Panel to review Fels govt. program

The committee will look at the Center's mission and role within Penn. What does state government or public policy have to do with architecture or painting? Some administrators are asking the same question. Nestled among four other programs in Graduate School of Fine Arts, the Fels Center of Government -- the University's graduate program studying local administration -- doesn't quite fit. And on December 18 and 19, a high-profile committee will conduct an external review of the Fels program, intended to determine a clear definition of the Center's function and future direction. Fels offers a Masters degree in government administration -- through a three-semester program -- that focuses on both technical management and political training. GSFA Dean Gary Hack said the review committee will focus on "what type of program we should be operating here at Penn." Committee members will include: Allen Altshuler, former executive dean of Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government; Dawn Price, former dean of Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs; and Sharon Ostler, a professor at Yale's School of Organization and Management. Penn administrators, working with Hack, will use the review to answer questions about Fels -- from future funding levels to whether GSFA should remain the program's sole host. The Center could be based in several schools at once, or it could move to another school altogether. Officials will also choose a new director for the program, based on the direction the committee lays out for the Center. John Mulhern has acted as interim director since January, when James Spady resigned from the post. Samuel Fels, whose former home now houses the Center, founded the program in 1937 as the Institute of Local and State Government during a larger national movement to "clean up local governments," according to Mulhern. The school has gone through several phases during its existence, becoming a part of GSFA in 1983. In entering the Fine Arts school, it began a new academic phase. Mulhern explained that in this current phase, the program "provides much more of a sense how administration and politics interact." And Hack said he foresees the program moving back toward its roots after the review ends. "I think that in the future, state and local government will be increasingly important? and that's where the really skilled leadership will be required," he said. This shift is a result of the federal government's recent move to decentralize many responsibilities of state and local jurisdictions, he added. The Fels Center will also have to adjust to the increasing privatization of government services, Mulhern said. Hack stressed that any changes to the program will arise through a "managed transition." "Those that are in the program today [will] continue to get a first-rate education," he said. Hack added that changes to the Fels program could occur as soon as next fall. The question of where the Fels Center fits into the University as a whole is "paramount in the minds of current Fels students," said first-year student Mark Siedband, who heads his class's internal government. But students have not necessarily reached any consensus as to the answer. Siedband joked that asking 12 different Fels students about the Center's place would probably produce 13 different responses.

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