS

First, it is clear that homeland security coursesplay a variety of roles in the curriculum. One genreof courses is taught as specific homeland securitycourses, where the subject is treated in a focusedfashion with an orientation toward counter-

terrorism. Homeland security taught as part of emergency management or preparedness courses is treated as another type of disaster or emergencysituation.These courses cast homeland security inthe broader context of planning and incident man-agement tailored to terrorist-type emergencies.Another group of courses in homeland security islong-established courses in such traditional formatsas terrorism or national security. However, this treat-ment necessarily prevents a fuller exploration of themore specialized knowledge areas that comprisehomeland security.

Other courses, not surprisingly mostly taught inmilitary academies or security institutes, focus thecurriculum on national security, risk assessment, andthe military response to terrorist threats.

Finally, there is a genre of courses that can beconsidered special courses or seminars on homelandsecurity. These courses typically are issue-focused(be that civil liberties- and or incident-related) anddo not necessarily offer a comprehensive treatmentof homeland security. By their very nature, they areshort courses and convey a limited set of specializedknowledge (e.g., first responder protocol).

The actual content analysis performed on the syl-labi reveals that, despite the descriptor of homelandsecurity, many courses still retain a familiar focus oncore functions in public affairs. Even a cursoryreview of the content terms presented in Table 2suggests that the concepts of federalism, civil liber-ties, the legal imperative, organization theory, policydesign, and budget processes speak to the treatmentof homeland security as requiring a much broaderfield of knowledge.

Somewhat surprising was the absence of some ofthe more technical topics—e.g., weapons of massdestruction, intelligence activity—that might beexpected to play more of a role in courses on home-land security. The first responder, disaster, and inci-dent management focus of some homeland securitycourses solidly grounds the course as an emergencymanagement course but subsumes the treatment ofhomeland security.

So content analysis of a purposeful sample ofhomeland security courses reveal numerous con-cepts, threads, and topics that make it difficult to



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accurately construct one inclusive definition ofhomeland security. This quandary poses real implica-tions for the knowledge base imparted in thesecourses. The very real issue for instructors of home-land security concerns what core competenciesmust be included in the standard curriculum.

In many respects, homeland security is no differ-ent from any course in political science or publicadministration. Indeed, there are many ways to teachIntroduction to American Politics, but there is proba-bly some agreement on the coverage of theConstitution, and institutions of government.Similarly, in public administration, it is probably fairto say that an organization theory class can betaught any number of ways, yet there should be acommon thread tied to the orthodoxy of theorists,human relation school, and others. The point is sim-ply that the quandary over clarity of definitionimposes some real constraints on the developmentof a broader curriculum and an understanding ofwhat these courses should convey in terms ofknowledge and training.

This definitional quandary is nowhere better evi-denced than in the Congressional Budget Office’s(CBO) 2004 Executive Budget Brief, which attempt-ed to explain funding for homeland security in 2004.Essentially the CBO has used three types of defini-tions for describing activities and programs receivingfunds as homeland security. The standard definitionis stated as “a concerted national effort to preventterrorist attacks within the United States, reduceAmerica’s vulnerability to terrorism, and minimizethe damage and recover from attacks.”15 At the sametime, the CBO makes distinctions in defining interna-tional versus domestic terror activities. They alsoinclude some military activities and include emer-gency preparedness and response as part of theirdefinition.

The Department of Homeland Security itself identifies what constitutes homeland security throughsix distinct mission areas:16 intelligence and warning,border and transportation security, domestic coun-terterrorism, protection of infrastructure, defenseagainst catastrophic threat and emergency prepared-ness and response. The DHS provides a useful tem-

plate for comparing the conceptual definition ofcourse syllabi developed in this study.

CLOSING OBSERVATIONS

Two distinct observations can be made about thecourses included in this abbreviated study. First,numerous courses on homeland security are offered,but there is very little agreement about what consti-tutes homeland security as a curriculum. Some thir-ty-three areas of topical coverage or course focus areidentified in the fifty-seven syllabi included in thisstudy. The range of topics mined from the syllabisuggests that there is little agreement on a definitionfor homeland security, but it also speaks to a broaderissue of what the substantive content of such cours-es should be. Standardization of course content mayor may not be desirable. There is certainly more thanone way to teach a class.

Second, the content of the syllabi is not exclusiveto one primary field; instead, topical coverage (e.g.,federalism or civil liberties) seems to be heavilygrounded in a variety of disciplines. At some levels,this may suggest an interdisciplinary focus for manycourses on homeland security.

Synthesizing a DefinitionBecause of the exploratory nature of this research

and the purposeful sample employed, it is difficult to draw any definitive conclusions from this paper.However, it seems appropriate to discuss some impli-cations of this study for the future of homeland secu-rity courses and to offer a definition gleaned fromthe curricula to guide further research.

In future research, this study should be replicatedmore systematically and with a broader and morerigorous sampling strategy. Casting a broader net thatwould examine all courses offered on homelandsecurity would be instructive. Possible alternatemethodologies could include mailing questionnairesto randomly selected schools to inquire about home-land security courses. It is hoped that this researchwill start a discussion in the broader public affairscommunity about the role of homeland securitycourses, given the illusive nature of the topical cov-erage delivered through these courses.



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However, there are sufficient data in this sampleof courses to construct a conceptual definition ofhomeland security. This definition is derived from an analysis of the content terms extracted from thesyllabi in a traditional grounded theory analysis.The terms (see Table 2) are assembled into a keystatement or definition of what the data tell theresearcher. The syllabi suggest that homeland securi-ty is a system of emergency preparedness thatrequires military and civilian response to perceived,potential, or eminent terrorist threats against U.S. cit-izens and interests at home. At many levels this defi-nition is not earth-shattering, but it does capture theinherent nature of homeland security as a disciplineor area of study closely aligned with emergencymanagement. Moreover, this definition recognizesthe interface between military and civilian authori-ties and places the appropriate emphasis on recogni-tion of the terrorist-driven nature of homeland security. If these component statements are accurateor obvious, it is still not clear that this is what isbeing taught under the rubric of homeland security.

It is clear that there is a demand for these cours-es, but the demand outpaces the recognition ofagreement over what should be taught in theseclasses. This paper offers a ground floor or baselineto begin this debate. Any future debate or researchshould help improve upon the delivery of thesecourses and better integrate or link homeland securi-ty to the overall curricula. In the absence of thiswork, and a more precise definition of homelandsecurity, the question about what we are reallyteaching in such courses remains unanswered.

NOTES

1. The initial sample was directed at courses offered throughMPA/Master of Political Science programs. Because numbers were small, the sample was expanded to include graduate and undergraduate offerings in related disciplines.

2. See Gyenes, Kelly,“Rhetorics of Terrorism, Homeland Security atRichmond,” December 19, 2003. Available at www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/12/18/elec04.richmond/. See also Seyfer, Jessie,“SchoolOffers Training for ‘Homeland Security’Jobs,” January 13, 2003.Available at www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/4934708.htm. See also Eric Kelderman,“College programs follow themoney,”August 8, 2003. Available at www.gazette.net/200332/weekend/a_section/172253-1.html.

3. See http://www.homelandsecurity.org/bulletin/ActionPlan_WhatIsHLS.htm.

4. Conference papers of William Waugh, Jr.:“Defending the Homeland:Institutionalism and the Politics of Weapons of Mass Destruction,”with R.T.. Sylves, Fifth National Public Management ResearchConference,The Bush School of Public Service,Texas A&MUniversity, College Station,TX, December2-4, 1999, and “The Defenseof the Homeland Against Terrorism and the De-Invention ofEmergency Management,” with R.T. Sylves, Southeastern Conferenceof Public Administration, St. Petersburg, FL, October 7-9, 1999.

5. The School for National Security Executive Education, a componentof the National Defense University, has offered “U.S. Foreign Policy inan Age of Global Terrorism,” and “The Global War on Terrorism.”

6. See www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/06/21/opinion/polls/main512974.shtml

7. FEMA provides courses on emergency preparedness and responsefor emergency personnel and the public through the EmergencyManagement Institute, Noble Training Center, EENET, CommunityEmergency Response Teams, Master Trainer Program, National FireAcademy, and EMI Independent Study Courses.

8. The Naval Postgraduate School (Monterey, CA) was one of the first schools to develop a master’s degree curriculum in homelandsecurity.

9. George Mason University’s Theory and Politics of Terrorism.10. See training.fema.gov/emiweb/edu/highnews.asp.11. Government Institutes (www.govinst.com) offers the course

Security Vulnerability Analysis Workshop for Hazardous MaterialsManagers. InfoSec Institute (www.infosecinstitute.com) offers thecourse SCADA Security: Protecting our Homeland Security.

12. The sample was gathered using four Internet search engines.13. For a thorough discussion of grounded theory and use of content

analysis, see Anselm Strauss and Juliet Corbin, eds., Grounded Theoryin Practice. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1997.

