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Public Policy

How does public policy contribute to social justice? This course intends to develop the skills and in-depth understanding of how public policy is shaped, influenced, and debated. Special attention will be placed on examining power and politics by looking into the processes, institutions, and social forces involved in reproducing and legitimizing outcomes that we may deem desirable, necessary, or unacceptable from the local, national, and international levels. 

Communication in Public Service 

This course offers an in-depth exploration of communication strategies in the public sector, focusing on the unique challenges and opportunities public administrators face. Students will learn the principles of public sector communication, including strategic planning, crisis management, media relations, and public speaking. Emphasis is placed on communication ethics, transparency, cultural competency, data-driven approaches, and emerging technologies. The course culminates in a capstone project, where students will develop and implement a comprehensive communication plan for a real-world public sector initiative, equipping them with essential skills for public administration and government communication.

Quantitative Methods

This class introduces students to research methods and basic statistical analyses, with a focus on their application in public service. It covers the essentials of descriptive statistics, univariate and bivariate statistical inference, and introduces multivariate analysis. Students will learn the theoretical and practical applications of various statistical tools and data visualization. The course will also examine the ethical implications of data, pitfalls of policy claims made with data, and how data can be leveraged to promote equity. Emphasis will be placed on the practical applications of these methods in management and policy.

Economics in Policy Making 

This course provides students with an understanding of microeconomic principles and applies these concepts to policy related issues. This course is primarily about microeconomics and will incorporate some concepts from macroeconomics. Throughout the course we examine explicitly the role of government and the tools available to policy makers to influence markets. Students will have a foundation of understanding of conventional economic theories and approaches so they can challenge these approaches with other perspectives.  

Strategic Human Resources Management

The purpose of this course is for students – as managers in a world of increasingly scarce resources – to understand the challenges and responsibilities they have in terms of managing human capital. Students will learn how strategic human resource management is a critical system within an organization that can move any team towards excellence. The need to attract the best people - keep them motivated, engaged and able to make a significant contribution to achieving the organization’s mission- is fundamental to success. Managers are responsible for selecting their team, developing them, managing performance and ensuring that they are engaged and feel rewarded for their efforts.

Advanced Quantitative Methods

The second in a two-part sequence covering mathematical and statistical concepts and methods used to design and conduct policy research, synthesize and describe data of all types, and support management decision making. The course focuses on applications rather than on theory and mathematical development. Topics including the scientific method, Measure of Central Tendency and Dispersion, Probability Theory, Hypothesis testing, Correlation analysis, Linear regression and Multiple regression.

Program and Policy Evaluation

Daily searches for management positions requiring monitoring and evaluation knowledge and skills populate a host of new opportunities at some of the world’s smallest and largest organizations and agencies. Whether to satisfy funding requirements or to improve ongoing program operations, the demand for measuring progress toward the delivery of outputs and achievement of outcomes is ever present in the nonprofit and public sectors. To meet the demand, this course will familiarize students with the fundamentals of monitoring and evaluation, including key concepts, designs, and methods, as well as some of the common challenges involved in conducting useful program evaluations.

Strategic Management of Public Organizations

This course provides an overview of the public sector and explores questions of vision, mission, values, strategy, and management. We will explore the congruence of leadership and management and learn about the foundational importance of values, vision and mission for public organizations to develop strategy and achieve their goals. The course will also focus on the components of strategic planning, fundraising, and how social justice organizations assess the environment, their power, and organizational resources to formulate strategy. We will also learn about the complexities of  managing teams, conflict, and building a healthy culture, and organizational change. Students will learn tools and practices to be effective managers and navigate complex management challenges. 

Public Budgeting and Finance

In simple terms, budgets are plans covering income and spending. However, they are much more than that. Budgets are a statement of priorities for a government or organization and indicate expectations about the future financial situation of those entities. They also can reflect the values behind the priorities that have been set and help drive change where needed.In addition, budget documents and websites are repositories of large amounts of data that can be used for analysis. And they provide an indication about the success or failure of policies and programs. This class will cover the terminology, components, practices, documents, and methods of public budgeting and finance at all levels of government and in the nonprofit sector. It will also place an emphasis on policy analysis—thinking through the available data, drawing conclusions, and communicating that information to a non-technical audience. 

Financing for Social Change

Aligned or adversarial, investment capital shapes so much of how our economy and society function. This course will focus on the broad spectrum of the rapidly growing “capital for good” industry - a complex ecosystem of philanthropy, community investment, and public and private equity - through the lens of impact investing and sustainable finance. Students will gain insights into what financial resources and incentives are available to leverage for social change. Students will craft their own strategies to mobilize capital actors and institutions to support their target areas for social impact. Many of our sessions will touch on funding sources and approaches, but the Course should not be viewed primarily as a fundraising class, its scope is much more expansive.

