PAD 5005
Fall 2008
School of Public Affairs – University of ColoradoDenver
Instructor: Kevin Ward
Telephone:847-651-7138 (available between 9:00 am and 9:00 pm)
E-mail:
Meetings:Online
Office Location:1380 Lawrence St., Suite 400 W, Denver, CO 80204
Office Hours:By appointment or email
Course Description and Objectives
Welcome to PAD 5005, The Policy Process and Democracy! This class is designed to help students better understand the phases of the policy process and the implications of democratic political systems on public policy.To provide structure for this course, the policy process will be subdivided into six phases, including:
- policy initiation
- estimation
- selection
- implementation
- evaluation
- termination
Assignments and Grading
Your semester grade will be based on the following:
- Quality of online discussions – 30 percent
- Midterm exam – 30 percent
- Final exam OR Research Paper – 40 percent
Students at the graduate level are expectedto provide thorough, concise, thoughtful and critical analyses of ideas and concepts presented in class.A grade of “B” indicates that the student has met general expectations for graduate student performance and demonstrates competence in the subject matter studied. This is the most common grade in most classes I teach. A grade of “A” indicates that the student has exceeded expectations and demonstrated superior competencies. A grade of “C” indicates the student needs more work to achieve competence in the study area.
Quality of participation in threaded discussion (30 percent):
Posts to threaded discussions should be submitted by 11:59 pm (midnight) on Tuesday nights. Posts should be thoughtful, demonstrate comprehension of the reading (citing text is not necessary), and be critical. Coursework at the graduate level moves beyond regurgitation of information toward digestion and should critically assess the assumptions, premises, and overall application of concepts presented by the authors and classmates.
Students will be randomly divided into discussion groups of 5-7; groups will be reassigned after the midterm. Students should engage their groups in thoughtful and respectful discourse. In additionto addressing the discussion prompts, students should address posts by other members of their group.
In each of eight modules I will pose one or more questions for threaded discussion.Your participation in at leastseven of the eightthreaded discussions is required and the quality ofyour contributions to the discussion will be evaluated by me. Merely participating in threaded discussion is no guarantee of a good grade for that module.
In Unit 1 (August11 – August19) you will be asked to introduce yourself to the rest of the class and to me, and you will find the first threaded discussion question (Note: There are two threaded discussions during the first week – your personal introduction will not be graded, but the second discussion related to the lecture notes will be graded). All students will be participating as an entire class in discussions during the first unit. But STARTING IN UNITTWO, each class member will be assigned to asmaller (5-7 students) group. Each group will be posting their responses to the same question and I will be monitoring and adding my two cents to each discussion. Over the course of each unit (excluding midterm and final exam) you will be expected to respond to threaded discussion questions. The discussion questions will be related to current events in the world of policy, politics and administration and you will be asked to apply what you have learned from the assigned readings and the lecture to the questions at hand. The threaded discussion question for each unit will be found under each unit heading on the eCollege website and will be labeled “discussion”. Think of it as akin to an in-class discussion with some differences:
-You don't have to worry about being interrupted
-You have time to consult your sources
-You can frame your contribution and your replies to others with careful thought and deliberation
Each threaded discussion will be graded as follows:
Content Assessment Skills:
- An A: Demonstrates a mastery of the material; uses the material presented as a starting point, but demonstrates deep understanding of concepts by questioning assumptions and critiquing theoretical underpinnings; ability to identify gaps in the literature; offers original contributions that push the theoretic envelope (in this course, A’s are relatively uncommon)
- An A-: Demonstrates excellence in grasping the key concepts; critiques work of others based on application of knowledge from resources and not just personal opinion; readily offers newinterpretations of discussion materials; cites relevant materialto support arguments from the reading, lecture, or other outside sources(a grade of A- represents a good grade – it is common, but should not be expected)
-An B+ -: Shows evidence of understanding most of the key concepts; is able to show basic level of support for opinions; offers an occasional divergent viewpoint (this is the modal grade for the course)
-B : Has mostly a shallow grasp of the material; rarely takes a stand on issues; offers no thoughtful response to other students (while still passing, a grade of B suggests that more time should be spent comprehending the presented material)
-C: Does not understand the material presented at the graduate level
Online Participation Form Skills:
Note: You may missONE threaded discussion without penalty. However, you must notify me in advance that you will not be participating in that unit’s discussion. Extra-credit may not be earned for participating in more thanseven threaded discussions, but if you participate in more than seven I will count the FIRST seven threaded discussion grades towards your total.