14. See Naviatil, Joe,“NPS Offering Master’s Degree in HomelandDefense,” Naval Supply Corps Newslette, May-June 2003, 66(1):50.

15. See www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=5414&sequence=0.16. See Office of Management and Budget, 2003 Report to Congress on

Combating Terrorism, at www.whitehouse.gov/omb/inforeg/2003_combat_terr.pdf.

REFERENCES

Caudle, Sharon. 2003.“Homeland Security:A Challenging Environment.”The Public Manager, 32(Spring):19-22.

Executive Order 13228 of October 8, 2001.“Establishing the Office ofHomeland Security and the Homeland Security Council.”

Kelly, Patrick. 2002.“Defining Homeland Security.” Military IntelligenceProfessional Bulletin, 28(3):10-15.



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McCutcheon, Chuck. 2001.“Defining Homeland Security.” CQ Weekly,September 29.Available at http://library2.cqpress.com/cqweekly/document.php?id.

Patton, Michael. 1990. Qualitative Evaluation and Research Methods(2nd ed.). London: Sage Publications.

Strauss,Anselm, and Juliet Corbin. 1990. Basics of Qualitative Research:Grounded Theory Procedures and Techniques. London: SagePublications.

United State Department of the Army. 2001. Army Homeland SecurityStrategic Planning Guidance. Washington, DC: U.S. Department ofthe Army.

United State Department of the Army. 2002. Joint Chiefs of StaffHomeland Security Definitions. Washington, DC: Department of theArmy.

United State Department of the Army. 1999. Supporting HomelandDefense:White Paper. Norfolk,VA: U.S. Department of the Army.



Robert W. Smith is director of the Joint Master of Public Administration Program between Clemson University and the University ofSouth Carolina. His articles and research have appeared in Public Administration Review, Administration & Society, and the Journalof Public Budgeting, Accounting and Financial Management. Smith’s research interests are in the areas of administrative ethics,public budgeting, civic engagement, and curricula and pedagogical issues in public affairs.

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The April 2004 J-PAE symposium, Social Equity in Public AffairsEducation, offered an opportunity to learn more about the concept ofsocial equity and how it can be integrated into MPA curricula.According toseveral of the authors’ definitions, I have been teaching and writing aboutsocial equity for more than three decades, particularly in the areas of repre-sentative bureaucracy, equal employment opportunity, affirmative action,and constitutional equal protection, due process, and protections for pris-oners and individuals confined to public mental health facilities.The sym-posium was clearly a good start at taking social equity more seriously inMPA education. However, it also has at least five substantial limitations thatmay well impede the authors’ objectives of bringing social equity into thecore of the MPA curriculum. In addressing these, I hope to advance thetreatment of social equity in the classroom.

1. Don’t forget the rule of law. Contributor Ernest J.Wilson III notes that“[e]quity remains important…but national interest must be brought to thefore” (160). Ditto, the rule of law. Building on separate work by theNational Academy of Public Administration’s Social Equity Committee,Susan Gooden, Samuel L. Meyers, Jr., James H. Svara, James R. Brunet, SusanWhite, and Anna M.Agathangelou endorse social equity as “the third pillar”of a field of public administration which has as its “first and second pil-lars…the normative touchstones of…effectiveness and efficiency” (Goodenand Myers, 2004a, 94;Agathangelou, 156, identifies one of the pillars aseconomy rather than effectiveness). Surely the rule of law is at least a pil-lar, if not the very foundation of public administration in democratic gov-ernments. Contributor Lacy Ward, Jr., makes the point that “[t]heConstitution forms the foundation of our study of American public affairs”(159). However, other contributors treat the rule of law as a subordinatecomponent of social equity itself (Svara and Brunet, 103) or, followingWhite, ultimately of little practical significance:“the law is rarely so clearand precise that it can uniformly be applied from case to case…. [I]f pub-lic administration is the law in action, then it inevitably requires interpreta-tion and discretion in its applications” (White, 114; my emphasis).

Taking Social Equity Seriously in MPA Education

David RosenbloomAmerican University


J-PAE 11 (2005):3:247-252

ABSTRACT

In this article, David Rosenbloom suggestsfive limitations of the 2004 J-PAE sympo-sium on Social Equity in Public AffairsEducation. He offers five injunctions,paralleling those limitations, to guide discussion: don’t forget the rule of law;define social equity; confront the inequitiesof social equity; explain the advantages, ifany, of applying the term social equity tostandard, longstanding subject matter inMPA education; and avoid stealing popularsovereignty.

9rosenbloom.247-252 M1 7/6/05 4:31 PM Page 247

One could obviously question whether effective-ness and efficiency themselves are separate pillars orif they are more important to public administrationin democratic government than accountability andtransparency. However, are MPA students really to betaught that the rule of law is not among the pillarsof contemporary public administration in democra-cies? Not emphasizing the rule of law is unimagin-able in the face of Abu Ghraib, the Supreme Court’sstrong rebuke of President George W. Bush’s uncon-stitutional claims of extravagant executive powerswith regard to “enemy combatants” (Rasul v. Bush,No. 03-334 [2004]; Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, No. 03-6696[2004]), and all too frequent troubling illegal activity,including racial profiling, by street-level bureaucrats.White says or implies that public administrators havea “duty” to “redistribute resources” (113). It will serveMPA students better to understand that publicadministrators are bound by the rule of law to imple-ment regulations, such as regressive taxes, that maynot comport with concepts of social equity, just asthey must obey open meeting and freedom of infor-mation requirements that may impede efficiency.

2. Define social equity. As Gooden and Myers andSvara and Brunet indicate, social equity is difficult todefine.This is worrisome for a term that gainedprominence in the field of public administration asfar back as 1968. Gooden and Myers define socialequity tautologically as “fairness or social justice”(92) and explain it in terms of distributive justiceand diversity (which are not necessarily compatible).Mitchell F. Rice draws a distinction between socialequity and diversity, the former being “fairness andequal treatment in public service delivery and publicpolicy implementation” (143) and the latter, essen-tially, representative bureaucracy.White quotes theNational Academy of Public Administration’s unhelp-ful declamation that “[s]ocial equity is, then, the bal-ancing of various forms of equality” (111). Svara andBrunet explain that “[f]airness, justice, and equitabledistribution are viewed as normative cornerstones ofequity” (101). However, in their view,“social equity”is “hollow” (100).

A hollow pillar might work in architecture butnot in pedagogy. Svara and Brunet fill it in with con-

sideration of public administrators’“ethical and legalobligation to ensure that Constitutional rights areprotected,”“distributional equity,”“consistency in thequality of existing services delivered to groups andindividuals,” and “examination of whether policiesand programs have the same impact for all groupsand individuals served” (101-102).

Aside from more tautology, Svara and Brunet con-found equity and social equity.Their discussion ofprocedural fairness and due process fails to note thatconstitutional procedural due process is overwhelm-ingly an individual right, not one that protects largegroups from unfair deprivation of liberty or propertyby government.This has been the constitutional rulesince 1915 (Bi-Metallic Investment Co. v. StateBoard of Equalization of Colorado, 239 U.S. 441).Constitutional equal protection is better suited tothe social in social equity. However, it requires race-and ethnicity-based public policies to be “narrowlytailored,” which in turn mandates that applicants forpublic university education (and other public bene-fits) be given “individualized consideration” (Gratz v.Bollinger, No. 02-516 [2003]; majority slip opinion,26-27).

Of course, social equity is not the only term orconcept that cannot be well defined or specified inMPA education. Justice, representation, politicalpower, and the public interest are perhaps equallyelusive. One can teach about these ideas withouthaving perfect definitions. Still, it is difficult to tellstudents they should do something ill-defined, espe-cially when, as Gooden and Myers show (91), thereare apt to be multiple competing ideas about whatconstitutes social equity in even simple distribution-al matters.Absent a coherent definition, how are stu-dents to recognize a breach of social equity or knowwhether it is so severe as to warrant a trade-offagainst the other two pillars or additional administra-tive concerns?

Gooden and Myers (2004b, 172) sidestep the defi-nitional conundrum by calling for social equityanalysis. However, disparity itself does not necessari-ly constitute a violation of social equity unless thelatter is defined to include any deviation fromabsolute equality—and such a definition would be






unworkable. Consider Jay Shafritz and WilliamRussell’s claim that social equity is “the principlethat each citizen, regardless of economic resourcesor personal traits, deserves and has a right to begiven equal treatment by the political system” (quot-ed by Svara and Brunet, 105). Strictly following thisapproach, public personnel systems and state univer-sities would violate social equity by distinguishingbetween applicants who are intelligent and unintelli-gent, achievers and nonachievers, motivated andunmotivated, leaders and followers, honest and dis-honest—and still the rich and the poor could be for-bidden alike from sleeping on park benches. It isincumbent on those who would make social equitya mainstay of the MPA curriculum to strive to pro-vide a clearer, operational definition.

