MPP Course Descriptions

Required Core Courses (22 credits)

POLICY PROCESS AND INSTITUTIONS:

PADMN 6320 Public Policy Theories and Applications (3 credits) Recommended Prerequisite: POLS 1100. Introduction to policy process in U.S. ; needs and demands for public action; organization and nature of political support; process and problems of decision making in major policy areas.

PADMN 6323 Policy Analysis (3 credits) Policy Analysis explores both the theoretical and practical aspects of performing policy analysis. Students will examine current policy issues from the perspectives of local, state, and federal governments, and from those of non-governmental and advocacy organizations. Students will be introduced to repositories of data, information, and analysis available on policy topics, and will conduct research using both original and secondary data.

PADMN 6330 Practice of Public Management (3 credits) This course emphasizes the contexts in which public managers manage - how managers of the public good get things done in practice. Contexts include both intra-and inter organizational systems and settings. Getting things done through influence (without formal authority) and inter-organizational networks are addressed as well as, for example, management skills and/or management survival skills within public bureaucracies. The course addresses aspects of management policy, but not issues of public policy analysis or formation.

PUBPL 6563 - Policy and Program Evaluation (3 credits) Systematic introduction to program and policy evaluation as a basis for accountability. Introduces alternative approaches to evaluation. Emphasis is placed on strategies for impact assessment (including randomized designs and non-randomized designs), measuring efficiency, examining short-term and long-term consequences. Identifying both intended and unintended impacts, and the social, political, and ethical context of evaluation.

PUBPL 6950 Master's Applied Policy Project (4 credits) Students take this course in the final semester of study. The course will consist of a faculty-supervised project applying the MPP curriculum to the analysis of real-world policy issue and partnering with a policy-oriented agency. Typically, the project will involve local governmental or nonprofit organizations. In addition, students will meet weekly to discuss their projects and challenges they are encountering. At the end of the semester, students will make a presentation to the entire class on the issue they addresses, their approach and recommendations.

ECONOMICS:

ECON 6300 Public Finance: Public Expenditures and Cost-Benefit Analysis (3 credits) Prerequisite: ECON 2010 or instructor's consent. The economics of public services and their justification due to market failures. Modern welfare economics and its elaboration into cost-benefit analyses of public programs in theory and practice. Shortcomings of American government, including the tendency to over expand, special interest politics, and budget deficits.

ECON 6380 Law and Economics (3 credits) Prerequisite: ECON 2010. Use of economics in the analysis of law, including the economics of contracts, torts, property, and criminal law areas. Some aspects of economic consulting for lawyers will be addressed. This course is recommended for economics majors who are planning to go to law school or intend to pursue a career in the legal field.

Required Quantitative Analysis Courses (6 credits)

PADMN 6290 Quantitative Analysis - Introduction to statistics and quantitative methods and their application within public administration. Topics include elementary research design, measurement and data collection, descriptive statistics, sampling, statistical significance, and hypothesis testing. Other analytical techniques (e.g. regression) with an emphasis on interpretation.

PUBPL 6900 Public Policy Research - Interpretation and synthesis of published research materials for the purposes of guiding public policy. Emphasis placed on critiquing the research designs and statistical approaches used in light of the public policy questions being addressed. Examples drawn from a range of policy areas.

Elective Courses (12 credits)

This is a list of sample elective courses. Students should identify courses, using the University course catalog, that fit their policy track and notify the program manager before enrolling.

