As the COVID-19 pandemic threatens American lives and disrupts daily routines, we continue to see front-line public servants step forward to battle the virus with persistence. Given the increasingly polarized COVID environment, the natural inclination is to ask: what is motivating these public servants to persevere in their work despite the…

Aspects of public service often involve tasks sometimes considered taboo, including working with grit, grime, blood, guts, grease, and stigmatized populations. Yet scholarship in our field directly incorporating dirty work remains limited yet growing. Importantly, if MPA students are not trained in how to work with and manage public sector…

The renewal of efforts to disrupt or dismantle White supremacy in public service organizations and society has been met by strong cross-currents from the current political and policy climate in the United States. We see efforts by public administration faculty to incorporate more critical perspectives around pedagogy and public service as very…

Public affairs programs have long aimed to advance public service education. First defined as preparing public servants for government employment, public affairs programs have expanded to advancing the public interest and governance across all sectors. While modern public affairs programs have become more expansive in how they define public…

Emotion is the "how" of NASPAA competencies related to leading and managing in a culturally-conscious manner. In this article, we describe the role of emotion in public service and we detail the mechanism by which emotion fosters a collective mind-set for effective public service leadership and cultural literacy. We indicate specifically…

This research aims to explore the factors influencing college students' aspirations for careers in public service. More specifically, we examine how gender impacts public service sector preference, in terms of policy advocacy, government positions, and crime and policing as well as their likelihood to apply for such careers. Given a breadth of…

Teaching about systemic racism and the myth of white supremacy to the next cadre of public administrators is critical as it supports students' abilities to challenge dominant paradigms and center counternarratives; both serve a purpose in advancing toward a more just and equitable society. This paper offers insight into the development and…

Debates about trade-offs among values are central to the field of public administration and to graduate education in public affairs. Accreditation guidelines from the Network of Schools of Public Policy, Affairs, and Administration (NASPAA) direct graduate programs to articulate the public service values that guide their curricula. Moreover,…

This article investigates transformations in public service education over the past 50 years, specifically: How have organizational forms evolved, and what lessons can we draw from that evolution? The organizational form construct originates in population ecology theory. We draw from a variety of evidentiary sources in answering the research…

Teaching cultural competency is a two-way street. Instruction is more comprehensive when it raises awareness of cultural context. And students see relevancy when they learn how theories and principles relate to the context they know. Cultural context is especially obvious in nations colonized by cultures different from theirs. India provides a…

Preconceived expectations for one's behavior drive how people interact with their communities. Messaging via pop culture is a common source for citizens to learn about one community engagement tool: compulsory volunteering. Compulsory volunteering, like court-ordered community service and school-based volunteering, provides an opportunity to learn…

NASPAA expects accredited public affairs programs to stress public service values in their educational program. This article examines the values that are included the mission statements of 125 public affairs programs. There is wide dispersion in the number and content of the values identified in these mission statements. Content analysis of the…

Public affairs programs aim to prepare students for public service roles by teaching certain skills and reinforcing prosocial motivations. Studies provide mixed results as to whether these aims are met. What we do not know is whether public administration and public affairs programs in Asia attract students different in their job sector attitudes…

Discussions of work-life balance challenges among members of the academy abound and this study contributes to those conversations by taking a step back and investigating faculty motivation. We contend that understanding the motivation of faculty members and their views of work are necessary as we engage in work-life balance conversations. More…