Government Administration (GAFL)
GAFL 5010 Public Communications
In today’s globally diverse and highly sensitive public arena, leaders are called upon to show up with confidence, speak to a crisis at a moment’s notice, and present messages that are concise, organized, persuasive, and authentic. The content of the course is grounded in historical, political, and social contexts surrounding what, when, and how public addresses should be made. It takes a hands-on practical approach to both writing and speaking by analyzing different structures, audiences, and purposes for various speeches and other types of statements such as crisis and policy. Students will be prepared to apply learning from this course directly to any professional situation and speak confidently to challenges about policies, procedures, plans and practices.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5020 Public Communications and Storytelling
Successful leaders must be able to convey their passion, integrity, goals and their ideas clearly, and their vision and values convincingly in public settings, team meetings, virtually and in-person. By analyzing iconic political speeches and contemporary visionaries, this class affords students to use tools and best practices in their own preparation and delivery of speeches to the class, this course teaches the fundamentals of persuasive public speaking while encouraging students to develop their own voice and also give advice and feedback to one another. This is a performance-based course. Students will gain skill and confidence in their speech writing and public speaking skills through practice, peer feedback, and extensive professional coaching with the instructor. Class lectures and discussions will focus on persuasive strategies, conveying complex information, visual tools, and techniques for handling community meetings, Q and A sessions, and interactions with the media. The course culminates in a favorite Fels experience - the Inspirational Speeches practice, where students deliver "commencement-like" speeches to their class and invited guests.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5220 Applied Impact and Performance Evaluation for International Development
This course is focused on designing and implementing large-scale impact and performance evaluations for international development. The course examines policy considerations, as well as practical field experiences in designing and conducting rigorous impact and performance evaluations. We explore real world management considerations and best practices for field-based data collection, in conjunction with research design, data sources, instrument development, budgets, contracting, and managing large-scale data collection efforts. We examine survey methodology as it relates to practical challenges to implementing high quality surveys and data collection protocols in difficult field settings. Although mostly focused on large-N household surveys, we also discuss complementary qualitative methods, as well as design considerations for more complex interdisciplinary evaluations that combine social science methods with biophysical data collection. Overall, this course will expose students to the A to Z of impact/performance evaluation for international development through the use of a number of evaluation case-studies from Africa.
Fall
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5280 Critical Issues in Public Finance
The Course, Critical Issues in Public Finance will consider contemporary issuesaffecting the fiscal state of local governments. Covered will be issues that have distressed municipalities; the policies/initiatives that seek to rectify such including privatization/public private partnerships; reformation of municipal pensions; sustainable education funding alternatives; and tax policies aimed at promoting economic growth. Students will be assigned to a team, which will identify and provide a solution for an issue or issues plaguing a fictional government. Each team will prepare a written report and make a presentation all of which will constitute the final project. Assignments will serve as the building blocks for the final written work product and presentation developed by each team. The class is divided into four modules. The first module will take a historical look at events behind fiscal distress in municipalities and then explore current day drivers that are causing the same today. Modules two, three and four will examine some of the tools that have been used successfully or otherwise to remediate the drivers of fiscal distress. In each module case studies will be used to further analyze the particular fiscal challenge of a municipality. Written assignments will be based on case studies.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5310 Data Science for Public Policy
In the 21st century, Big Data surround us. Data are being collected about all aspects of our daily lives. To improve transparency and accountability an increasing number of public organizations are sharing their data with the public. But data are not information. You need good information to make sound decisions. To be an effective public leader, you will need to learn how to harness information from available data. This course will introduce you to key elements of data science, including data transformation, analysis, visualization, and presentation. An emphasis is placed on manipulating data to create informative and compelling analyses that provide valuable evidence in public policy debates. We will teach you how to present information using interactive apps that feature software packages. As in all courses at Fels, we will concentrate on more practical skills than theoretical concepts behind the techniques. This course is designed to expand upon core concepts in data management and analysis that you learned in GAFL 6400: Program Evaluation and Data Analysis. This is a graduate level course and while GAFL 6400 is not a pre-requisite, students are expected to have a foundation of data management and analysis before beginning this course.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5320 International Development Policy Research Shop