COMM 7360 Qualitative Empirical Research (3) Practice of research using qualitative research methods and concepts.
ECON 6120 Public Policy Towards Labor (3) Prerequisite: ECON 4010. An exploration of the laws and policies that regulate and protect employers and employees in U.S. labor markets: labor-management relations, equal employment opportunity, wages and hours, safety and health, immigration, termination, income maintenance, and other topics.
ECON 6140 Discrimination in the Labor Markets (3) Prerequisite: ECON 3100 or instructor's consent. Meets with ECON 5140. Graduate students should register for ECON 6140 and will be held to higher standards and/or additional work. Examination of wage and employment discrimination in U.S. labor markets. Racial, ethnic, gender, age, religious, and other forms of discrimination may be considered. Emphasis on original, quantitative analysis of these issues: students will identify particular topics of interest to them and will collect and analyze relevant data. Fulfills University's diversity requirement.
ECON 6180 Poverty and Inequality (3). Economic theories of the causes of poverty and inequality, with a focus on the structure of the U.S. economy and recent economic trends. Policies to address these socioeconomic issues are addressed in light of theory.
ECON 6190 Health Economics (3) Economics of health care, health-care delivery systems, public and private health insurance, location of health facilities, and health-care inflation.
ECON 6240 Urban Economics (3) An economic analysis of the forces shaping the modern American city, which underlie urban problems and politics. An emphasis on public policy with applications to poverty, segregation, neighborhood decay, redevelopment, pollution, local taxes, and government services.
ECON 6250 Environmental and Natural Resource Economics (3) Air, water, and ground pollution; public policies to reduce pollution (including taxes, quotas, and tradable permits); destruction, valuation, and protection of natural environments and the species within them. The United States and other nations are considered. Also exploitation and depletion of nonrenewable energy and mineral resources; equity between different human generations; natural reproduction and human harvesting of fish and trees; extinction of species; entropy, thermodynamics, and the prospects for perpetual economic growth.
ECON 6360 Industrial Organization (3) Prerequisite: ECON 2010. The basic theory of industrial organization; interrelationships among market structure, conduct, and performance; public policy, and empirical evidence.
ECON 6500   Monetary Theory and Policy (3) Prerequisite: ECON 4020 or instructor consent. Recommended Prerequisite: ECON 3200 or 3500. Meets with ECON 5500. Graduate students should register for ECON 6500 and will be held to higher standards and/or additional work. Traditional and modern theory concerning the role of money in economic activity, how Keynes' economics became Keynesian economics, and the continuing quest for theoretical understanding of monetary phenomena.
ECON 6510 International Monetary Relations (3) Prerequisite: ECON 4020 and 3200 or 3500 or instructor consent.  Graduate students should register for ECON 6510 and will be held to higher standards and/or additional work. The international monetary system and open economy macroeconomics (history, theory, and practice): alternative standards, exchange rates, interest rates, inflation and unemployment, macroeconomic policies, competitive monies, and the political economy of international monetary arrangements.
ECON 6530 Principles of Economic Development (3) Prerequisite: ECON 2010 and 2020 and College Algebra (or 1010 and instructor's consent).  Graduate students should register for ECON 6530 and will be held to higher standards and/or additional work. Problems of poor countries, theories of economic development, development policies, and economic relations between rich and poor countries.
ECON 6550 International Trade and Commercial Policy (3) Prerequisite: ECON 4010.  Graduate students should register for ECON 6550 and will be held to higher standards and/or additional work. Theoretically sophisticated (undergraduate) treatment of issues and theory: determinants of the pattern of trade; tests of trade theory models; growth and international trade; multinational firms; tariffs, quotas, subsidies; common markets and free trade agreements; international movement of technology and labor.
ECON 6560 Gender and Economic Development in the Third World (3)  Graduate students should register for ECON 6560 and will be held to higher standards and/or additional work. Cross-listed as WM ST 5560. The impact of economic development on the gender division of labor and gender-based control over resources in the Third World . Case studies of rural transformation and agricultural development, rural-urban migration, urbanization and industrialization, economic crisis and population growth. Examines policies and political struggles aimed at overthrowing gender bias in development processes.
ECON 7590 Econometrics (3) Ordinary least squares, maximum likelihood, constrained estimation, systems of equations, generalized least squares, and regression diagnostics. Application oriented.
ECS6614The Culture Wars and Educational Policy (3) Meets with ECS 7614. Focuses upon central debates over national educational policy: national curriculum, multicultural education, affirmative action in admissions, religion in the curriculum, and inclusion of gay and lesbian students.
ELP 6010 Analytic Methods for Decision Making (3) Understanding and evaluating educational research and data for use in administrative decision making. Attention is also given to the role of inference, judgment, and intuition in decision making.
ELP 6410 Educational Law (3) Introduction to legal principles and laws affecting administration and management of schools with emphasis upon building level concerns.
ELP 6470 Higher Education Budgeting & Planning (3) This masters level course is designed to acquaint graduate students with key concepts in resource allocation and planning in colleges and universities. The objectives are to acquaint students with various planning and resource acquisition and allocation models at the state, institutional, and program or departmental levels.
