The University of Texas at TylerPublic Administration Program

PADM 5335-060(3.0 Credit Hours)

Topics in Policy Analysis

Spring 2018

(100% online)

Richard C. Helfers, Ph.D.

Phone: 903-566-7399

Office: BUS 232

email:

Office Hours: Mondays 12:30-2:30pm, 4-5pm (and by appointment).

I welcome you to contact me outside of class and during my student office hours. You may email me, call my office, or contact the department and leave a message, or schedule a meeting via Zoom.

I have recently found the best way to contact me, which is preferable, is to send me a message through Canvas!

Course Description:

This course provides an overview of the role policy analysis has within public agencies. The course will review policy formulation, implementation, and evaluation.

Prerequisite:

There are not any specific prerequisite courses listed in the University catalog. However, this is a graduate course and you are expected to communicate orally and in writing as a graduate university student. It is beneficial if you have already taken PADM 5396-Research Methods prior to enrollment in this course.

Course Overview:

The purpose of this course is to expose you to the complex nature of the policy analysts environment. The course will discuss statistical modeling, but will not delve deeply into the analytical nature of the techniques. The course can be considered a policy analysis familiarization course.

Textbook:

Required:

Dunn, W. N. (2012). Public Policy Analysis (5thed.). New York, NY: Routledge. ISBN: 978-0-205-25257-2.

Bardach, E., & Patashnik, E. M. (2016). A Practical Guide for Policy Analysis: The Eightfold Path to More Effective Problem Solving Los Angeles, CA: Sage. ISBN:

978-1-4833-5946-5

Stone, D. (2012). Policy Pardox: The Art of Political Decision Making (3rded.). New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company. ISBN: 978-0-393-91272-2

When I considered books for this course, I examined several different books and found these to be the best for your learning as a graduate student.

Internet Access:

It is imperative you have reliable internet access. If you do not have it at your residence, you will be required to spend time in the Computer Lab. This is important because this is an online course, which will require you to complete numerous activities every week online.I will also be making important announcements in the course Canvas site and sending you emails. Furthermore, I will post your grades in Canvas so you will have an “at a glance view” of your current standing in the course.

Course Objectives:At the end of this course, you will be able to do the following:

  1. Describe the concept of policy analysis.
  2. Justify the importance of policy analysis to public administration, policymakers, and the public.
  3. Synthesize an approach to effectively solving policy problems.
  4. Summarize the conceptual frameworks, strategies, and paradigms with respect to policy analysis.
  5. Generate a policy analysis design and research report.

Overall “Big Question” we will be focused on all semester: How can policy analysts become an integral factor in enhancing the effectiveness and efficacy of public policy decision-making?

Attendance Policy:

This is an online course where all the activities will be performed online. You are expected to stay current with the material and work on the course every week. This is not a self-paced course. There are weekly readings, lectures, and assessments each week. All assignments are due by 11:59pm on Sunday.

Extenuating circumstances may arise that can make it difficultfor you to complete all the assignments and assessments. If a serious family or personal emergency occurs, please let me know as soon as the event occurs or within 24 hours so we can discuss options.

Class Participation:

I hope you actively participate in this course. I say this because I found it the best way to engage you in learning the material. It also makes the learning process more fun because everyone gets the opportunity to learn from each other. Be prepared for every activity. In other words, read and study the material!

Missed Exams/Late Assignments:

Unfortunately, illnesses, deaths in the family, or other traumatic events are part of life. Such events are unwelcomed and because I understand how difficult these times are, if you contact me within 24 hours of the event and provide documentation, I will be happy to give you a make-up exam or extend an assignment deadline.

The general rule is I will not accept any late assignments. Please devote particular attention to the due dates for each assignment. All due dates are specified in the course schedule.

Student Expectations:

You may be wondering what is expected of you? I have listed the minimum (basic) items that are in your best interests to adhere to because it will help you be successful in the course:

  • Remain current with the course material. You must read the material and watch the video lectures prior to engaging in the learning activities for the week. Relevant learning activities will follow the lecturewhich you are expected to complete.
  • Be proficient with the APA citation/reference style by the end of the first week of class. This is the style you will use for all assignments (this includes discussion boards because they require citations/references).
  • Read all the information prior to engaging in the learning activities. This means you mustread the assigned material for the week. I have heard many students do not read the material prior to class, but it is in your best interest to do so because the online activities are related to the reading material. Reading and being prepared is important for your success in this course.
  • You are expected to participate in all activities associated with this course. Details for your participation will be articulated in the instructions for each assignment.
  • Complete all assignments, projects, and assessments.
  • Submit all assignments on or before the due date.
  • Check the “Announcement” page regularly in Canvas.
  • Check your patriot email (that is the email account the university provides to you and all my correspondence with you via email will be sent to your university email account).
  • Send emails in the subject line: PADM 5335 (then list the item that is the subject). Remember it is preferable for you to send me correspondence through Canvas.
  • If you need additional clarification, you should be contacting me as soon as practical. Do not wait until the end of the semester to ask for help.