3. Confront the inequities of social equity.Achieving social equity, reasonably defined, is notlikely to establish Pareto optimality.The public inter-est may be served, but there are apt to be winnersand losers.The Fifth Amendment’s takings clauseguarantees just compensation for the latter whentheir real property is taken for public use. However,there is no guarantee of compensation when theinclusion of some requires the exclusion of othersfrom a public benefit. Rice alludes to this in notingthat resistance to affirmative action may take theform of “perceived fears of reverse discrimination”(151). Not all such discrimination is reverse, though.One minority group may have its opportunities for apublic benefit, such as state university education,limited to enhance the inclusion of other minorities.Moreover, even the included may suffer inequity.

Justice Clarence Thomas cautions proponents ofsocial equity to consider the full impact of measuresto achieve diversity.Writing on federal efforts to fun-nel funds for transportation infrastructure to minori-ty owned businesses,Thomas contends:

These federal programs not only raise graveconstitutional questions, they also underminethe moral basis of the equal protection princi-ple. Purchased at the price of immeasurablehuman suffering, the equal protection princi-ple reflects our Nation’s understanding that

such classifications ultimately have a destruc-tive impact on the individual and our society.Unquestionably,“[i]nvidious [racial] discrimina-tion is an engine of oppression,”.... It is alsotrue that “[r]emedial” racial preferences mayreflect “a desire to foster equality in society,”....But there can be no doubt that racial paternal-ism and its unintended consequences can beas poisonous and pernicious as any other formof discrimination. So-called benign discrimina-tion teaches many that because of chronic andapparently immutable handicaps, minoritiescannot compete with them without theirpatronizing indulgence. Inevitably, such pro-grams engender attitudes of superiority or,alternatively, provoke resentment among thosewho believe that they have been wronged bythe government’s use of race.These programsstamp minorities with a badge of inferiorityand may cause them to develop dependenciesor to adopt an attitude that they are entitled topreferences (Adarand Constructors, Inc. v.Pena, 515 U.S. 200, 240-241 [1995], concurringopinion; internal citations omitted, bracketsand internal quotes are in the original text).

Failure to treat such concerns as research propo-sitions or hypotheses1 drastically limits the possibleutility of case studies such as David W. Pitts and LoisRecascino Wise’s comparison of a single university’slaw school and school of public affairs on the dimen-sions of faculty and course diversity (125-142). In acase study of such limited scope, shouldn’t one atleast explore the extent to which faculty and stu-dents perceive unfairness and other negative effectsof efforts to promote diversity? Perhaps Thomas seri-ously overstates such effects.

4. Explain the advantages, if any, of applyingthe term social equity to standard, longstandingsubject matter in MPA education. Svara and Brunetfill in the hollow pillar of social equity with constitu-tional rights and representativeness (103).Why notteach law as law and political values and phenomenaas political values and phenomena? The rule of lawand allegiance to the Constitution require public


administrators to divide Gooden and Myers’ hypo-thetical pie in accordance with the relatively con-crete dictates of equal protection rather than theadmittedly ill-defined tenets of social equity. Equalprotection doctrine identifies the constitutional teststhat public policy classifications based on race, eth-nicity, gender, age, residency, wealth, and other fac-tors must meet, whether or not Gooden, Myers, andMPA students find them socially equitable. It may befine for MPA faculty and students to advocate socialequity, but public administrators have to do equalprotection on the job. Similarly, Svara and Brunetrefer to “representativeness” as “[a]n important con-sideration for social equity proponents” with respectto “the racial, ethnic, and gender composition of thepublic workforce” (103).This subset of representa-tiveness is easily taught with reference to civil ser-vice and equal employment opportunity law as wellas representative bureaucracy—a concept that hasbeen in the field’s literature since 1944.The federalCivil Service Reform Act of 1978 calls for a federalcivilian workforce drawn from “all segments of soci-ety” and provides a formal definition and measure ofthe “underrepresentation” of minority groups (92Stat. 1111; 1113, 1152).The statute already definessuch underrepresentation as a public policy prob-lem.What is gained in MPA education by adding thatit may be a social equity problem, depending onhow social equity is defined and operationalized?

What is lost in filling in the hollow pillar of socialequity in Svara-Brunet fashion is clear. First, publicadministration’s intellectual history is obscured.Constitutional rights and representative bureaucracypreceded social equity in the field’s developmentand were developed largely—perhaps entirely—without reference to it.Although labeling such con-cerns social equity may be convenient shorthand ormarketing, it hides the fact that these subjects stoodand can continue to stand on their own. Second,social equity, reasonably defined, is muddled when itis treated as a pillar built of sometimes incompatibleconcerns and concepts. Equal protection permitspublic schools attended predominantly by ethnicminorities to receive lower per pupil funding thanthose in the same district with largely non-minority

student bodies (San Antonio Independent SchoolDistrict v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1 [1973]). Suchunequal funding is a subject for social equity analy-sis, but how would this feature of equal protectionhelp fill the hollow pillar? Third, the overall coher-ence of concepts like equal protection and represen-tative bureaucracy may be lost when some of theiraspects are said to be in the third pillar, whereas oth-ers remain outside. As a political concept, represen-tative bureaucracy is more inclusive than social equi-ty. It may address geographic, tribal, and other dimen-sions of representation regardless of whether theyare relevant to social equity issues in a particularpolity. For instance, representative bureaucracy oftenconsiders religious representation, which neitherSvara and Brunet (103) nor Agathangelou (156) mention as a social equity concern.

5.Avoid stealing popular sovereignty. In his strident attack on the New Public Administration,Without Sympathy or Enthusiasm, VictorThompson (1975, 66) warned public administrationfaculty against attempting “to ‘steal’ popular sover-eignty.” His point was that, being a profession of government, public administrators may be free toadvocate values such as social equity, but they needdemocratic-constitutional legitimation to imposethose values on the political system. Orthodox U.S.public administration tried to impose efficiency asthe highest administrative value (“axiom numberone,” in Luther Gulick’s well known words (1937a,638)). Gulick (1937b, 455) justified imposing effi-ciency without recourse to consent by the public orthe constitutional branches of government by claim-ing that “[e]fficiency is one of the things that is goodfor him [the common man] because it makes lifericher and safer.” The Orthodoxy foundered on thisscore because Congress, the president, and the feder-al courts viewed other values, including transparen-cy, representativeness, and individual rights, as moreimportant in federal administration.White echoesGulick’s approach in asserting that

[a]s public administrators, our duty [withregard to “tribulations associated with race”] tothe citizens we serve is to become a means for




achieving compromise and for struggling forsocial change. Our process should be toredress injustices, redistribute resources, andimprove the atmosphere in which people liveand work (113).

Clearly, public administrators need a mandatefrom the constitutional branches of government tolegitimate their pursuit of redistribution and socialchange, just as they would to justify repression inthe name of administrative efficiency or nationalsecurity.As Justice Thomas notes, efforts to promotesocial equity, like the quest for other laudable admin-istrative goals, can lead to misguided, injurious, andunconstitutional actions.

In contrast to White, Svara and Brunet urge publicadministrators to tread carefully around theft of pop-ular sovereignty. They contend that

public administrators have a responsibility topromote fairness, justice, and equitable distrib-ution in policy formulation, implementation,and management and to critically examine theimpact of government actions. Definingresponsibility in this way assumes that adminis-trators play an active role in policy-making andthat their efforts to shape policy shouldinclude giving explicit attention to the implica-tions of alternative approaches for equity(102).

Advocacy, not imposition of personal and profes-sional values, should be the rule.

CONCLUDING OBSERVATIONS

The five points above seem most in need of atten-tion if social equity is to become a pillar of the MPAcurriculum. In closing, two claims in the symposiummerit challenge. First, Svara and Brunet incorrectlyassert that “[t]he current stock of introductory text-books cover social equity in one of two ways—as astand alone chapter…or as a prominent feature in ahuman resources section” (108). My book, withRobert Kravchuk, Public Administration:Understanding Management, Politics, and Law in

the Public Sector (fifth ed., 2002; sixth ed. 2005)does not index social equity. However, it integratessubject matter explicitly considered by Svara andBrunet as filler in the hollow pillar of social equityinto twelve of its thirteen chapters: procedural dueprocess appears in six chapters; equal protection inseven chapters; fairness and fair adjudication in fourchapters; remedial law, which the symposium largelyignores as a vehicle for promoting social equity, inthree chapters; and Chapter 11 is devoted entirely to the treatment of “Public Administration andDemocratic Constitutionalism.” Second, as the bookexplains, management, politics, and law, each derivedfrom the constitutional separation of powers, pro-vide a broader and stronger basis for U.S. publicadministration than the so-called pillars of efficiency,effectiveness, and social equity (see also Knowlesand Riccucci, 2001; Reed and Meyer, 2004).

NOTE1. Nine years’ worth of classroom discussions of Thomas’ assertions

with both pre-service and in-service MPA students, at least 25 per-cent of whom are members of minority groups, strongly suggeststhat Thomas is far from alone in his beliefs on these matters.

