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Curriculum: International Policy and Development

The MA in International Policy and Development (IPD) is a 42-credit program that can be completed in 12 months or 16 months.

Start Credits Practicum Second Language Program Chair
August or January 42 Required Optional Scott Pulizzi

Learning Goals

The International Policy and Development curriculum is based on distinct learning goals that provide students with an in-depth knowledge of policy processes and systems in a variety of contexts. Review the IPD learning goals.

Requirements

Core Course Work

Economics (3 credits)

Research Methods and Qualitative Data Analysis (3 credits)

Development/Policy (3 credits)

Quantitative Data Analysis (3 credits)

Language Studies and Intercultural Competence

You will take content courses in a second language and/or courses in intercultural competence.

Sample language studies courses:

  • Arab-African Relations (in Arabic)
  • Citizenship, Security, and Development in Latin America (in Spanish)
  • Challenges in Peacebuilding—Congo (in French)

Sample intercultural competence courses:

  • Intercultural Group Dynamics: explore why global and multicultural teams often struggle and conversely how you can manage diverse teams to outperform homogenous groups.
  • Communication in Multicultural Settings: gain the knowledge and tools needed for effective participation in multilingual and multicultural communication as you examine the related social, cultural, and linguistic factors.

You may use electives to take additional language studies and/or intercultural competence courses.

Practicum

Your final semester practicum can be completed in-person or remotely, allowing you to transition to your preferred location before you graduate and gain professional experience in a context that closely aligns with your career goals. Learn more.

Electives

You may use electives to take additional language studies and/or intercultural competence courses, career-related module courses, specialization courses, and/or courses from other degree programs (assuming prerequisites met).

Projected Course Availability

This table outlines anticipated offerings for the coming two academic years. Please note that the projected course availability may be subject to change at any time, and, depending on the circumstances, the Institute may not be able to provide advance notice of changes. 

Enrolled students should consult the Course Schedule for course dates, times, and locations for the current and upcoming semester. Degree maps for enrolled students are provided via Canvas through the “Front Desk” site.