Instructor Expectations:

I believe teaching is a two-way street. Therefore, you should also have expectations of me. Here is what you can expect from me.

  • You should expect me to communicate important events with you as they arise.
  • I will return all of your written work in a timely fashion. This means I will provide you feedback on each and every item that is graded within 2 weeks.
  • I will also return any emails I receive from you within 48 hours.

How to Contact Me:

I am very approachable. I am here to help you understand the importance of administrative ethics in our society today. Please ask questions in class and be engaged in the discussion. If you have any questions or concerns please contact me at the earliest convenience possible.

Email me with any questions you may have through my University email account (if you send correspondence through Canvas, I will be notified via my University email account). My email is . Or, you may call my office phone at 903-566-7399. If I am not in, please leave a message.

When sending an email, please write in the subject line PADM 5335 (then list the item that is the subject of the email).

Evaluation Procedures:

Exams and assessments are necessary for me to determine your mastery of the core concepts of the course. Your final grade will be determined by your performance on the exams, written assignments, discussion boards, and other learning activities.

I acknowledge there is a significant degree of reading material associated with the course, but after all, this is graduate school and in the social sciences reading and writing is a major aspect for most courses. The reading is not overwhelming, but you will need to be organized and remain current. I recommend you develop a reading schedule early in the semester to ensure you can complete all the reading.

Grading Rubric:

A grading rubric will be provided to you in Canvas for each written assignment. Please review the rubric prior to each assignment and prior to submission. This will help ensure you maximize your points.

Evaluation:

  1. Discussions (Discussion Boards and Flipgrid): 25%
  2. Padlet Assignments: 5%
  3. Semester Paper:30%
  4. Quizzes:20%
  5. Memos:20%

100%

Discussions (Discussion Boards and Flipgrid):

There will be numerous discussion boards during the semester. Each of these will require you to think and apply the material you learned in your reading. Each discussion board will require you to make a post that is 250 words or greater. You must also use evidence to support your position. This will require you to use the APA documentation style. You must also reply to other students, along with commenting on any posts to your original posting. All discussion boards are due by 11:59pm each Sunday. Follow the specific instructions associated with each discussion board.

There will be numerous assignments using a third party tool called “Flipgrid.” Don’t worry the assignments are linked to Flipgrid in Canvas. These are similar to a discussion board, but they require you to complete a video to engage the class. You will also respond to your other students’ videos. We will talk more about this during the first class session. Students have found these videos a fun and worthwhile alternative to a discussion board.

Padlet Assignments:

Similar to the Flipgrid assignments, we will also have assignments in Padlet. These are also linked in Canvas. These are another type of alternative to discussion boards. You will first be exposed to this in the “Getting Started” module. Make sure you make an introduction of yourself on the padlet.

Paper/Written Assignment:(Semester Paper)

There will be a major research paper that will count a significant percentage of the course grade. You will be asked to present a paper on a policy problem topic. The policy problem can have an international, national, state, or local scope. You will be asked to do a significant amount of research to find out the state of the literature on your policy problem. You will then be asked to make a recommendation or suggestion about how the problem should be solved.

Your paper should include a literature review. There should also be a section of the paper that consists of some attempt either to gather or assess data regarding your problem. There are two ways, perhaps, to proceed on the data section. If you do not gather your own data, you should find some data from one or more sources from your literature review and present and discuss those data in your paper. In other words, in addition to searching the literature you will want to assess the degree to which the authors of books, journal articles, government documents, etc. have the data to back up their claims, suggestions, or recommendations. A second approach would be to go one step further and gather or collect your own data. That is to say, if you were to do a quantitative analysis to make a suggestion about public policy, you would “crunch the numbers” and you have to have data to crunch. Note that I am not asking you to apply sophisticated techniques to any data you collect, I am only asking that you collect some and “eyeball” the data to see if there are really problems out there and to see if some nations, states, cities, etc., seem to be doing better than others in solving the problem you are attempting to highlight.