REFERENCESAgathangelou,Anna M. 2004.“What is to be Done? Globalization and

Social Equity.” Journal of Public Affairs Education, 10(2):155-158.Civil Service Reform Act. 1978. PL 95-454 (October 13).Gooden, Susan T., and Samuel L. Myers, Jr. 2004a.“Social Equity in Public

Affairs Education.” Journal of Public Affairs Education, 10(2):91-97.__________. 2004b.“Social Equity Analysis and Management:What MPA

and MPP Students Need to Know.” Journal of Public AffairsEducation, 10(2):172-175.

Gulick, Luther. 1937a.“Science,Values and Public Administration.” InLuther Gulick and L. Urwick, eds., Papers on the Science ofAdministration, New York: Institute of Public Administration asreprinted in “Special Issue on Luther Gulick and ‘Papers on theScience of Administration,” 1998, International Journal of PublicAdministration, 21(2-4):635-641.

_________. 1937b.“Notes on the Theory of Organization.” In Luther Gulick and L. Urwick, eds., Papers on the Science ofAdministration, New York: Institute of Public Administration asreprinted in “Special Issue on Luther Gulick and ‘Papers on theScience of Administration,” 1998, International Journal of PublicAdministration, 21(2-4):445-489.

Knowles, Eddie Ade, and Norma M. Riccucci. 2001.“Drug Testing in thePublic Sector:An Interpretation Grounded in Rosenbloom’sCompeting Perspectives Model.” Public Administration Review,61(4):424-431.






Pitts, David W., and Lois Recascino Wise. 2004.“Diversity in ProfessionalSchools:A Case Study of Public Affairs and Law.” Journal of PublicAffairs Education, 10(2):125-142.

Reed, Christine M., and Kyle P. Meyer. 2004.“Medicaid Managed Care forChildren with Special Health Care Needs.” Public AdministrationReview, 64(2):234-242.

Rice, Mitchell, F. 2004.“Organizational Culture, Social Equity, andDiversity:Teaching Public Administration Education in thePostmodern Era.” Journal of Public Affairs Education, 10(2):143-154.

Rosenbloom, David H., and Robert S. Kravchuk. 2002, 2005. PublicAdministration: Understanding Management, Politics, and Law inthe Public Sector, fifth and sixth eds. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Svara, James H., and James R. Brunet. 2004.“Filling in the Skeletal Pillar:Addressing Social Equity in Introductory Courses in PublicAdministration.” Journal of Public Affairs Education, 10(2):99-109.

Thompson,Victor. 1975. Without Sympathy or Enthusiasm. University:University of Alabama Press.

Ward, Lacy, Jr. 2004.“A Critical Social Equity Component of Public AffairsEducation: The Role of the Civil Rights Movement.” Journal of PublicAffairs Education, 10(2):158-160.

White, Susan. 2004.“Multicultural MPA Curriculum:Are We PreparingCulturally Competent Public Administrators?” Journal of PublicAffairs Education, 10(2):111-123.

Wilson, Earnest J. , III. 2004.“From Social Equity to National Security:Shifting Rationales for Enhanced Diversity.” Journal of Public AffairsEducation, 10(2):160-165.

David Rosenbloom is a distinguished professor of public administration at American University. He is a member of the NationalAcademy of Public Administration and the recipient of numerous awards, including the 2001 American Political Science AssociationJohn Gaus Award for Exemplary Scholarship in the Joint Tradition of Political Science and Public Administration, the American Societyfor Public Administration’s 1999 Dwight Waldo Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Literature and Leadership of PublicAdministration, the 1993 Charles H. Levine Award for Excellence in Public Administration, the 1992 National Association of Schools ofPublic Affairs and Administration and American Society for Public Administration Distinguished Research Award, and AU’s School ofPublic Affairs outstanding scholarship and service awards (1994, 1999, and 2000). His study, Building a Legislative-Centered PublicAdministration: Congress and the Administrative State, 1946-1999, received the National Academy of Public Administration’s 2001Louis Brownlow Book Award. His most recent books are Administrative Law for Public Managers (2003) and Public Administration:Understanding Management, Politics, and Law in the Public Sector, 6th ed. (2004).


The standing and importance of social equity in public administration iselevated by giving it careful scrutiny. In our article in the J-PAE symposiumon teaching social equity (Svara and Brunet, 2004), we examined anddefined the concept, noted its vague and imprecise usage and the surpris-ing lack of attention given to it in public administration textbooks, and pro-posed how the major elements of social equity could be incorporated intoan introductory course. David Rosenbloom has provided scrutiny by con-fronting self-satisfying assumptions about social equity and fuzzy pro-nouncements about what it means. He challenges the basic notion thatsocial equity is a useful—much less central—concept in public administra-tion. In the final analysis, the points he makes help to clarify what socialequity means and why it is important for public administration as a profes-sion to be committed to its advancement.We will respond to each of thepoints Rosenbloom makes and then present, with refinements stimulatedby his commentary, an operational definition of social equity.

1.What are the pillars? We acknowledge that we simply accepted thesocial-equity-as-third-pillar analogy from the literature and sought to give itmore precise meaning.We did not consider the fundamental question:What are the pillars of public administration? The rule of law is criticallyimportant, and we did not suggest that it was a subordinate component ofsocial equity itself, although aspects of law are part of our measures ofsocial equity. Dismissing the idea that administrators have a “duty” to “redis-tribute resources” (from White, 113), Rosenbloom argues that MPA studentsshould “understand that public administrators are bound by the rule of lawto implement regulations, such as regressive taxes, that may not comportwith concepts of social equity.”The binding nature of the law, however,does not preclude administrators from recognizing that the taxes they col-lect are regressive and trying to change this condition through legitimatemethods.Without an awareness of and concern for social equity, adminis-trators might simply follow the letter of the law or fail to question whetherthe law should be changed.The concern for social equity also can guideadministrators in the exercise of discretion under the law. Having a com-

Social Equity Is a Pillar of Public Administration

James H. Svara and James R. BrunetNorth Carolina State University


J-PAE 11 (2005):3:253-258

ABSTRACT

In this article, the authors respond topoints raised by David Rosenbloom regard-ing our 2004 J-PAE article “Filling in theSkeletal Pillar:Addressing Social Equity in Introductory Courses in PublicAdministration.” We conclude with anoperational definition of social equity for public administrators.

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mitment to social equity is, therefore, crucial as amajor perspective in public administration.We feelthat social equity deserves the prominence of pillarstatus. Re-examining what the other pillars arewould be a useful topic for a separate discussion.

2. Definition. Rosenbloom complains that the def-initions of social equity in two of the symposiumarticles are tautological.1 We start our definition bylinking the concept to “fairness, justice, and equi-table distribution” (101). It may be redundant toinclude “equitable” along with fairness and justice inthe definition of social equity, but one can argue thatequitable administrative practices promote socialequity.We suggest that for social equity to be mean-ingful, it must be measurable and—drawing on thework of the NAPA Social Equity Panel—propose fourdimensions that build on the definition and providethe basis for measurement: procedural fairness,access, quality, and outcomes.We describe the condi-tions that are consistent with social equity in eachdimension.

Rosenbloom raises the substantive complaint thatwe “confound equity and social equity”2 and ignorethat “constitutional procedural due process is over-whelmingly an individual right, not one that protectslarge groups from unfair deprivation of liberty orproperty by government.” If individual rights are pro-tected in a universal and consistent way across allgroups, there are no social equity concerns. Muchnegative experience, however, indicates that proce-dural fairness should be examined from a socialequity perspective (and, in addition, many socialequity shortcomings would persist even if procedur-al fairness were the same for all citizens.) To sharpenthe language we used in our article, practices suchas failure to provide due process before relocating afamily as part of an urban renewal project or unfairlydenying benefits to a person who meets eligibilitycriteria raise equity issues.When the unfair practicesare used disproportionately in dealings with mem-bers of identifiable groups, there is a social equityissue, just as there is when using racial characteris-tics alone to “profile” criminal suspects.When indi-vidual rights are systematically denied to membersof groups identified by characteristics such as gen-

der, income, race, ethnicity, or age, there is a socialequity problem.

Rosenbloom indicates that constitutional tests of equal protection are more appropriate to the“‘social’ in social equity,” but then focuses entirely on equal protection as a judicial standard that tendsto focus on individuals. (This matter is discussed fur-ther in the next section.) A commitment to equalprotection helps to prevent social equity problemsfrom arising or leads to the correction of sociallyinequitable practices such as assigning unqualifiedteachers or sending old textbooks to low-incomeschools.3

Procedural fairness is the obvious starting point indefining social equity and specifying correctiveaction because the behavior is not problematic—indeed constitutional competence is required ofpublic administrators (Rosenbloom and Carroll,1990)—even if it is complex.As Rosenbloom says,public administrators should “do equal protection”—as well as due process and equal rights—“on thejob.” But this is not all they should do with respectto social equity.We will return to the matter of pro-viding a more coherent, clear, and operational defini-tion of social equity.