Leadership in Public Service

This course is designed to amplify students' leadership capabilities as they prepare to leverage the knowledge gained in the program. Students will explore Adaptive Leadership (AL) concepts, surface real-world challenges, and discuss practical interventions so they leave with a sense of their own agency to facilitate change in teams, organizations, and communities. This course will include introductions to frameworks that will help students understand the dynamics of resistance to change and encourage self-reflection to identify their own blindspots and reveal their authentic leadership capacity. The goal is for students to cultivate an adaptive mindset that leads in community instead of in isolation in order to deliver lasting change.

Capstone

This course represents the culmination of the MPA students' academic journey, where theory meets practice, and learning transforms into action. The course integrates students’ experiential and classroom learning into a single project. Students work directly with a public sector or community-based partner (‘client’) on an organizational challenge to complete a complex, semester-long project that is of direct practical use to the client organization. This experience presents students with a real-world client management exercise to further develop and hone their analytical, communication and project management capabilities. 

Ofronama Biu
 is the Chief Economist and Senior Research Director at the Maven Collaborative. Her research interests include labor market and workforce development policies, wealth building, and racial and gender stratification in the economy. Professor Biu brings extensive experience in project management, program evaluation, partnership building, employer engagement, and direct service to participants. Previously, she was a principal research associate at the Urban Institute where she was part of the Building America’s Workforce team. As a senior research associate at the Building Movement Project, Professor Biu worked on national projects focused on leadership, including Race to Lead reports, service and social change, and movement building, as well as place-based projects in Detroit and New Mexico. She was also a senior research associate at the NYC Labor Market Information Service at the CUNY Graduate Center, where she directed research projects on trends impacting the social services and middle-skill healthcare workforce. Meanwhile, she has co-founded a nonprofit organization that connects youth to media professionals for skill-building and mentoring opportunities. Professor Biu holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the NYU College of Arts and Science and a Master in Public Administration (MPA) degree from the NYU Wagner School of Public Service and a PhD in Public and Urban Policy from The New School. 

Ryan Hallock
 teaches Program Evaluation. Since being honorably discharged from the U.S. Army, he has focused on helping nonprofit organizations build their monitoring and evaluation capacity, including at the World Federalist Movement and International Crisis Group. He currently works at Planned Parenthood Federation of America in the Research and Evaluation Department. Ryan holds an MPA from the City College of New York and an M.A. in program evaluation from Michigan State University.

Jeff Holland
teaches Public Budgeting and Finance. He worked in the Projections Unit of the Congressional Budgeting Office for 26 years, overseeing data compilation, writing, and production for a large part of CBO’s most widely read publications. He now serves as the Vice President of Research at the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, a non-partisan organization dedicated to addressing long-term fiscal challenges to ensure a better economic future. Professor Holland received his MS in Public Administration and Policy from Carnegie Mellon University and BA in Economics and Urban Studies from the University of Maryland.

Eric Horvath
 currently serves as vice president of community-engaged investing at Earlystone Management. He is also founder and principal at Untapped Capital Consulting and leads a program for labor pension fund trustees and responsible investing at Harvard Law School. Prior to that, he was the Director of Impact Investments at Common Future, a national nonprofit focused on eliminating the racial wealth gap and building an economy for all. Before Common Future, he worked at Transform Finance, where he launched several educational initiatives for activists, organizers and other social sector allies that explored paths for their communities to better engage with investments. Eric serves on the board and investment committee of the New York Foundation and the finance committee for the North Star Fund, New York City's social justice community foundation. He received his MBA from NYU, MPA from Syracuse and BA from Fordham. He calls Brooklyn home.

Lucy Joffe
 has worked in housing policy and as a leader in city government for more than a decade.  She has also worked as a housing attorney within the Office of General Counsel of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, as a legislative aide to New York City Council Member Dan Garodnick, and as an elementary and middle school English as a Second Language at P.S./I.S. 50 in East Harlem.  She is a former Teach for America corps member and Americorps member and serves on several nonprofit boards.  Lucy earned a J.D. from the New York University School of Law, an M.S. for Teachers from Pace University and a B.A. in sociology with a political science minor from the University of Michigan.

Janet Kyle
has more than 20 years of experience in the private, public, and non-profit sectors driving organizational change through strategic talent management. She holds a Master of Arts degree from The Johns Hopkins University, School of Advanced International Studies and a Master of Science degree from Pace University's School of Education. She teaches Strategic Human Resources Management.