ELP 6510 Organization and Governance of Higher Education (3) Meets with ELP 7510. Explores the theory and practice of how colleges and universities are governed, their organizational characteristics and behavior, administrative and management issues, including faculty roles and power, and the variations in organizational cultures found both within such organizations and among various types of colleges and universities. Also focuses on external governance issues such as the relationship between universities and the state, governing boards, and other important external constituencies.
ELP 7060 Qualitative Research Methods I (3) Prerequisite: ELP 6010 or ELP 6030. Examines underlying assumptions in qualitative research methods and related research questions. Explores conceptual frameworks with data collection and analysis strategies. Students apply methods to field-based cases.
ELP 6430 Politics of Education (3) Examines the politics of education at various government levels in the context of larger social values and concerns. Special attention is given to the character and dynamics of the policy-making process as it relates to the development of education policy.
ELP 7440 Educational Policy (3) Prerequisite: ELP 6430. Examines the major issues associated with policy analysis and the predominant streams of theoretical work in policy research. Provides a working foundation for the analysis of educational policy by placing students in a position to assess the merits of a variety of policy situations.
FCS 5430 Families, Consumers, and Health (3) Covers two broad areas: the interplay among health care delivery, government policy, and consumers, and the role families play in affecting the health of family members. Content emphasis will vary according to the instructor.
FCS 5440 Consumers, Markets, and Government (4) Prerequisite: FCS 3210 or MATH 1040. The economics and politics of advancing the consumer interest in the marketplace. Market structure, government anti-trust policy, economic regulation, health and safety regulation, and information disclosure as they influence consumer welfare. Examples drawn from a variety of markets including broadcast communications, transportation, and telecommunications.
FCS 5650/6650 Housing and Community Development (3) Prerequisite: FCS 3600. Revitalization of central cities and neighborhoods; programs and techniques for community environmental, social, and economic development; policies regulating the financing, production, consumption, and preservation of market and low-income housing.
FCS 6110 Graduate Multivariate Statistics (4) Prerequisite: FCS 3210. Course covers a range of topics on regression analysis. Topics include multiple regression, conducting regression diagnostics, multi-collinearity, interaction effects, repeated measures, and logistic regression. SAS computer assignments.
FCS 6120 Demographic Methods (3) Prerequisite: URBPL 5020 or equivalent. Covers in-depth the methodology of demography and population studies including life tables, increment/decrement processes, methods for estimating fertility and reproduction, stable and non-stable population models, modeling vital events, indirect estimation, survival models.
FCS 6200 Families and Social Policy (3) Relationship between the family and social environments emphasizing ecology and life-course frameworks in the dependency between the family and kin, school, neighborhood, work, class, and ethnic environments.
FCS 6400 Families and Economic Policy (3) Prerequisite: FCS 3450. Economic and political influences on family resource-allocation patterns and interest-group efforts to alter constraints imposed by these policies. Examples drawn from a variety of policies including child care, marriage, divorce, welfare, and retirement.
FCS 6600 Environments and Human Behavior (3) Reviews and connects research, policies, and physical designs for a variety of physical settings (homes, workplaces, communities) and socio-physical processes (stress, fear of crime, privacy, recreation, place attachment). Often involves vulnerable populations (women, children, elders, the poor) and is tailored to student interests.
FCS 6730 Community Development & Environmental Change (3) Focuses on the ways in which ordinary people can become involved in creating physical environments (such as neighborhoods, new housing, work-places, schools, parks, playgrounds, and other institutional settings and public spaces) that are responsive to the needs of users (individuals, families, communities); how communities can deal with environmental hazards and crime and disorder; the roles of environmental impact statements, zoning laws and master plans, neighborhood organizations and resources; and ways of collaborating with designers and buildings. The main focus will be on practical intervention strategies (working with urban planners and architects, policy-makers, and community organizers and leaders).
GEOGR 6140 Methods in Geographic Information Systems (4) Prerequisite: GEOGR 3140; C0-requsite GEOGR 410 - Introductory Visual Basic for ArcGIS, or equivalent programming course. This course explores the practice of using a geographic information system (GIS) to support geographic inquiry and decision making. Students will strengthen their technical knowledge of the common tasks that a geographic analyst faces in applying a GIS to a variety of spatial problems. The lab sections offer an opportunity to gain hands-on experience using a leading commercial GIS to complete a series of real-world projects.
GEOGR 6340 Managing Nations Disasters (3) Meets with GEOGR 5340 and URBPL 5440. Hazard risk reduction approached from a governmental standpoint, including cost reduction through mitigation. Development of awareness and expertise in public safety aspects of hazards-reduction planning and implementation. Relationship between levels of government involving laws, agreements, and developing organizations and programs, as influenced by changing philosophies in legal and financial liability.
