BSM
communicate & interact
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The fifth core competency set forth by NASPAA is the ability to communicate and interact productively with a diverse and changing workforce and citizenry. This involves: the ability to have an understanding of the needs and values of specific communities in the United States; have an understanding of a commitment to the values of representative bureaucracy; have a respect for the views and experience of all members of a public or non-profit organization; and experience in interacting with diverse individuals and groups. To illustrate this competency, I've chosen the following experiences:
Diversity as a concept focuses on a broader set of qualities than race and gender. In the context of public spaces, valuing diversity means creating public spaces that respect and include differences, recognizing the unique contributions that individuals with many types of differences can make, and creating an environment that maximizes the potential of all citizenry and colleagues. Public administrators should also have a long term goal that their organizations should generally reflect the population that it serves. During my coursework in the Masters of Public Administration program, I have had the opportunity to complete a course on Diversity in Public Life. This course focused on the status of many groups that have been identified as a "minority" within America's cultural and political framework. The artifact that I chose to illustrate the fifth competency, communicate and interact productively with a diverse and changing workforce and citizenry, is a series of Implicit Bias Assessment memos that were completed during this course. These memos were reflective writings of a succession of online implicit bias assessments that assessed our level of bias against various marginalized groups. These assignments were very beneficial to my career because they forced me to diagnostically think of why I may have implicit biases against specific populations. Being able to communicate and interact with diverse groups is critical to ones' success while working in the public sector. Being aware of my implicit biases can help me more effectively address the needs of individuals, even if I am incapable of understanding their experiences or circumstances on a first-hand basis.
School climate and school culture directly impact student success. As a result, it is particularly crucial for the school culture to reflect, acknowledge, and celebrate diversity. Throughout my time in the Masters of Public Administration program I have utilized my elective courses to concentrate in the area of Educational Foundations, Leadership, and Technology. Through this experience, I was able to enroll in a Curriculum and Program Planning Course in the Fall of 2018. For the final project of this class, I utilized skills from my Public Administration, Public Policy, and Education Classes. I used skills that I acquired in Seminar in Public Policy, Program Evaluation, and Diversity and Inclusion to identify, analyze, and diagnose the disparity in Diversity between students and teachers in a specific school system in South Alabama. Once recognizing this, I designed a curriculum to combat the diversity issues within this system specifically. From this project, I gained communication and interaction skills that will directly help me with my career in educational policy. Through my career, I will have to work on issues that face education at the state level. Although this project was completed for a local level institution, the project required me to research how other states design their curriculum so that employees and students can gain skills to communicate and interact productively with a diverse and changing workforce and citizenry. To expand my knowledge of how educational policy works directly within Alabama, I had to complete a series of personal interviews with state and local level administrators, as well as directly classroom educators. Learning how diverse curriculum is already presented in the schools and gaining the skills to evaluate what works and doesn’t work has helped me greatly. The Diversity and Inclusion Curriculum has increased my knowledge of Public Education Policy and will help me considerably while breaking the barriers between being a graduate student and young professional.