3. Confront the inequities of social equity. It isimportant to consider in a dispassionate way thepotential inequities of social equity, as Rosenbloomobserves. Still, one cannot ignore the fundamentalinequalities in society, many of which cannot beexplained by differences in individual aptitude orinclination.The commitment to social equity indi-cates that public administrators are not indifferent tothese conditions. Proponents of reducing inequalityare guided by Rawls’ second principle:“social andeconomic inequalities are to be arranged so thatthey are to the greatest benefit of the least advan-taged” (1971, 302).Through developing policy pro-posals to reduce social and economic problems andthrough choosing proactive administrative and man-agement practices within existing policy,4 publicadministrators seek to address the effects of discrimi-nation based on personal characteristics or therestricted prospects produced by inadequate socio-economic resources.




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Public administrators need to be constantly awarethat, in efforts to reduce inequality, there will belosers as well as winners, even if the “losers” are intheory more advantaged.

In devising remedies that change the distributionof benefits,5 the equal protection test is relevant, asRosenbloom has argued. Court decisions requirerace- and ethnicity-based public policies to be “nar-rowly tailored,” and applicants for public benefitsmust be given “individualized consideration.”Theserequirements do not preclude taking race intoaccount if it is not the only or deciding factor. InGrutter v. Bollinger, regarding the University ofMichigan, Justice O’Connor wrote that “the EqualProtection Clause does not prohibit the Law School’snarrowly tailored use of race in admissions decisionsto further a compelling interest in obtaining the edu-cational benefits that flow from a diverse studentbody.” In its undergraduate admission policies inGratz v. Bollinger, the court ruled that the universitywent too far in automatically awarding points tominority candidates, although once again the courtpermitted race to be used as a factor in admission ifit was not the deciding factor.The concern aboutcreating inequities should be a salient one to admin-istrators, but it should not cause administrators toignore the persistence of inequalities nor immobilizethem from seeking to correct inequalities, even ifthis means testing the limits as the University ofMichigan did.

4. Explain the advantages, if any, of applyingthe term social equity to standard, longstandingsubject matter in MPA education. Rosenbloomargues that MPA education should cover the rule oflaw—constitutional rights and equal employmentopportunity law—and representative bureaucracyand that nothing is gained and much is lost whensubsuming these topics under the discussion of“social equity.” In his view,“these subjects stood andcan continue to stand on their own.”These subjectsare important and will be recognizable in the cur-riculum, but can they be viewed as covering the fullscope of social equity? The reason that we proposedteaching social equity across the introductory courseis that these and many other topics contribute to a

full understanding of social equity. Similarly, repre-sentative bureaucracy may be “more inclusive thansocial equity” because it can examine more cate-gories, but this topic focuses only on public sectoremployment patterns and not the full range of poli-cy and management issues covered by social equity.

In our view, Rosenbloom provides an argumentfor retaining an emphasis on social equity along withexamination of the rule of law. He observes thatequal protection analysis by the courts permits (ordoes not provide the basis for invalidating) publicschool financing systems that provide less money foreach student in districts with predominantly ethnicminorities than those that have predominantly non-minority student bodies (San Antonio IndependentSchool District v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1 [1973]).6

Social equity analysis emphasizing the distribution ofresources and legal analysis emphasizing equal pro-tection may lead to differing views. A legal remedyin the form of a court-ordered redistribution offunds is not permissible in the Texas case, but thatdoes not mean that the court would overturn a stateplan to achieve greater uniformity in funding acrossdistricts. There is a wide zone of acceptable activi-ties around equal protection. A commitment tosocial equity prompts one to analyze and explorethe activist limits of equal protection, whereas theabsence of this commitment might cause one to tol-erate instances of inequality out of concern thatremedies might not pass the equal protection test.Although Rosenbloom is concerned that social equi-ty will be “muddled when it is treated as a pillar builtof sometimes incompatible concerns and concepts,”an opposing view is that it is stronger because it isbased on considering and balancing multiple formsof analysis reflecting the four dimensions.

Rosenbloom’s final concern seems misplaced.There is no reason why the coherence of equal pro-tection and representative bureaucracy need to becompromised when the concepts are applied to theexamination of social equity and also examined sepa-rately. Indeed, it seems that the understanding ofequal protection is expanded by applying it to testthe adequacy of administrative practices as well asthe Constitutional appropriateness of policy remedies.


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We state the question in the opposite way: Whatis lost by not talking about social equity as a centralconcept? Rosenbloom seems to dismiss advocatingsocial equity as a self-satisfying diversion for MPAfaculty and students but a practice that is irrelevantto practicing administrators.We think that it shouldbe a concept that deserves serious intellectualinquiry in the academy and also a major responsibili-ty for public administrators. Practitioners should dosocial equity analysis and—within appropriate lim-its—action.

5.Avoid “stealing” popular sovereignty. Whatindeed are the appropriate limits? Just because, asRosenbloom reminds us, some aspects of the NewPublic Administration implied an illegitimate pre-sumption that administrators should substitute theirpreferences for those of elected officials, promotingsocial equity as a pillar does not carry the same pre-sumption.As we argued—and Rosenbloom recog-nizes—examining the appropriate limits of adminis-trative action are an essential part of the study ofsocial equity.We stress that public administratorsshould make elected officials and the public awareof social equity problems, should promote socialequity in their policy recommendations to electedofficials, and should examine their own administra-tive and management practices to ensure that socialequity is being observed and advanced.We sharewith Rosenbloom the emphasis on advocacy ratherthan “imposition of personal and professional val-ues.” Consistent with this view, there are extensiveopportunities to advance social equity in administra-tive and management behavior as well as in theappropriate advocacy of policy proposals.

6.Analysis of textbooks.Rosenbloom asserts thatwe were mistaken in the way we characterized histextbook co-written with Robert Kravchuk. Hepoints out that they do not index social equity (nordid we rely on index references alone), but they inte-grate subject matter that we treat as part of socialequity throughout the book.We recognized thatbroad coverage, but the coverage of due process andequity in different parts of the text make no refer-ence to “social” equity.The preponderance of materi-al related to social equity in their book—discrimina-

tion, sexual harassment, EEO/AA, and representative-ness—is included in their personnel chapter. Thus,our generalization about the two approaches isappropriate: explicit coverage of social equity occurseither in a stand-alone chapter or in the humanresources section of the book (108).Their book pro-vides extensive discussion of topics related to socialequity but not social equity itself.

This brings us back the fundamental question.Should social equity be a topic that receives explicitattention, or should we rely on discussion of othertopics that may develop awareness, understanding,and commitment to the some of the concernsencompassed by the concept of social equity? Weprefer the former approach, because the clarity,coherence, and importance of the concept may oth-erwise be lost. How do students know that the vari-ous topics are related to social equity if it is notemphasized as a separate theme? Still, this approachof making social equity a central theme is defensibleonly if the concept has clear meaning and is accept-ed as a core value of public administration.

CONCLUSION: OPERATIONAL DEFINITION OF SOCIAL EQUITY

We conclude with a response to Rosenbloom’schallenge to provide a “clearer, operational defini-tion.”The definition of the NAPA Social Equity Panel(2000) provides the starting point, as in our originalarticle:

The fair, just and equitable management of allinstitutions serving the public directly or bycontract, and the fair, just and equitable distrib-ution of public services, and implementation ofpublic policy, and the commitment to promotefairness, justice, and equity in the formation ofpublic policy.

In operational terms, public administrators shoulddemonstrate the following commitments:

Procedural fairness. Provide due process, equalprotection, and equal rights to all persons regardlessof their personal characteristics. Each individualshould be treated fairly, and any instances of unfairtreatment of individuals should be corrected.




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Furthermore, existing and new practices in imple-mentation, service delivery, and management shouldbe examined to ensure that procedural fairness isnot disproportionately denied to any groups of per-sons.Any deviations should be corrected and factorsthat contribute to this behavior should be eliminat-ed.

Distribution and access (equity in availabilityof services/benefits). Services and benefits should bedistributed equally or in such a way that those whoare less advantaged receive greater benefits. Thesegeneral principles should guide the observance ofrequirements that are multiple and complex and thatvary with the purpose of a program or the problemthat is being addressed. For existing policies and pro-grams, distribution and access should match theintended purpose. For example, if all are to receive aservice or benefit, then it should be made availableto all equally. If all are eligible, then it should beaccessible to all equally. If special conditions arerequired to receive a service or benefit, effortsshould be made to reach all who are eligible, andlegal discretion should be used to include ratherthan exclude persons whose eligibility is borderline.In formulating new policy, promote equal distribu-tion, compensatory redistribution, and efforts to cor-rect past discrimination, depending on the nature ofthe problem being addressed.Avoid creating barriersto access, such as service fees for essential servicesthat impose a disproportionate cost for persons withfewer resources. In developing policy proposals thatentail redistribution, take into account the obligationto be accountable to the rule of law and the impor-tance of making best use of scarce resources.

