Allison Hawkins is a first-year MPA student with a passion for public service. Her father, Transylvania County Commissioner Mike Hawkins, says his commitment to service began with the birth of his daughter. They’ve learned a lot from each other.
Once again, the Carolina MPA program has ranked among the top 25 programs in the country according to US News and World Report’s 2017 Best Graduate School Rankings. The program’s ranking in the public affairs category improved in some of its areas of expertise including city management (5th), public management administration (16th), and public finance and budgeting (17th). The program is also ranked 15th in the area of environmental policy and management.
Save the date for the Carolina MPA 50th Anniversary Alumni Celebration on March 31, 2017 in Chapel Hill. We’ll have a great half-day that will include an educational event, the Deil S. Wright Lecture, networking time with students, and a celebratory anniversary dinner! Details are being finalized now.
Nearly 200 are enrolled in MPA@UNC, the online format of the Master of Public Administration program housed at the UNC School of Government. One of those students, Lorrie Fair Allen, is returning to UNC more than a decade after her undergraduate tenure at Carolina, which included three NCAA women’s soccer championships.
Allen, an olympic silver medalist and FIFA World Cup champion, works for the Charlize Theron Africa Outreach Project and volunteers as a sports envoy for the U.S. State Department. She expects to complete her master of public administration degree in the summer of 2019.
“This MPA will prepare me for life,” Allen said. “It’s preparing me for how to attack the advocacy side, the policy side. I know it’s going to help me be better at my job.”
The online format of the MPA program gives Allen flexibility to complete her degree while juggling a full-time job and a family. Allen had an opportunity to interact with students from both the online and on-campus formats at a special weekend of instruction in November 2017.
Learn more about Allen’s story at UNC’s YouTube channel.
To learn more about MPA@UNC, visit onlinempa.unc.edu.
On Thursday, March 8, the UNC School of Government will host a discussion on “Administrative Courts in the Polish Legal System” with Agata Hauser, PhD, a lecturer at the Constitutional Law Department of the Adam Mickiewicz University. Hauser’s research focuses on judicial protection of individuals by the Court of Justice of the European Union (EU) and the European Court of Human Rights as well as interactions between the EU and the Council of Europe and application of the EU law by national courts of member states.
“This is a special opportunity to hear directly from a teacher and scholar in a country that has undergone and continues to see dramatic constitutional and institutional change,” said School of Government faculty member Charles Szypszak. “Hauser is among the brightest in Poland who daily consider fundamental issues that we often take for granted here in the United States.”
Hauser is visiting the University of North Carolina and participating in a series of events with support from UNC’s Center for Slavic, Eurasian and East European Studies. She will be speaking on Judiciary Reforms in Poland as a Threat to the Principle of the Rule of Law, 5:30 p.m., Tuesday, March 6 at the FedEx Global Education Center.
We all know that our MPA alumni believe in public service, so much in fact they are willing to spend their Saturday improving the homes and lives of low-income homeowners. Before the MPA Alumni Picnic, a group of 24 MPA alumni and students spent the day working with Rebuilding Together of the Triangle. Rebuilding Together is the nation’s largest nonprofit organization working to preserve affordable homeownership and revitalize neighborhoods by providing home repair and renovation services free of charge to those in need.
The original idea for the Day of Service originated last year with Justin Amos (UNC MPA 2006) when he was seeking a way to celebrate his cohort’s 10th anniversary. Justin said his cohort wanted to “find a group event that would symbolize the reason we came to Chapel Hill for graduate school to begin with: to serve the public.”
After the success of the first Day of Service in 2016, Justin was determined to open this event up to all UNC MPA alumni. Justin partnered with Executive Director of Rebuilding Together of the Triangle and fellow MPA alumni, Dan Sargent (2010), to make this event a reality for students and alumni. Current student, Andrew Cutler enjoyed the opportunity to meet alumni and work beside them. Andrew said, “The recipients were super appreciative, and I think the work we did made some kind of valuable contribution to improving their circumstances.”
Justin believes the Day of Service “perfectly encapsulates the reasons many of us chose to get a Carolina MPA: to serve others, to meet new people, reconnect with friends, and to make a difference in their community.” Dan encouraged alumni that live and work in the triangle to “engage their workplaces, faith communities, and civic organizations to help serve homeowners in their neighborhoods to ensure low-income families in the Triangle have safe, healthy places to live.” Dan hopes that the Day of Service becomes an annual tradition that continues for many years.
By Sarah Dickson and Jim Hemphill
On Saturday, August 12, 2017, the North Carolina Association of County Commissioners (NCACC) honored the UNC School of Government with their Distinguished Service Award. Established in 1970, the award celebrates an individual or an entity that “has rendered a truly outstanding and distinctive service to the cause of improving local government above and beyond his usual duties or occupation.”