This is a directed-study course that provides students with an opportunity to engage with bi-lateral donors, including USAID and the World Bank, on real-world research and evaluation tasks to inform international development programs and practice. This course builds on a collaboration between PDRI-DevLab and development practitioners that promotes the uses and application of high-quality evidence to inform program design and effectiveness. Through PDRI-DevLab’s partnerships with a variety of international donors, students in this course will complete an original research project that will be submitted to an international development donor for review and evaluation. From design to final completion, students will engage with policy specialists and program managers at regular intervals on their project. Students will work on a set of monitoring, evaluation, research, and learning (MERL) tasks that may include analysis of quantitative and qualitative data or literature and evidence reviews. The exact products and topics will be selected each semester on a rolling basis, depending on client research interests. These research and learning tasks will examine a variety of development topics and research questions; these might include exploring the relationship between land and resource governance and climate change, biodiversity conservation, human trafficking, women’s empowerment, Indigenous Peoples and local communities, resilience, food security, health, conflict, corruption, and migration and forced displacement, among others. Students will present their final projects to the client either through a remote brown bag session or in-person through a workshop hosted at the Biden Center. This course aims to bridge theory and practice, expose students to real-world issues in international development, and facilitate a real-world professional and client-centered experience for students.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5350 International Policy and Security Seminar
This course provides a practical survey on the underpinnings of the idea of the “international order” and how it affects trade, politics, and security for the United States and the world. Students will be able to consider and analyze what states mean when they appeal to the international community, to a putative liberal order, and why other states may contest it. The course will also provide a basic survey of key policy and security challenges in the contemporary international environment related to international policy and security. Does an international community really exist? Why does it matter? What’s the difference between the Yalta Agreement and the Helsinki principles, and how does this interact with the United Nations charter? Students will examine primary source texts, key analyses, and will have the opportunity reflect upon and develop policy advisories around international policy. Aligned with the Fels’ mission in service of praxis, the course will also allow students the opportunity interact with guest speakers involved in foreign and national security policy and present their policy recommendations on a key international public policy issue.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5420 AI for Public Sector Leadership
This course prepares future public sector leaders to effectively leverage artificial intelligence (AI) in government and nonprofit organizations. While technical knowledge is valuable, this course focuses on developing the strategic and practical skills needed to identify, evaluate, and implement AI solutions to public sector challenges. Through a combination of case studies, hands-on projects, and expert guest speakers, students will learn how to be intelligent consumers and managers of AI technologies in public service contexts.
Not Offered Every Year
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5490 Leading Nonprofits
Leading Nonprofit Organizations is designed for those interested in leading and managing a nonprofit organization. It takes a practitioners perspective on strategic realities of modern practice. Each section will seek to rapidly orient a new manager to the complexities, strategic issues, & politics. The course is taught through a combination of theory and practice using selected readings, lectures, guest presentations, group activities (Mock senior staff discussions) and field assignments (pairing with area nonprofit leader and attendance at one of the organizations board meetings.) This course has seats reserved for Fels students and NPLD students, and gives priority to grad students.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5510 Government Relations
In a system of representative government, organizations and individuals with interests at stake often seek the support of a government relations professional. This course addresses government relations from the varying perspectives of the current or aspiring professional, the client, and the government official.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5690 The Politics of Housing and Community Development
This course offers an exploration of how legislative action, government policymaking, and citizen advocacy influence plans for the investment of public capital in distressed urban neighborhoods. Course topics this semester will include an evaluation of the results of City of Philadelphia development policies under the eight-year administration of outgoing Mayor James F. Kenney, who will be leaving office in January, 2024. The course will also include an assessment of large-scale property acquisition and development strategies undertaken by the Philadelphia Housing Authority (in North Philadelphia), by Drexel University (in West Philadelphia), and by the Philadelphia Housing Development Corporation (on a citywide basis), as well as a review of recent and current reinvestment proposals for Camden's waterfront and downtown-area neighborhoods.
Fall
Also Offered As: CPLN 6250
Mutually Exclusive: URBS 4510
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5900 Use and Misuse of Data for Policy Challenges
"Data-Driven Policy Making" has become a popular phrase, but what does it actually mean and how can aspiring policy-makers meet its lofty goals? This class will help students understand how data of all sorts (administrative, observational, experimental, "big") can be used to shed light on various policy issues. To do this, the class teaches students a set of computational tools (centered on the R statistical programming language), and shows them how to gather, analyze, and present data in useful ways. It does so by working through a number of important policy issues, including policing, campaign finance, public health, political polling, and many others. No prior statistical or technical knowledge is assumed, though basic statistical literacy is helpful.