Mid-term Exam (30percent): This will be an open-book, open-notes essay answer style and will be timed online. You will be given the questions when you open the test and will have three hours to complete. There is a one-week study and review session before the midterm exam and the midterm exam must becompleted before 11:59 pm onTuesday, October 21,(you MUST begin the exam before 9:00 pm MST).
Final Exam or Term Paper (40 percent): The final examwill be an open-book open-notestake home final. You will be given five days to complete the final (December 4 - 9). The final exam questions will be posted on or before 8 am onDecember4and you must submit your answers to the questions on or before 11:59 pm on Tuesday, December 9). You may write up to six double-spaced pages for each answer.
OR IN LIEU OF THE FINAL EXAM YOU MAY WRITE A RESEARCH PAPER. (you have two options, but the final paper or the final will be due on the same day, namely, by 11:59 pmon December 9).
If you choose to do a final paper, you must do it with at least one other person. I will provide guidelines for writing the paper, but in essence, the paper will ask you to apply at least three steps of the policy model we are studying to a "real life" policy issue. I would encourage you to make this as real as possible, maybe even contacting a policy maker and doing a little of the descriptive work on a policy they are working on. Or, you can look at past policy and track it through at least three of the policy stages. We will have more detailed discussions on this later in the course.
Course Policies and Standards
Communicating
If you have questions throughout the semester, please send me an email or give me a call. Students can expect a response within two days, however I will usually respond sooner.
Late Assignments
Discussions will not be accepted after 11:59 pm of the due date (discussions are designed to be interactive and facilitate group learning – if discussions are posted after the course has moved on to next unit, the posts will not be read and will not add value to classmates’ experience). However, keep in mind that you are able to drop one discussion from your final grade. Please inform me the week before discussions are due if you do not plan on participating in the next unit’s discussion.
Examinations will be reduced by one-third of a letter grade for every 24 hours the assignment is late. If you are experiencing extenuating circumstances, please let me know as soon as possible.
Academic Honor Code – From the University of ColoradoDenver Course Catalog, 2007-2008*
A university’s reputation is built on a standing tradition of excellence and scholastic integrity. As members of the University of Colorado at Denver and HealthSciencesCenter academic community, faculty and students accept the responsibility to maintain the highest standards of intellectual honesty and ethical conduct in completing all forms of academic work at the university.
Forms of Academic Dishonesty
Students are expected to know, understand, and comply with the ethical standards of the university. . . . Academic dishonesty is defined as a student’s use of unauthorized assistance with intent to deceive an instructor or other such person who may be assigned to evaluate the student’s work in meeting course and degree requirements. Examples of academic dishonesty include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Plagiarism – Plagiarism is the use of another person’s distinctive ideas or words without acknowledgement. . . . .
- Cheating – Cheating involves the possession, communication, or use of information, materials, notes, study aids, or other devices not authorized by the instructor in any academic exercise, or communication with another person during such an exercise. . . . .
- Fabrication and Falsification – Fabrication involves inventing or counterfeiting information, i.e., creating results not obtained in a study or laboratory experiment.Falsification, on the other hand, involves the deliberate alteration or changing of results to suit one’s needs in an experiment or other academic exercise.
- Multiple Submission – This is the submission of academic work for which academic credit has already been earned, when such submission is made without instructor authorization.
- Misuse of Academic Materials – The misuse of academic materials includes but is not limited tothe following:
- stealing or destroying library or reference materials orcomputer programs
- stealing or destroying another student’s notes or materials or havingsuch materials in one’s possession without the owner’s permission
- receiving assistance in locating or using sources of informationin an assignment when such assistance has been forbidden bythe instructor
- illegitimate possession, disposition or use of examinations or answerkeys to examinations
- unauthorized alteration, forgery or falsification of academic records
- unauthorized sale or purchase of examinations, papers or assignment
- Complicity in Academic Dishonesty – Complicity involves knowingly contributing to another’s acts of academic dishonesty.