Dean Mike Smith accepted the award during the President’s Banquet at the conclusion of NCACC’s 110th Annual Conference, held at the Durham Convention Center. “This award is intended to honor faculty and professional staff at the School for all of their work for counties over the years. They deserve it, and so do many of our former colleagues. I’m humbled to accept the award on their behalf and heartened by the strong partnership we have both with the Association and officials at all 100 counties,” said Smith.
Other award recipients included county commissioners, former NCACC board leadership, and Director of NC Emergency Management Michael Sprayberry. Durham County Commissioner Brenda Howerton—a graduate of the Advanced Leadership Corps, which is one of the School’s premiere leadership programs—was sworn in as president of the Association.
Founded in 1908, the NCACC serves as the counties’ advocate before the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of state government. The School partners with the NCACC and the NC League of Municipalities to offer leadership training for elected officials through the Local Elected Leaders Academy.
For more information, view the NCACC’s news release or Dean Mike Smith’s blog post.
Photo courtesy Chris Baucom/NCACC.
Today, the School of Government and University celebrate Veterans Day by honoring all those who have served in our nation’s armed forces.
The School is proud to recognize our faculty and students in the Master of Public Administration program who are veterans of the U.S. military. The School would also like to take this opportunity to thank those among us who are currently serving as active duty members of the U.S. military.
To the following, thank you for your service:
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Michael Barclift
Hunter Brendel
Steven Bromir
Adam Caldwell
Richard Cloninger
Samuel Croom
Drepannon “Lex” Davis
Aigboje Enahoro
Larry Figgs
Ian Frady
Brandon Garay
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Miranda Leyshon
Gregoire Metellus
Tyler Mulligan
Nicholas Prieto
Carter Stapleton
Justin Stapleton
Charles Szypszak
Matthew Taylor
Matthew Van Epps
Charmetri Wrice-Bulluck
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Stephanie Watkins-Cruz grew up in southeast Charlotte where, she said, “There were families and people of every shade, shape, and size. However, it looks much different now.” Observing these changes and how they impacted people drew her interest in community work early on.
Then in 2012, her family was evicted from their home of nine years for the first time, and in 2016 for the second. They have been living in a hotel since. Watching her hometown change drastically and living through her family’s experiences with housing insecurity sparked Stephanie’s passion for issues of affordable housing and motivated her to pursue a career in public service.
“Housing is more than a roof and four walls,” she said. “It involves your surroundings, the health of your environment, and what you have and don’t have access to. At home is where your identity takes root.”
As an undergraduate at UNC Asheville, Watkins-Cruz found a like-minded community of activists—and her voice. She was involved in campus life as a student orientation leader, president of a student organization, and as a programming supervisor. During her tenure as an MPA student, she has worked as a housing intern in Orange County as well as a collaborative home repair and modification coordinator at the Chatham County Council on Aging. Watkins-Cruz also serves as a member of the board of directors for America’s Promise Alliance, a collaboration between hundreds of national nonprofits, businesses, communities, educators, and citizens dedicated to creating the conditions for success for young people. These experiences have shaped her perspective of the program and brought the MPA classroom curriculum to life.
Watkins-Cruz has been a freelance blogger for Asheville Grit and has published several pieces on Huffington Post. She commented, “I have really gotten into writing pieces about the intersection between housing and education.” She observes that there have been silos between housing and other social policy issues and is determined to be a leader who can help tear down those silos and connect people to the various and sometimes complex resources they need.
She chose Carolina MPA and UNC because of “the enormous sense of community and UNC’s unique role in improving North Carolina.” She is the recipient of a Weiss Urban Livability Fellowship, a Nannette V. Mengel Scholarship, and the Gene Rainey Outstanding Service Award.
Watkins-Cruz said her most rewarding MPA experience has been a combination of her professional work experience at the Orange County Department of Housing, Human Rights, and Community Development and her current work with the Chatham County Council on Aging.
“Public service is a great way to extend the reach of those fighting for their communities, homes, and livelihood,” she said.
This profile was written by Dylan Russell ’17 and originally appeared in the summer 2017 issue of IMPACT. To view previous issues of IMPACT, visit the UNC MPA website.
When I graduated, I had a diploma and a belief that networks make government stronger. Jean Coble, Gordon Whitaker, and David Ammons expected that each class would work to serve and support each other. Because of this, teamwork was baked into every part of the Carolina MPA experience.