Fall
1 Course Unit
GAFL 5999 Independent Study
Independent study course.
1 Course Unit
GAFL 6110 Statistics for Public Policy
This course is GAFL 6110, the required course in statistical analysis for students in the Fels school. This is the required course in statistical analysis for public policy/public administration. Increasingly, this is a quantitative field. Even if you think you'll someday just be (say) a city manager, and not likely to use quantitative analysis yourself, you will likely find yourself working with quantitative data. For example, "policy evaluation" has become a buzzword in recent years in public management and examples involving Fels graduates-or their equivalents-abound. Did giving low-income children after-school tutoring improve their academic performance? Does expanding a free-lunch program reduce the number of student outbursts in classrooms? Did Philadelphia's "big belly" trash cans actually reduce the amount of litter on our streets? Answering any of these questions requires statistical analysis. This course aims to lay the groundwork for you to answer these (and many more!) questions. The point here is not to convince you to adopt a quantitative design for your own work, or that quantitative designs are the "best" designs for answering all questions. Rather, the goal is to give you a set of tools that will enable you to read, critique and eventually produce your own quantitative research. The course will introduce you to the logic of social scientific inquiry, and the basic statistical tools used to analyze politics and public policy.
Fall
1 Course Unit
GAFL 6120 Quantitative Methods for Policy Analysis
This course will help students learn how to make evidence-based decisions in a public sector context. The course will introduce important data analysis skills and help students evaluate the quality of studies undertaken to measure the impact of public policies and programs.
Fall
1 Course Unit
GAFL 6210 Public Economics
This course provides students with the knowledge required to understand government operations in relation to the market economy. In theory of supply and demand, students explore the pricing mechanism, price elasticity, and the effects of price controls on markets. Efficiency is examined in connection with competition and again in connection with equity, and market failure is considered as a reason for government intervention. Cost-benefit analysis is examined in the context of selecting among public investment alternatives. The course also assists students in addressing issues connected with local public goods and economic development.
Fall
1 Course Unit
GAFL 6222 Economic Principles of Public Policy
This course will introduce students to key economic concepts such as scarcity, efficiency, monopolies and cost-benefit. Students will practice applying these principles to the range of decisions that public sector executives have to make in order to understand the trade-offs inherent in any public policy or program.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 6330 Executive Leadership
This course covers the essentials to help you become a more dynamic leader who knows what to do in uncertain situations. Through applicable readings, applied exercises, assessments, and personal leadership development, students will develop skills in communicating with authenticity and influence, leading with Emotional Intelligence, building productive working relationships, networking across organizations, and making high-impact decisions.
Summer Term
1 Course Unit
GAFL 6340 Writing for Public Policy and Administration
This course covers techniques in effective writing for policy and public sector audiences. Students will learn how to effectively draft policy memos, public comments, crisis management communications, professional emails, and persuasive Congressional Hill materials. Students will gain a persuasion toolkit and be able to pitch ideas to diverse sets of stakeholders. In addition, this course explores the ethical use of Generative AI in order to improve one's writing while still maintaining personal voice and critical thinking to prepare for future use in the workplace.
Fall
1 Course Unit
GAFL 6400 Program Evaluation and Data Analysis
How do we know if a given program is effectively achieving its goals? How can we compare which of several programs is actually producing the greatest benefit to society? Students learn the tools needed to analyze policies, with a particular emphasis on presenting the results of quantitative analysis effectively for a nontechnical audience. By the end of this course, you will be able to 1) design quantitative and qualitative program evaluations, 2) analyze data collected for program evaluation using rigorous techniques in R, and 3) effectively present quantitative results to non-technical audiences.
Spring
Prerequisite: GAFL 6110
1 Course Unit
GAFL 6410 Program Evaluation & Data Analysis
This course introduces program evaluation in the context of research methods. Students learn about design and the application of data collection skills to all phases of program/service delivery from needs assessment to analysis of findings to implementation of changes based on results. Students learn to appreciate how these skills can be used as practical tools for identifying problems to developing and implementing programs. This applied course provides students with practical experiences to apply guidelines of evaluation and research methods in actual program evaluation projects in Philadelphia.