There are many appropriate paper topics. I do not mind you using something from work, as long as you do not substitute for the paper some report you have already written. In other words, it could be a problem that you might have to deal with at work, but the research should be new and original. Here are a few examples of paper topics: Criminal Justice topics (how to reduce crime, gun control, the war on drugs, capital punishment, police action versus civil rights); Health topics (Medicare and Medicaid costs, citizen health as measured numerous ways, how to promote research and development, nurse and doctor [maybe hospital] shortages for communities); Welfare topics (how to prevent poverty, how to alleviate poverty, homelessness, mental illness and poverty); Education policy (how to measure outcomes, parental choice, federal govt. involvement in a local policy arena, special needs funding versus advanced placement funding); Economic policy (fiscal policy, monetary policy, balanced budgets versus deficit spending, entitlement spending); Tax policy (need I say more?); International Trade policy; Immigration policy; Environmental policy (the sky – and earth and sea – is [are] the limit[s] here); Civil Rights policy (affirmative action, equal rights for Hispanics; feminism; gay/lesbian rights); Defense policy (threat of nuclear war, role of NATO in the future, regional conventional wars, the War on Terror). You could also write on local government topics such as problems related to human resources management in local government, provision of water and sewer, parks and recreation issues, traffic problems, infrastructure improvement and other issues related to planning, housing policy, intergovernmental cooperation at the local level, etc., etc. You can probably think of many others. The point is that the topic should be a problem that someone has identified and a problem that HAS BEEN OR COULD POTENTIALLY BE ADDRESSED BY SOME LEVEL OF GOVERNMENT. Thus, we are talking about public policy problems, not private issues such as whether the Hatfields or the McCoys were right in the old Appalachian family feud.

So your paper will basically be a very brief elaboration of the Eightfold Path identified by Eugene Bardach and Eric Patashnik (we will cover this material in the first couple weeks of class). State the problem, see what others say about it, and suggest a solution (that’s only three of the eight steps in BardachPatashnik).Obviously, you have only 14 weeks to do this and I am not a client who will pay you for the work, so I am not expecting a master’s thesis, just a solid term paper. I would like to see an approximately 15-20 page paper in terms of length, with most of that length consisting of narrative (i.e., it is mostly prose, with tables, charts, graphs, etc., supplementing the narrative but not used as space creators).

I will grade the paper on the following criteria: organization/formatting (make sure you include headings and possibly subheadings throughout the paper), grammar, academic diction, literature review, use of data to support your argument, and the meaningfulness of your discussion at the conclusion of the paper. A good way to think about organizing the paper would be to start with a brief introduction of the topic, followed by a review of the literature, then a presentation of any relevant data you have found or collected, and then a policy recommendation with discussion.

With regard to style, you will be expected to follow the APA style manual (6thed.). You will need to cite your sources and include those sources in a reference section (you must have peer reviewed sources, but the nature of this paper will also require government sources). Of course plagiarism will not be tolerated; your papers will be submitted through Turn-It-In; do not worry, that tool is supported by Canvas and when you upload the paper it will be automatically uploaded and checked through Turn-It-In. Additionally, any data presented in tabular form or any charts or graphs should be numbered and titled, with the title providing a comprehensive description of the table, chart, or graph, and the table, chart, or graph should be referenced in the narrative.

I have high expectations for these papers. But I also want them to be fun in the sense that I want you to write about some policy issue that is of interest or importance to you, and I want you to learn more about this policy area from the work you do on the paper. Do not be a procrastinator. Begin immediately or you will compromise your ability to earn a high grade on this assignment. If you have any questions, please contact me (sooner rather than later). The due date for the papers is April 22 and they must be uploaded by 11:59pm in Canvas.

A few items to recap:

  1. Use APA format. Use all requirements, refer to the APA Manual (6thedition) for assistance, direction, and guidance.
  2. One inch margins.
  3. Double space.
  4. Times New Roman with 12 point font.
  5. Use peer reviewed sources, government documents, and information from credible sources.
  6. Upload in a Word document (file ending in .doc or .docx)

Generally, when writing an academic paper you will not use the same informal type language you use during your daily conversations. Informal, conversational language, will negatively impact your grade.