I met my husband Kent Wyatt ‘02 while working for Tom Lundy ‘71 on a utility line extension analysis project in Catawba County (always a romance starter….). Fast forward fifteen years, and I’m proud to have co-founded and now serve as the executive director for the Engaging Local Government Leaders (ELGL) network.
Copying the Cohort
Although the concept seems simple, it was inaccessible when Kent and I needed it most: a generalized local government organization that we could join and learn from when we moved across the country to Oregon while looking for jobs in local government.
I started my local government career in finance and moved into management, while Kent worked in long-range planning and now works in communications. So, we started our own cohort focused on local-level general government service.
We knew we didn’t want the group to be overly focused on job title or function. And we wanted to welcome anyone working in public service to participate. On top of that, we believed that local government leadership was changing. There isn’t just one path to becoming a city manager, elected leader, or department director anymore.
Informed by the Carolina MPA cohort experience, we gathered 16 people in different roles from cities across the Portland region for lunch. Everyone had so much fun that we agreed to meet up the next month, and then the month after that.
Soon we started bringing in guest speakers to share what they were working on and how it affected cities, counties, and districts. Then we added a website and social media to share what we were learning. We called ourselves ELGL—the Engaging Local Government Leaders network.
About ELGL
Today, ELGL has 4,800 members in every state and six countries. Our mission is to engage the brightest minds in local government. We do this with a daily flow of blog posts and weekly GovLove podcast content. We also host exciting events like City Hall Selfie Day, Supper Clubs, and conferences. And all of these focus on increasing diversity and inclusion in local government and finding the joy in public service.
We also spend our time on substantive topics like collecting data for the Diversity Dashboard (DiversityDashboard.org), a first-of-its-kind live database of the demographics of local government leaders nationwide.
We recognize outstanding local government leaders, places, and employers via our awards program. In this spring’s #ELGLKnope recognition of the top parks in local government, Matt Roylance ‘97 shepherded Garner’s parks to the Elite Eight, showcasing this North Carolina town’s leadership and infrastructure investment.
Our work is meaningful and fun. Anyone is welcome to join—our members are students, managers, police officers, librarians, accountants, civic tech startup founders, innovation directors, planners, and everyone in between. Why? Because we know that local government is stronger when we work together and welcome everyone to the ELGL table.
Bringing #ELGL19 to Durham
In May 2019, ELGL brought our annual conference to Durham, North Carolina, the perfect spot for a national local government conference. Not only does the city boast national accolades for programs like Innovate Durham and for improving opportunities for justice involved residents, but it also has a consistent track record of hiring and promoting the brightest minds in local government. Plus, Durham and the Triangle region have deep networks of Carolina MPA students and alumni who are active ELGL members.
ELGL Board Member Ben Kittelson led the organizing effort for #ELGL19. His team included Josh Edwards ‘05, Sarah Hazel ‘14, Caley Patten ‘16, Ellis Johnson ‘18, and Rafael Baptista ‘15. They curated a speaker lineup that included Eric Marsh ‘17 as master of ceremonies and Monica Chaparro ‘05, plus a keynote panel with Greensboro Mayor Nancy Vaughan and Carrboro Mayor Lydia Lavelle. The attendee list included a who’s who of Carolina MPA local government leaders from across the country.
#ELGL19 was made even more special thanks to a partnership with the Carolina MPA “Happy Hour Hub” program which brought local alumni to the #ELGL19 social event at Hi-Wire Brewing in Durham.
Continuing Connections
ELGL continues to build our relationship with the Carolina MPA program. And we’re proud of our relationships with 20 students (now 12 alumni and eight rising second year students). Like Kent and I did so many years ago, they are exploring issues of interest in local government in that same first-year consulting class. Students have worked on the Diversity Dashboard, researched paid family leave, studied trends in HR recruitment, and reviewed parks and recreation management.
Without a doubt, we are proud to support the work of Carolina MPA faculty. Recently, we interviewed faculty members Leisha Dehart- Davis and Kim Nelson for GovLove on their “Near the Top” research about women and people of color in local government leadership. We’re also anxiously awaiting publication of David Ammons’ newest performance-measurement publication and hope to host an #ELGLBookClub discussion about it. John Stephens and ELGL share a love and social media following for civic data and open source government and found shared connections at the Code for America Summit in Oakland, California. And the MPA program continues to be an amazing advocate for ELGL, enrolling current students in the organization as part of the School of Government’s “All-In” membership level. If you missed #ELGL19 in Durham, we’ve already booked #ELGL20 scheduled for May 13–15, 2020 in Portland, Oregon.
Learn more at elgl.org/membership.
Listen to the GovLove podcast at elgl.org/govlove.