Quality (equity in the process of providing ser-vices and benefits). Ensure that there is consistencyin the quality of services and benefits delivered to allgroups of people.Although some persons have themeans to secure enhanced quality, public administra-tors should strive to ensure that prevailing standardsof acceptable practice are met for all groups.

Outcomes. Seek to achieve an equal level ofaccomplishment or outcomes in the social and eco-nomic conditions for all individuals and seek to elim-inate differences in outcomes for groups.While rec-

ognizing the importance of individual behavior onoutcomes and the constraints that general condi-tions impose on outcomes in specific areas, e.g., theimpact of poverty on educational performance, pub-lic administrators should examine why different out-comes occur and identify possible approaches toreducing disparities. Public administrators should askhow much inequality is acceptable and to whatextent government can and should—on its own andin partnership with the business and nonprofit sec-tors—intervene to reduce the inequality in out-comes.

Related responsibilities. Guarantee all a place atthe table so that they can express their own viewsabout public policy choices and service delivery.Take proactive and affirmative efforts to involve allcitizens and solicit feedback.

It is a step into uncharted territory to specifywhat it means to put the commitment to social equi-ty into action.We acknowledge David Rosenbloomfor challenging us to take this step and invite othersto help move beyond this initial effort. This state-ment makes it clear how broad-ranging and funda-mental the commitment to social equity is for practi-tioners and scholars. Social equity defines the largerpurpose to which public administration is dedicatedthat stands alongside (but cannot override) account-ability and rises above (but cannot ignore) instru-mental management values. In sum, social equity is apillar on which public administration rests.

NOTES

1. He criticizes Gooden and Meyers for defining social equity tautologi-cally as “fairness or social justice” (92). Except for the double use of“social,” the definition seems appropriate.The Oxford dictionarydefines equity as “fairness, impartiality, even-handed dealing;” a defin-ition of equitable is “just.”We identify four dimensions of social equi-ty as procedural fairness, access, quality, and outcomes, but we seethese as elaborating what social equity is, not restating the same ideain different words.

2. Similarly, Frederickson distinguishes between equity and social equi-ty.“Certainly, there has always been a concern for fairness in the bet-ter practices of public administration, but it was not until the 1960sthat the phrase ‘social equity’ became a feature of public administra-tion with an attendant set of concepts and a cluster of shared val-ues” (2005, 2-3.) Still, later in the paper Frederickson returns to a view of social equity as concerned with “fairness, justice, andequality.”




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3. Rosenbloom usefully points out that “remedial law” is a practice usedby courts to correct pervasive failure in administrative performance.As indicated in the closing section, we feel that administratorsshould undertake systematic examination of their own practices.

4. For example, the Raleigh, North Carolina, police chief last year insti-tuted new procedures in dealing with illegal encampments. Officersare to ask residents to dismantle the camp and give them reasonabletime to do so, to counsel homeless persons about available services,and inventory to protect their property if it is removed from an ille-gal encampment (Raleigh News & Observer, July 11, 2004, B1).

5. As noted earlier, examining equal protection can also be used to pre-vent or correct practices that violate social equity.

6. From our reading of this case, the decision does not permit unequalfunding in the same district, as Rosenbloom indicates.

REFERENCES

Frederickson, H. George. 2005. The State of Social Equity in AmericanPublic Administration. Paper delivered at the Fourth Social EquityLeadership Conference, Cleveland Ohio, February 17-19.

Gooden, Susan, and Samuel L. Meyers, Jr. 2004.“Social Equity in PublicAffairs Education.” Journal of Public Affairs Education, 10: 91-97.

National Academy of Public Administration, Standing Panel on SocialEquality,“Issue Paper and Work Plan,” October 2000, amendedNovember 16, 2000.

Rawls, John. 1971. A Theory of Justice. Cambridge, MA: HarvardUniversity Press.

Rosenbloom, David H., and James D. Carroll. 1990. TowardConstitutional Competence:A Casebook for Public Administrators.Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Svara, James H., and James R. Brunet. 2004.“Filling in the Skeletal Pillar:Addressing Social Equity in Introductory Courses in PublicAdministration.” Journal of Public Affairs Education, 10: 99-109.

White, Susan. 2004.“Multicultural MPA Curriculum:Are We PreparingCulturally Competent Public Administrators?” Journal of PublicAffairs Education, 10:111-123.

James H. Svara teaches administrative ethics and the doctoral course in foundations of public administration in the PublicAdministration Program at North Carolina State University. He is chairman of the Research Committee of the Social Equity Panel ofthe National Academy of Public Administration.

James R. Brunet teaches introduction to public administration and administrative ethics at North Carolina State University. He is cur-rently conducting a review of social equity measures in criminal justice policy and administration in the United States for the SocialEquity Panel of NAPA.


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GAZETTE

People in Public Affairs

Clinton School Welcomes Inaugural ClassThe Clinton School of Public Service, located in an his-

toric railroad station adjacent to the Clinton PresidentialLibrary, will have sixteen students in its inaugural class,which will begin coursework in August. Initially offeringonly a master of public service degree, the School isdesigned as a global program with its curriculum struc-tured around three large public service projects: a grouppracticum, an international internship, and a public ser-vice capstone project that introduces each student to oneor more career options. Faculty during the inaugural yearwill be drawn from the parent university campuses, sup-plemented by visiting faculty from other institutions anddistinguished scholars and public service leaders fromaround the world. The founding dean of the ClintonSchool is former Arkansas governor and U.S. Senator David Pryor.

USC School Names New DeanJack H. Knott, University of Illinois professor of public

policy and management and director of the Institute ofGovernment and Public Affairs, has succeeded DanielMazmanian as dean of the University of SouthernCalifornia’s School of Policy, Planning, and Development,effective August 15.

Announcing Knott’s appointment on behalf of USCPresident Steven B. Sample, Provost C. L. Max Nikias said,“We look forward to his leadership of this school, which,with its focus on societal issues, has great potential tocontribute to the goals outlined in our Strategic Plan forthe university.”

Knott called USC “a major, first-rate research universitythat has made an important commitment to also careabout community and society” and said the School’s “pro-grams reflect the actual governance in society.”

Mazmanian is the current vice president and incomingpresident of NASPAA.

University of the Virgin IslandsThe University of the Virgin Islands’ (UVI) MPA pro-

gram has had several interesting developments. First, theprogram set a graduation record in 2004, with its gradua-

tion rate increasing from two graduates in 2003 to twelvein 2004.

Second, at the National Certified Public ManagerConsortium’s Meeting in Kentucky last fall, theConsortium approved the UVI’s membership application,giving a green light to establish a Certified PublicManager (CPM) program in the U.S.Virgin Islands. Thisnationally recognized training and development programfor public sector managers will serve as a professionalcertificate program in UVI’s MPA program. This willenable the program to meet the training and developmentneeds of public managers and to professionalize the prac-tice of public management in the Virgin Islands.

Third, the program has upgraded and revitalized itscurriculum (pending approval) in order to position itsMPA program for accreditation and to meet the education-al and employment needs of its students.The new MPAcurriculum is expected to be launched this year.

New Programs Added at Upper Iowa UniversityUpper Iowa University announces two new degree

programs.The first is a bachelor’s degree in emergencyand disaster management. This new degree is intended for persons in or desiring to attain positions in planning,prevention, and response for emergencies and disastersarising from natural and human causes. The seconddegree is a new area of emphasis in homeland securitywithin the university’s master of public administrationprogram. This degree is intended for persons who hold oraspire to executive-level positions involved with planningfor and response to terrorist-based events.

Both degree programs are available through UpperIowa University’s online program ([email protected]). Theundergraduate degree is also available through the univer-sity’s program of independent study ([email protected])and at selected learning centers in Iowa,Wisconsin,Kansas, and Louisiana ([email protected]).

More information on these two programs can beobtained by contacting Sybil Delevan, MPA program coor-dinator, at [email protected].

Tennessee State University NewsIn June (2005), Alex Sekwat, associate professor of pub-

lic administration was appointed associate dean of the

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Graduate School at Tennessee State University (TSU).Sekwat will retain a teaching assignment at the Institute.

This past spring, Rodney Stanley, assistant professor ofpublic administration at TSU, received the outstandingalumni award from the University of Tennessee atChattanooga’s Political Science department.

Ann-Marie Rizzo,TSU professor and director of theInstitute of Government, was awarded an Exxon/Mobilscholarship to attend a June seminar on “Past andContemporary Italy” at the University of Ferrara. The seminar was sponsored by the Council on InternationalEducation Exchange.

