The MPA Messenger

Volume 1 Issue 1a October 1996
NEWSLETTER OF THE MPA PROGRAM AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ALASKA ANCHORAGE , 907 786-1700
 
School of Public Affairs + School of Business = College of Business and Public Policy
As part of UAA's reorganization efforts, the Schools of Public Affairs and Business have been merged into the new College of Business and Public Policy. Acting Business School Dean Hayden Green has been named Dean of the new college for the first two years. The major change for the School of Public Affairs so far has been the departure of the Justice Program which joined the new College of Health, Education and Social Welfare. Faculty offices will remain the same for the foreseeable future. There are new administrative structures and better utilization of faculty in the new joint College is being planned. A major bonus for MPA students is access to the computer labs in the Business Education Building.

Certificate in Public Management (CPM) debuts in Anchorage
Professor Emeritus Garth N. Jones began researching certification of public managers in the early 1980s. Trainers in a number of states had been concerned that often training of public administrators was haphazard, depending on courses that happened to be available, but not necessarily geared to what employees needed. They banded together to establish a curriculum which took participants through the various skills and abilities most necessary for good public management. A national association now accredits such programs in 20 states in the US. Then graduate student Allen Kemplen worked with Garth N. Jones to develop a proposal for implementing this program in the state of Alaska. Allen and John Stafford on behalf of the then Anchorage ASPA Chapter took this proposal to Juneau, where Professor L.A. Wilson at UAS (then UAJ), had worked with the Arizona state government to establish the program in Alaska. With the tremendous work of the program’s UAS coordinator Laraine L. Derr, the program has begun to flourish in Juneau. In 1995 we enticed Dr. Jones out of his semi-retirement to help establish the CPM program in Anchorage. With the competent staffing of Bruce Rowe, the first CPM courses are being offered this semester in the Anchorage area. For information on this program, please contact Bruce Rowe at 786-6758. This was a successful ASPA chapter initiative which needs continued chapter support.

Ralph Brower wins national award for doctoral dissertation
When Ralph Brower got his MPA at UAA in 1989 he followed this by taking the joint doctoral seminar we offered then with USC. Next he entered the public administration doctoral program at the State University of New York (SUNY) Albany, where he graduated May 1995. Since graduation he has been an assistant professor of public administration at Florida State University in Tallahassee. We’ve recently learned that Ralph’s doctoral dissertation, entitled "Everyday Forms of Bureaucratic Resistance: An Ethnographic Investigation," received a Sunya President’s Distinguished Doctoral Dissertation Award, and also won the National Association of Schools of Public Affairs (NASPAA) Best Doctoral Dissertation of the year. We proudly note that in this award winning dissertation, Ralph thanks UAA MPA faculty for continuing support.

Faculty news
Greg Protasel served last year as the project coordinator for the American Russian Center’s Institutional Partnership Project funded by USAID. The purpose of the project was to increase the competency of Russian Faculty in free-market economics and business. This involved coordinating faculty exchanges and curriculum building efforts between the three University of Alaska Campuses (UAA, UAS, UAF) with three universities in the Russian Far East (Yakutsk State University, Magadan Pedagogical University and Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk State Pedagogical Institute). Presently, Dr. Protasel is studying recent changes in Russian Public Administration.

Steve Aufrecht’s "Toward a Model for Determining Appropriate Corrective Action in Public Employee Discipline" was published in the latest edition of the Journal of Collective Negotiations in the Public Sector. Professor Aufrecht’s article reviews the various models used when employees are sanctioned to identify the underlying principles used in employee discipline action. Dr. Aufrecht integrates the principles and assumptions found in the disciplinary literature to offer a model practitioners can use when deciding on employee sanctions. For a copy of the article, contact Janet Burton at 786-1700. His current research projects include work on Ombudsmen and the role of Native American governance in American public administration.

Sharnan Haley and Matt Berman’s paper "Estimating Net Benefits of Reallocation: Discrete Choice Models of Sport and Commercial Fishing" is currently under review by the journal Marine Resource Economics. Dr. Haley is also busy doing research estimating the value of sport fishing in Alaska as well as evaluating Native Health Boards and rural sanitation demonstration projects.

Erchinger and Rabas receive first ASPA Scholarships in Memory of John Stafford
In January 1991, John Stafford, MPA graduate and President of the Alaska ASPA Chapter, died three weeks after being diagnosed with leukemia. John, who had entered the MPA program after a distinguished career as an engineer, in the Air Force, and as Assistant Adjutant General of the Alaska Air National Guard, became a very strong supporter of the program and had often talked about setting up a student scholarship. The ASPA chapter, its members, and many MPA alumni, as well as others who had known John, contributed $10,000 to endow the scholarship fund.

The first two recipients of the scholarship were Kristin Erchinger, Controller for the City of Seward who commutes to class from Seward, and Trish Rabas, Clinical Associate at Southcentral Counseling. We thank all those who contributed to the fund for making it possible for us to honor John Stafford's life and to recognize outstanding students in the public administration program. The awards are still quite modest and tax deductible contributions are still very welcome.

Policy emphasis improvements
Sharman Haley will serve as coordinator for the Policy Emphasis curriculum for our MPA students. The course content among the emphasis area courses and PADM 604 will be adjusted as necessary to make the overall emphasis area more cohesive. A fixed two year cycle will also be developed to help students plan their programs.

Registration for spring classes
Course schedules for spring classes are now available. Priority registration runs from October 28 through November 25. Open access registration runs November 26-December 5, with additional Wolfline openings December 16-20 and January 3-6. For information about registration, call UAA Enrollment Services at 786-1480. For faculty permission to enroll in MPA classes, call Janet Burton at 786-1700.

Research assistants needed
Two part-time graduate research assistants are needed to assist MPA program faculty for the remainder of the current semester. The pay is $10.29 per hour, for ten hours per week. Tuition waivers for the research assistants are a possibility if the students hired meet certain criteria. For information about these openings as well as possible internship opportunities with the U.S. District Court and Anchorage Municipal Planning Department, contact Janet Burton at 786-1700.