Spring
Prerequisite: GAFL 6120
1 Course Unit
GAFL 6510 Public and Nonprofit Finance
Government budgets are expressions of public policy and carry the authority of the law; non-profit budgets express the commitment to the mission of the organization and are the blueprint for meeting obligations to donors and funders. Both types of budgets and the accounting systems that support them are subject to legal and professional standards. The course is designed for students with little or no background in financial reporting, budgeting, and financial management and intends to provide an understanding of the primary financial management issues and decisions confronting senior management in nonprofit and government agencies.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 6520 Financial Management of Public and Nonprofit Organizations
This course provides an introduction to financial management principles for public and nonprofit organizations. The primary objective of this course is to demystify financial information and improve students ability to effectively engage in financial discussions, regardless of their role in the organization. This course will be focused on the vocabulary and tools necessary to interpret, analyze, and properly communicate financial information in order to develop and execute an appropriate financial strategy.
Summer Term
1 Course Unit
GAFL 7100 Negotiations
To influence public policy you need analytical skills to discover optimal solutions to problems, and good negotiation skills to tailor implementable solutions that address the needs and priorities of multiple stakeholders. What resources you want to invest, whom you engage in discussions, and what you expect to receive in return are open to explicit and implicit negotiations. This course will provide a working understanding of key negotiations concepts, including: Strategic elements of negotiations - interests, goals, positions, rights, power, value creation, high stakes, disputes; Preparation for and the details of negotiation processes; Ethical encounters and conundrums; Leveraging your strengths/understanding your negotiating personality. You will learn cooperative and competitive strategies, have a solid grasp of the decision-making science of negotiation, and better understand cognitive processes and emotional dynamics that affect the ways people negotiate. This is a "hybrid" course, with synchronous, online meetings and once-monthly, on-campus meetings in Philadelphia, PA. Full attendance at the four in-person course sessions is required.
Fall
1 Course Unit
GAFL 7320 Public Management
This core MPA course is intended to help each student to learn more than he or she already knows about public management both as a profession and as a field of academic study and to enjoy the company of supportive peers, instructors, and special guests as he or she contemplates a post-MPA career in governance. This course satisfies a core requirement in the Master of Public Administration full-time program.
Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 7330 Public Management (MPA Executive Section)
This core MPA course is intended to help each student learn more than s/he already knows about public management, both as a profession and field of academic study, and to enjoy the company of supportive peers, instructors, and special guests as s/he contemplates a post-MPA career in governance. This course satisfies a core requirement in the Master of Public Administration program. Seats are reserved for Fels' students and this course gives priority to grad students.
Fall
1 Course Unit
GAFL 7980 MPA Capstone I
This required non-credit class is the first part of the MPA Capstone, which is a requirement for the Master of Public Administration at the University of Pennsylvania's Fels Institute of Government. During MPA Capstone I, students will work through the early stages of their capstone projects, including project planning and project research and design. Examples of early stage work include conducting background research, creating a working bibliography, designing the project, and planning and executing data collection. Students will work with their Capstone instructor, advisor and Community Partner Organization. Full-time MPA students take MPA Capstone I during the Spring semester. Executive MPA students take MPA Capstone I during their second Fall semester.
Fall or Spring
0 Course Units
GAFL 7990 MPA Capstone II
Successful completion of a Capstone project is one of the academic requirements for the Master of Public Administration (MPA) at the University of Pennsylvanias Fels Institute of Government. This core course is designed to give students direct guidance as they apply and consolidate knowledge and skills gained across the curriculum through the completion of a rigorous Capstone project. Capstone students are responsible for designing and completing a public policy or public administration-related project and presenting a deliverable (described below) to the Fels community and other stakeholders.
Fall or Spring
1 Course Unit
GAFL 8980 MPA Professional Development & Career Seminar
In these weekly sessions, MPA students will participate in workshops and informational sessions regarding key components of the career services program at Fels, including internships, job search strategy, professional networking, capstone projects etc. Enrollment is required for MPA students.
Fall or Spring
0 Course Units
GAFL 8990 Public Administration Internship
Internship with a relevant nonprofit or government agency, chosen in consultation with a career services advisor. Students put their knowledge to use, develop vital skills, and build a professional network through an internship with a government or nonprofit organization. Our career advising team helps students identify internship opportunities to align with their professional goals.
Fall, Spring, and Summer Terms
0 Course Units