Arie Halachmi,TSU Institute of Government professorof public administration, used spring break to visitZhongshan University, where he celebrated the Chineseedition of his 1999 book, Performance and QualityMeasurement in Government: Issues and Experiences.The book was translated and published by Sun-Yat SenUniversity Press. Halachmi’s research appointment atZhhongshan has been extended through 2008. The uni-versity is home to the Chinese National Center for PublicAdministration Research and is China’s leading universityin the field of public administration.

Political Insiders to Teach New Course on AmericanPolitical Campaigns at LBJ School of Public Affairs

A well-known political strategist, a national advertisingexpert, a veteran political reporter, and an Emmy Award-winning political filmmaker will teach a course this falltitled “The Modern American Political Campaign” at theUniversity of Texas at Austin’s LBJ School of Public Affairs.

The team is made up of Matthew Dowd, chief strategistfor the 2004 Bush-Cheney campaign; Mark McKinnon,who oversaw advertising for the 2000 and 2004 Bush-Cheney campaigns; Wayne Slater, senior political writer ofthe Dallas Morning News and coauthor of Bush’s Brain:How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential; andPaul Stekler, a nationally recognized documentary film-maker whose films include “George Wallace: Settin’ theWoods on Fire” and “Last Man Standing: Politics,Texas Style.”

U.S. Geological Survey Director to Head New Policy Center on Energy and Environment

Charles G. Groat, director of the United StatesGeological Survey since 1998, has been appointed found-ing director of a new public policy center at TheUniversity of Texas at Austin focusing on energy and theenvironment.

Groat will work with the LBJ School of Public Affairsover the next year to hire two new LBJ School facultymembers who specialize in international energy and envi-

ronmental policy. For more information, see www.utexas.edu/lbj/news/summer2005/groat.html.

Welfare-to-Work Experience is Focus of New BookWelfare and Work: Experiences is Six Cities is the title

of a new book by Christopher T. King, director of the LBJSchool’s Ray Marshall Center for the Study of HumanResources, and Peter R. Mueser, professor of economicsat the University of Missouri-Columbia.

The book, published by the W.E. Upjohn Institute,examines changes in welfare participation and labor mar-ket involvement of welfare recipients in six major citiesduring the 1990s. By focusing on these cities—Atlanta,Baltimore, Chicago, Fort Lauderdale, Houston, and KansasCity—the authors were able to determine the extent towhich differences in state and local policy, administrativedirectives, and local labor market conditions contributedto trends in caseloads, employment, and well-beingobserved among former recipients.

For further information, see www.utexas.edu/lbj/news/summer2005/king.html.

LBJ School Announces New FacultySix new faculty members with a range of academic

and professional experience in nonprofit management,international affairs, and social policy will join the LBJSchool this fall. Peter Frumkin has been appointed as atenured professor and will serve as director of the LBJSchool’s RGK Center for Philanthropy and CommunityService. Eugene Gholz, Shreyasi Jha, Alan J. Kuperman,and Cynthia Osborne will hold tenure-track appointmentsas assistant professors, and Jane Arnold Lincove will be apostdoctoral fellow. Details are available at www.utexas.edu/lbj/news/spring2005/new_faculty.html.

Michele Deitch Named Soros Senior Justice Fellow for Work on Prison Reform

Michele Deitch of the LBJ School of Public Affairs hasbeen named a 2005 Open Society Institute Soros SeniorJustice Fellow. Deitch was selected for her proposals tocurb human rights abuses in U.S. prisons and jails by mak-ing them more transparent and accountable. She willreceive a stipend over the next year while she researchesoptions for creating an independent entity that has thepower to inspect correctional facilities and enforce stan-dards for the treatment of prisoners. For more information,see www.utexas.edu/lbj/news/spring2005/deitch.html.Other LBJ News

LBJ Professor Kenneth Apfel testified before the U.S.House Ways and Means Committee recently on the futureon Social Security on May 12. A transcript of the hearing

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is available at http://waysandmeans.house.gov/hearings.asp?formmode=view&id=2634.

Visiting LBJ lecturer Sherri Greenberg has beenappointed the 2005-06 Fellow of the Max Sherman Chair in State and Local Government. Next fall, she willdirect a policy research project, commissioned by theCongressional Research Service, that will examine state-level e-government practices and applications. Details areavailable at www.utexas.edu/lbj/news/spring2005/greenberg.html.

LBJ Professor Max Sherman was honored with thePrice Daniel Distinguished Public Service Award by theBaylor Alumni Association. Sherman was recognizedduring Baylor University’s commencement ceremony onMay 14. Details are available at www.baylor.edu/pr/news.php?action=story&story=34357.

“Blasts from the Past: Proliferation Lessons from the1960s,” is the title of LBJ Professor Francis J. Gavin’s mostrecent article, which was published in the current issue ofInternational Security. In the article, Gavin provides ananalysis of contemporary security issues surroundingnuclear proliferation and discusses the conceptual and his-torical foundations of U.S. nonproliferation policy. Heargues that George W. Bush and his administration haverejected crucial lessons from the past in their efforts tomeet the goal of halting nuclear proliferation, particularlyby so-called rogue regimes.Considered America’s leadingjournal of security affairs, International Security is editedat Harvard University’s Belfer Center for Science andInternational Affairs and is published by The MIT Press.

The Harry S.Truman Scholarship Foundation has elect-ed as its new vice president Professor Max Sherman of theLBJ School. For more information, see www.utexas.edu/lbj/news/spring2005/truman.html.

News in BriefThe University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) is

celebrating the tenth anniversary of its School of PublicAffairs. The School was founded in 1994, bringing thelongstanding UCLA departments of Social Welfare andUrban Planning together with the newly formedDepartment of Public Policy. In celebration, the schoolheld a series of events including a dinner with keynotespeaker Ray Suarez, senior correspondent for theNewsHour with Jim Lehrer, as well as a panel discussing“The Challenge for California at the Turn of the Century”with former California governor Gray Davis and formerCalifornia State Senator Jim Brulte.

The School’s associate dean of academic affairs,Fernando Torres-Gil, was one of twelve Californians

selected by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to be a dele-gate to the 2005 White House Conference on Aging,“TheBooming Dynamics of Aging: From Awareness to Action,”which will be held December 11-14 in Washington, D.C.

UCLA Distinguished Professor of Public Policy andHistory Eric Monkkonen passed away May 30. Monkkonenwas already a renowned scholar in UCLA’s Department ofHistory when the School of Public Affairs was established.He split his academic appointment with the Departmentof Public Policy and also was the School’s first director ofthe popular undergraduate public affairs minor.

At the Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy at DukeUniversity, Professor Bruce Kuniholm replaces BruceJentleson as director of the institute. After five years asdirector, Jentleson wants to focus full time on teaching,policy projects, and other scholarly efforts. Kuniholm willalso chair the Department of Public Policy studies.

Brown University has developed two new master’s pro-grams at the Taubman Center for Public Policy. One is atwo-year master of public policy program, while the otheris a one-year master of public affairs program. The firstclass of new students will start September 2005. Detailsabout each program can be found at www.brown.edu/Departments/Taubman_Center/.

The Martin School of Public Policy and Administrationat the University of Kentucky is offering a new master ofpublic policy degree. The analytically focused degree,designed to prepare students for careers as policy analystsor further study for the Ph.D. degree, complements theMartin School’s other degree offerings: master of publicadministration, master of health administration, and thePh.D. in public administration.

Ron McNinch-Su reports the results of 2004 Universityof Guam student exit polls on the legislative elections thatcountry. The survey was developed, organized, and man-aged by graduate students in a research methods class.Guam has a unicameral fifteen-member legislature electedat large every two years. The students used a proportionalsample of 1,000 voters and accurately predicted thirteenout of fifteen senators elected from a field of thirty candi-dates.

Effective July 1, 2005, Brian Nickerson is the new chair of the Department of Public Administration at PaceUniversity. The former chair, Mary M. Timney, continues asa professor in the graduate program. Formerly part of thePolitical Science Department, Public Administrationbecame a separate department earlier this year.

The University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) hasannounced the appointment of Jeremy Hall, who will join the MPA program at UAB effective fall 2005. Hall,who

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received his Ph.D. in public policy from the Martin School of Public Policy and Administration at the University ofKentucky, specializes in economic development and pub-lic policy and analysis.

Akhlaque Haque, director of UAB’s Graduate Studies inPublic Administration, was invited to participate at arecent congressional briefing panel titled “BuildingGeographic Management Systems:Tackling Critical PolicyNeeds for the Nation’s Future.” Haque spoke about howlocal governments are using GIS and discussed the needfor training in GIS for future public administrators.

Clark Atlanta University President Walter D. Broadnaxsends word that phase one of the university’s recoveryplan has been successful. This has included a balancing ofthe books in 2004 as well an effort to reduce waste andduplication in services. The school is also retooling itsacademic enterprise by developing a strategic plan for theuniversity.

University of Missouri-St. Louis Professor AndrewGlassberg, director of the Public Policy Administrationprogram, has received a contract from the Department ofDefense for Advance Planning for Scott Air Force Base aspart of the 2005 base closing process.