Gara LaMarche
 is the former president of the Democracy Alliance (DA), providing overall leadership, strategic vision and management capacity for the organization. Prior to joining the Alliance, he served as Senior Fellow at New York University’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and previously, as President and CEO of the Atlantic Philanthropies. At Atlantic, he led the foundation’s efforts to embrace a social justice framework for grantmaking, and spearheaded the largest-ever grant made by a foundation for an advocacy campaign – over $25 million to press for comprehensive health care reform in the U.S. Before joining Atlantic in 2007, he served as Vice President and Director of U.S. Programs for the Open Society Foundations (OSF), launching the organization’s pivotal work on challenges to social justice and democracy in the United States. A longtime advocate for human rights at home and abroad, he has held various positions with Human Rights Watch, PEN American Center, and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Gara is also a frequent commentator on progressive issues in the news and has taught courses on philanthropy, public policy, and non-profit leadership.

Erin Malone
 has more than 20 years of experience in communications for nonprofits, unions, and foundations. She specializes in helping organizations transform their mission, vision, and aspirations into compelling stories that resonate with their audiences. Whether through message development, branding, content creation, media relations, or executive coaching, she works at the intersection of communications and organizational development to foster impactful change. Erin is also passionate about empowering teams with the skills and confidence to communicate effectively. In addition to strategic consulting, she offers customized communications training—tailored workshops and coaching sessions designed to enhance internal communications capabilities, improve media relations, and strengthen public speaking and crisis management skills. Erin aims to partner with organizations to craft strategic communications that amplify their voices and drive impact. Her approach is both straightforward and values-driven, grounded in a deep respect for the communities most affected by the work. She believes that powerful storytelling—coupled with radical imagination—can reshape our collective reality and spark transformation.

Shanelle Matthews
Shanelle Matthews collaborates with social justice activists, organizations, and campaigns to inspire action and build narrative power for social justice and liberation. She recently completed her tenure as the Movement for Black Lives communications director. She founded Radical Communicators Network (RadComms)—a global community of practice for social movement communications workers, and is a former faculty of Resistance Narratives at The New School. Shanelle is a Distinguished Lecturer at City College at the City University of New York. She is co-editor of a forthcoming anthology that details world-building narrative campaigns and strategies led by social movement communications workers in the 21st century.

Lakimja Mattocks 

brings over twenty years of leadership in the nonprofit sector and currently serves as Chief People and Culture Officer at LEAP. In addition to her primary role, she also partners with senior and emerging leaders as a strategic thought partner and coach, and works  with organizations to assess and co-create solutions to organizational design, culture and learning and development challenges. Prior to joining LEAP, Lakimja co-led Nonprofit New York’s internal racial equity work and how it was operationalized in our programs, specifically with the use of the Key Areas of Nonprofit Excellence. Additional roles in the sector include designing, managing, and facilitating cohort-based leadership programs as the Associate Director of Strategic Partnerships and Learning at Support Center and leading the Programs team as the Senior Program Director at Roads to Success. Lakimja has leaned into and leveraged professional certifications to build on her MPA from Baruch College, MS in Counseling from Long Island University and BA in Psychology and Criminal Justice from Temple University. She is active in her local community, through the New York Urban League and East Kings County Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. and is a regional leader with her undergraduate alma mater, Temple University. She is also an experienced coach, mentor, and facilitator.

Archana Menon
is a social impact consultant and facilitator with expertise in journalism, politics, and adaptive leadership. She specializes in fostering individual and organizational capacity to drive lasting social change. With diverse experience across diplomacy, civic leadership, marketing, and reporting, Archana excels in creating cross-sector partnerships and revenue-generating programs that align with mission-critical goals. Currently a Senior Consultant at Taproot Foundation, she manages key corporate partnerships, leads teams, and contributes to business development to enhance resource equity for mission-driven organizations. Previously, as Program Director at Coro New York Leadership Center, Archana led leadership development initiatives, coaching multi-sector change leaders and delivering transformative training sessions. A trained Adaptive Leadership facilitator licensed in Interpersonal Leadership Styles (ILS), Archana holds a BA in Journalism with a minor in Politics from Ithaca College and is an alum of the altMBA program.

Hannah Rosenberg
 holds a bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Vermont and a master’s degree in General Psychology from ��������. Since fall 2022, she has taught undergraduate and graduate courses in applied statistics, research methods, and interdisciplinary social sciences. Her research explores how structural conditions shape lived experience on both conscious and unconscious levels, particularly in the contexts of mental health, systemic inequality, and education. At the Social Mobility Lab and the Inequality and Mental Health Lab, she has contributed to mixed-methods projects examining student success, social class, and psychological well-being, with a focus on making research findings accessible and actionable. In the classroom, Hannah emphasizes the subjectivity of data interpretation and the ethical dimensions of research. She works to make quantitative reasoning more approachable, encouraging students to think critically about how knowledge and information are created and consumed.