GERON 6002 Service Agencies and Programs for the Elderly (3) Analyze the current delivery system of services and programs for the elderly at the national, state, and local levels. Local services and programs specifically examined to determine quality and effectiveness, identify service gaps, and be better prepared to meet the increasing demands of a rapidly aging population. Learn about current concepts in health and social policy reform, and evaluate current public policy recommendations.
POL S 6001 Quantitative Analysis in Political Science (3) Recommended Prerequisite: POLS 3001 or instructor consent. Application of statistical techniques for the analysis of political data including inferential statistics, contingency tables, and regression analysis.
PADMN 6290 Quantitative Methods in Public Administration (3) Introduction to statistics and quantitative methods and their application within public administration. Topics include elementary research design, measurement and data collection, descriptive statistics, sampling, statistical significance, and hypothesis testing. Other analytical techniques (e.g. regression) with an emphasis on interpretation.
PADMN 6321 Health Policy (3) Introduction to health policy issues in U.S.; needs and demands for public action; organization and nature of political support; process and problems of decision making in health policy areas.
POLS 6322 Environmental Policy (3) Meets with POL S 5322. Graduate students should register for POL S 6322 and will be held to higher standards and/or additional work. Course analyzes ways government action or inaction affects problems of resource scarcity, environmental health and safety, natural aesthetics, and economic growth.
POLS 6660  American Foreign Policy (3) Recommended Prerequisite: POL S 2100 or 3800. U. S. government machinery for formulation and conduct of foreign policy. Appraisal of U.S. policy in Europe, Asia, Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East .
POLS 6690  Foundations of International Security (3) Recommended Prerequisite: POL S 2100 or 3800. Focuses on the evolution of international security from the Cold War to the post-Cold War era. Topics include concepts and approaches in understanding international security; differing interpretations of security including economic, human rights, military, and political dimensions.
POLS 6710  Foundations of the Politics of International Economic Relations (3) Recommended Prerequisite: POL S 2100 or 3800. Explores the relationship between politics and economics in international relations. Its fundamental objective is to enable the student to understand the ways in which politics and economics interact in the international arena.
POLS 6720  The Politics of North-South Economic Relations (3) Recommended Prerequisite: POL S 2100 or 3800. Examines ways in which international economic processes are affected by the politics of developing countries. Focuses on political-economic interactions between developed and developing countries and their participation in international regimes.
POLS 6800 Theories of International Relations (3) Recommended Prerequisite: POL S 2100 or 3800. Analysis of theories of international relations, such as Realism, Liberalism, Constructivism; using major works and current theoretical research. Recommended introduction to upper-division students.
PSYCH 6500 Quantitative Methods I (1-4) Prerequisite: PSYCH 3000 and MATH 1050 and instructor's consent. Introduction to measurement and design; foundation of statistical reasoning (probability theory, expectations, linear models, model testing, power, and effect size.
PSYCH 6510 Quantitative Methods II (1-4) Prerequisite: PSYCH 6500 and instructor's consent. Analysis of variance, regression methods; introductions to multivariate techniques and to nonparametric statistics. Computer intensive.
SOC 6115 Sociological Analysis (3) An intensive examination of a wide range of sociological studies, designed to acquaint students with how sociologists, using a variety of methods and data sources, handle important theoretical issues. Particular attention is given to the logical coherence of each study and the fit between data and interpretation.
SOC 7130 Statistics II (3) Prerequisite: SOC 6120. Techniques of data analysis and when and how to apply techniques. Interpreting results in nonstatistical terms and applying computer packages such as SPSS. Techniques for data reduction, classification, and causal analysis (i.e. LISREL). Assumptions of the model and consequences when assumptions are violated.
URBPL 6010   Urban Research (3) A hands-on course in quantitative skills used for urban analysis. Data sources, dataset development, descriptive statistics, correlation, trend analysis, modeling, and styles for graphical and written presentation. Planning applications of demographic and economic analysis including population projection, economic base analysis, and measures of characteristics and distribution.
URBPL 6020   Urban and Regional Analysis (3) The economic, demographic, and spatial interaction models used to analyze and develop alternative urban and regional plans including cohort-survival, input-output, shift-share, and gravity models. Model concepts, mathematics, design, logic, and limitations. Small-scale spreadsheet models are applied to analyze problems, interpret output and present results.
URBPL 6350    Public Lands and Environmental Policy (3) Meets with GEOGR 5350 and URBPL 5350. Graduate students should take URBPL 6350 and will be held to higher standards and/or more work. A review of environmental impact assessment, focusing on the policies, requirements, methods, and examples from the National Environmental Policy Act, with a review of state and local approaches to environmental impact assessment.
URBPL 6360   Environmental Planning Law and Policy (3) Meets with URBPL 5360. Graduate students should take URBPL 6360 and will be held to higher standards and/or more work. A review of federal, state, and local environmental laws, policies and procedures as they affect planning including air, water, and hazardous waste, impact assessment, public lands, common law, and aesthetic regulation .