Instructor Information
Kevin Ward is a doctoral candidate at the School of Public Affairs where he also serves as a research assistant. After graduating from the University of Illinois with a degree in economics, Ward worked in the private sector before serving two years in the AmeriCorps program National Civilian Community Corps. Upon completion of the program he worked for several nonprofit organizations in Colorado before earning his MPA in the accelerated program at SPA.He has conducted research for the RAND Corporation, Urban Institute, and Institute for Law and Justice studying counterterrorism intelligence in local law enforcement agencies and cost effectiveness of forensic evidence in criminal prosecution. Ward’s most current research interests include voluntary national service programs and social network analysis.
Course Schedule
There are eight Units in this course. Note that this schedule is tentative and may be adjusted if necessary as the course progresses.
Bi-Weekly Units
Units for this course are roughly bi-weekly (last two weeks; see schedule below) and run from Wednesday 12:00 am through Tuesday 11:59 pm. There are several exceptions (note first and last units (units 1 & 8 ) are one week each and there is one week allotted for both the midterm and final examinations).
All discussion posts are due at the end of the unit at 11:59 pm on Tuesday night. Late discussions posts will not be accepted as the class will have moved onto the next unit. In the interest of engaging in active discussion, students are expected to post toward the middle of the unit as well as respond to several other students’ posts throughout the unit. Consistently postings close to the Tuesday night deadline will result in reduction of discussion grades.
Textbooks and Readings
Janis, Irving. Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascos. 2d ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1982.
Pressman, Jeffrey L., and Aaron Wildavsky. Implementation: How Great Expectations in Washington are Dashed in Oakland... 3d ed. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
Rivlin, Alice. Systematic Thinking for Social Action. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 1971.
Dahl, Robert A.On Democracy.New Haven, CT:YaleUniversity Press, 2000.
Derthick, Martha A.Upin Smoke.WashingtonDC:CQ Press, 2002.
deLeon, Peter. An article will be uploaded to eCollege later in the semester.
Schedule
Unit 1: August 11 - 19
Unit 1 – Policy in a Democratic Society
Discussion posting due on Tuesday, August19
NOTICE: There are two discussion prompts this week – one is a personal introduction and the second is in response to a question prompt.
Reading Assignment: None this week, however it may be helpful to begin reading On Democracy, Robert Dahl
Unit 2: August 20 – September 2
Unit 2 – Overview of the Policy Process
Reading Assignment:On Democracy, Robert Dahl
Discussion posting due on Tuesday, September 2
Unit 3:September 3 – 16
Unit 3 – Initiation
Reading Assignment:Up In Smoke, Martha Derthick
Discussion posting due on Tuesday, September 16
Unit 4: September 17 – September 30
Unit 4 – Estimation
Reading Assignment:Systematic Thinking for Social Action, Alice Rivlin – Chapters 1-4
Discussion posting due on Tuesday, September 30
Unit 5: October 1 – 14
Unit 5 – Selection
Reading Assignment:Groupthink, Irving Janis
Discussion posting due on Tuesday, October 14
Midterm Exam Preparation: October 15 – 21
Midterm Exam Due: October 21, 11:59 pm MST
Unit 6: October 22 – November 4
Unit 6 – Implementation
Reading Assignment:Implementation, Pressman and Wildavsky – Chapters 1-8 and 11
Discussion posting due on Tuesday, November 4
Additional assignment – Participation in the democratic process – be sure to vote!
Unit 7: November 5 – 18
Unit 7 – Evaluation
Reading Assignment: Remainder of Implementation and Systematic Thinking for Social Action
Discussion posting due on Thursday, November 18
Unit 8: November 19 – December 2
Unit 8 – Termination
Reading Assignment: Peter deLeon article
Discussion posting due on Thursday, December 2
NOTICE: This unit is intended to only be one week long (however, Fall break makes it two weeks). There will be less reading during this unit to reflect the shorter unit.
Final Exam Preparation: December 3 – 9
Final Exam or Final Paper Due: December 9, 11:59 pm MST