Professor Anne Winkler (Public Policy Administrationand Economics) will receive the 2005 Chancellor’s Awardfor Excellence in Teaching at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.

The MPA program at Valdosta State University hasannounced the appointment of Daniel Baracskay as assis-tant professor of public administration and political sci-ence effective August 2005. Baracskay received his Ph.D.from the University of Cincinnati, and moves to Valdostafrom the Maxine Goodman Levin College of Urban Affairsat Cleveland State University.

Leonard Bright, formerly of the University of SouthAlabama, has joined the MPA Program at the School ofUrban and Public Affairs at the University of Louisville.

Oakland University in Rochester, Minnesota, recentlyadded a new concentration, Criminal Justice Leadership,with four areas of concentration and has two new certifi-cate programs, Nonprofit Organization and Managementand Local Government Management. Each certificate pro-gram will require a minimum of sixteen credit hours forsuccessful completion and are designed to give studentswho have already earned an MPA or related administrativedegree additional education and training in specializedareas of public management and administration. Moreinformation is available at www4.oakland.edu/mpa/eForum.htm.

The MPA program at Texas Tech University has addedthree new faculty members. Hyun Joon Kim, a 2005 Ph.D.graduate of the Maxwell School of Citizenship and PublicAffairs at Syracuse University, has received an appoint-ment as an assistant professor. Michael Pennington, a2005 Ph.D. graduate of Texas A&M University, alsoreceived an appointment as an assistant professor.Thomas Longoria, previously at Kansas University, hasbeen appointed as an associate professor and director ofthe Center for Public Service at Texas Tech University.

Programs & EventsPark University featured Michael E. O’Hanlon as part

of its 13th annual Dr. Jerzy Hauptmann DistinguishedGuest Lecture series. O’Hanlon is a senior fellow inForeign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution. He is avisiting lecturer at Princeton University and has writtenseveral books as well as numerous op-ed pieces for majorU.S. newspapers.His speech was titled “The Axis of Eviland Doctrine of Preemption Three Years On.”

Latino Health Issues Focus of Upcoming Conference on Aging in the Americas

A conference focusing on the health of aging Latinosin the Americas will be held in Austin,Texas, at the LBJSchool of Public Policy on September 21-22.

The event is called “The Second Conference on Agingin the Americas: Key Issues in Hispanic Health and HealthCare Policy Research,” and is being organized by LBJSchool Professor Jacqueline L. Angel and PennsylvaniaState University Professor Keith Whitfield. For more on theconference, see www.utexas.edu/lbj/news/spring2005/aging_conf.html.

Benchmark 3 Conference Date is SetFor those interested in the ever-expanding field of

nonprofits, the BenchMark 3 conference will considerhow far the field of nonprofit and philanthropic studieshas come in the last thirty years and where the field isheaded in the future. It will take place in March 2006 atArizona State University in Phoenix, Arizona.

This conference invites wide participation of U.S.-based and international scholars, professors, teachers,nonprofit practitioners, association leaders involved intraining programs, funders, students, alumni, and otherstakeholders interested in the field of nonprofit/NGO edu-cation, philanthropic studies, and education for a civilsociety, and related fields.

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Topics will include issues of curricular content, peda-gogy, technology, enrollment trends, impact measures, andother essential ingredients of educational programs.Thevariety of topics will be considered across the range ofeducational levels including undergraduate, graduate, pro-fessional development (continuing education), and execu-tive education programs.

BenchMark 3 is the third conference in the series.To be placed on an email distribution list for news onupcoming conferences, please send a request with fullcontact information to [email protected].

Bosch Foundation Announces 2006-07 ProgramThe Robert Bosch Foundation is now accepting

applications from outstanding young professionals inter-ested in participating in the Robert Bosch FoundationFellowship Program for 2006-07.

The Bosch Fellowship’s nine-month work/study program enables twenty outstanding young American professionals to acquire an in-depth understanding of thepolitical, economic, and cultural environment of Germanyand the European Union.

From September through May, fellows complete twohigh-level internships, the first in federal or regional gov-ernment institutions, and the second in private industry,mass media, or the nonprofit sector. Fellows also partici-pate in three intensive seminars with high-ranking govern-ment officials, as well as leading representatives fromindustry, the media, and academia.The seminars will takeplace in cities across Europe, which in past years haveincluded Berlin, Munich, Paris, Prague, Brussels, andWarsaw.

Applicants should possess a graduate degree and/ortwo years of professional experience in one of the following fields: Business Administration, Journalism/Mass Communications, Law, Political Science, or PublicAffairs/Public Policy. Candidates lacking a graduate degreeare nevertheless encouraged to apply, provided they pos-sess extensive professional experience in one of the fieldsmentioned above.

Applications are available at www.cdsintl.org/fromusa/bosch.htm. The application deadline for the fellowshipyear beginning in September 2006 is October 14, 2005.

About NASPAA

NASPAA is an association of more than 249 schools ofpublic affairs and administration in the United States andassorted associate members in the United States andabroad.We are committed to promoting quality in publicaffairs education and to promoting the ideal of public ser-vice. NASPAA serves as the specialized accrediting bodyfor academic programs in public administration, publicpolicy, and public affairs.This accreditation practice nowincludes a roster of 150 accredited programs.

Featured activities on NASPAA’s agenda include anactive campaign for public service and public service education, which includes initiatives addressing mediarelations and the tracking of public policy issues relevantto NASPAA’s mission.We are sponsoring research andaction on the status of minorities in public affairs educa-tion. NASPAA works closely with the International CityManagers Association (ICMA) on education and trainingfor local government management. In recognition of thebroadening dimensions of our field, we have developed aset of guidelines for nonprofit education in collaborationwith the Nonprofit Academic Centers Council. We arealso working on outreach in other areas central to NAS-PAA programs, such as health management education. Inaddition, we are engaged internationally, particularly inthe development of the Network of Institutes and Schools of Public Administration in Central and Eastern Europe(NISPAcee) and the new Inter-American Network forPublic Administration Education (INPAE).

The NASPAA Annual Conference on public affairs andpublic affairs education is a meeting focused on researchand dialogue on academic program administration, on curriculum and teaching, and on the synthesis of researchon topics of current importance and the relationship ofthis research to teaching and practice. The conference isan active mix of program administrators, faculty, students,and practitioners in our field.

■ NASPAA on the InternetWeb site: www.naspaa.orgListserv: To subscribe to the NASPAA listserv, emailyour request to [email protected] line should remain blank. In the body of themessage, type only the following line: subscribe naspaayour complete name. To submit items to the listserv,address them to [email protected].

NASPAA also has specialized listservs for career direc-tors and doctoral program directors. Please see http://

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www.naspaa.org/principals/news/listserv.asp for detailson how to join these lists.

■ NASPAA Staff Directory

Laurel McFarland, Executive [email protected]

Jinla Byrne, Director of [email protected]

Jacqueline F. Lewis, Conference/Project [email protected]

Ana Mejia, International Programs [email protected]

Megan Tabak, Project [email protected]

Scott Talan, Director of Marketing and [email protected]

Barbara Ridgely, Finance [email protected]

Rebecca Singer, Project [email protected]

Monchaya Wanna, Office [email protected]

Inquiries about specific program areas may be sent to the following email addresses or to NASPAA at1120 G Street NW, Suite 730,Washington, DC 20005.Phone: 202-628-8965. Fax: 202-626-4978.

General Info: [email protected]: [email protected]: [email protected]: [email protected]: [email protected]

Please send news about your program, faculty, honors,etc., in writing, for upcoming issues of the J-PAE Gazette.Fax: 202-626-4978. Email: [email protected]

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Journal of Public Affairs EducationVolume 11, No. 3

July 2005

National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

1120 G Street, NW • Suite 730

Washington, DC 20005-3801

(202) 628-8965 • Fax: (202) 626-4978 • www.naspaa.org

J-PAEIntroduction: Symposiumon Leadership Education

Barbara C. Crosby

Leadership Education inPublic Administration:Finding the Fit BetweenPurpose and ApproachJanet V. Denhardt and Kelly B. Campbell

Public Leaders AreGendered: Making GenderVisible in Public AffairsLeadership EducationDeLysa Burnier

Challenges of IntroducingLeadership into the PublicAffairs Curriculum: The Case of the Humphrey InstituteBarbara C. Crosby and John M. Bryson


Student Evaluations ofTeaching: How You Teachand Who You Are

Heather E. Campbell, SueSteiner, and Karen Gerdes

What is Homeland Security?Developing a DefinitionGrounded in the CurriculaRobert W. Smith

Taking Social EquitySeriously in MPA EducationDavid Rosenbloom

Social Equity is a Pillar ofPublic AdministrationJames H. Svara and James R. Brunet

Volume 11, No. 3 July 2005 Journal of Public Affairs...

Documents

Transcript of Volume 11, No. 3 July 2005 Journal of Public Affairs...