  • Offered in:
    FA25 SP26 FA26 SP27
    offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course is a guided introduction to conceptualizing problems and making sense of quantitative information in the policy sphere. The course begins by introducing the theory and practice of policy analysis. The stages of the public policy process and methods for structuring policy inquiry are introduced to provide a means for deconstructing policy problems and asking relevant and practical questions in a policy context. Next the class is introduced to how such questions are addressed using quantitative tools. Topics to be covered include sampling, estimation, hypothesis testing, analysis of variance, and regression techniques. This will basically be a primer on applying inferential statistics to policy problems. The course will also include introductory training in the use of innovative statistical software, as well as Excel statistical functions.
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course introduces students to the politics of development, its contemporary debates, agencies and issue-areas. Development is a contested concept and practice that originates from the exercise of power, which is at the core of politics. Governments, International Organizations (IO), Non Governmental Organizations (NGO), and other social actors within Civil Society, have kept alive and thriving the debate on the best development practices that can better the lives of billions of individuals. It is a debate that takes place at multiple spatial and socio-political contexts, within and beyond the institutions of the state, yet its concrete outcomes are located within the boundaries of a specific state, or group of states. It is often assumed that states and societies share common development goals, this is far from being the case, as the key ideas, agencies and practices of development are shaped within domestic and international political systems where political and economic power are far from being distributed equally. Such unequal distribution of power is even greater between states with different levels, or models, of development. Today the economic and political gains from the dominant model of development are also far from being distributed equally. For these reasons it is fundamental that future practitioners recognize the limits and reaches of development models, as these are intricately related to how political power is conceptualized, exercised and distributed through a wide range of social contexts at domestic and international levels.
  • Offered in:
    FA25
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    Complex social problems are beyond the capacity of any single organization – or sector — to solve. Their sheer intractability suggests that we need new ways of both understanding the problems themselves and imagining solutions that span across the public, private, and non-profit sectors. This course will look at one such intractable problem – the fact that a very large percentage of workers in the United States do not come close to earning a living wage – and unpack the multiple reasons for this and the harms to society that this situation creates. The course will then challenge students to identify pathways forward towards achieving a society in which all workers receive a living wage. Learners will master tools and approaches for power, institutional, and hegemonic analysis; acquire knowledge about the actions needed to bring together odd bedfellows (organizations/sectors that do not normally work together); gain understanding of what a true living wage is in the US and how to calculate it; and will build a sophisticated understanding regarding how structural social change actually happens…vs. how we may wish it happens.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 FA26
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course provides a multidimensional introduction to international trade policy. The course is structured to provide students with a thorough understanding of the political economy of trade and the ever-evolving nature of policy issues that are confronted by those engaged in international trade. Its purpose is to provide students with an understanding of international trade economics, rules, politics and institutions, and the major policy issues facing the global trading system. The course begins with an exploration of the theories of international political economy, the rationales for free trade & protection, the distributional impact of trade, and the challenges presented by deeper international economic integration. The course then considers the World Trade Organization (WTO). It explores negotiation mechanisms and principles, and the rules relating to market access, dispute settlement, fair trade, safeguards and trade-related intellectual property (TRIPs). The final section considers major issues facing the global trading system. These include regional trading arrangements, foreign investment, labor standards, trade and environment and the implication of the current global financial crisis on international trade.
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course offers you a meaningful learning opportunity to understand what it takes for organizations - a group of people with a shared goal – to work together and get things done. This presupposes a good understanding of human motivation and drivers of behavior and how to problem solve and make decisions in complex situations. These also happen to be the highest ranked among the 21stcentury skills. To learn about how organizations operate and how to lead them effectively, we will use readings, exercises, and case studies among other learning methods. In addition, you will engage in analysis, diagnosis, and problem-solving exercises focusing on one organization of your choice.
  • Offered in:
    SP26
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    In this course, students will learn to recognize the predisposing factors of a financial crisis and policy options for optimal financial crisis management by looking at historical case studies. But first, we will look at how the ForEx (foreign exchange) market works, who are the different players, how are typical transactions structured, different exchange rate regimes (e.g. pegs, crawling bands, free floats, monetary union), factors influencing exchange rate determination, balance of payments, and sovereign debt sustainability. Students will parse multiple financial crises from both emerging markets and OECD economies. In addition to readings related to cases, students will also have regular reading assignments of current events.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 FA26
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course introduces students to the field of International Development as well as the key ideas, major debates and politics that inform its theoretical and practical boundaries. The first section of the course covers the theoretical debates around the intricate connections between economic, social and political development. The remaining sections discuss specific issue areas, such as globalization, human rights, human security, gender equity, and ideas of sustainable development. The purpose of this course is to provide students with a general and critical understanding of the field of International Development and an opportunity to begin to narrow down their own interests. It is organized by in-class discussions and the screening of documentary films with a strong focus on alternative approaches and social justice. As it is a course geared towards future practitioners and policy experts in development, the key assignments are focused on acquiring strong analytical tools accompanied by persuasion and influencing skills.
  • Offered in:
    SP26
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course looks at both the theory and practice of international trade for trade practitioners, commercial diplomats, and corporate officers. Topics include analysis of the gains and costs from free trade and the effects both of installing and removing barriers to trade such as tariffs, quotas, subsidies, and other instruments of commercial policy. Institutional frameworks for international trade – including regional trade agreements and the World Trade Organization – are addressed as well as the economic impact of globalization. This course strengthens students’ ability to conduct and interpret basic economic analysis at the national, industry, and firm level. The course blends theory and practical analytical skills to focus on application of those skills to specific public policy issues.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 FA26
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course provides an introduction to budgeting and financial and financial analysis in governmental and nongovernmental organizations. Topics to be covered include budget systems; improved management of resources; budgetary decision making including the activities of allocating, using, and accounting for resources, and activities associated with securing resources. The course will help to maximize organizations’ potential for mission impact and results, specifically focusing on measuring organizational performance and financial stewardship in terms of impact, performance budgets, and accountability. Students will also learn economics concepts that support budgetary and financial decision making, and practical financial management tools to improve stewardship among nonprofit and government managers and leaders.
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course and associated lab provide participants with instruction in three core trade law compliance disciplines: Trade Law Compliance (International and Domestic), Compliance with Import Procedures, and Compliance with Export Procedures. It will also provide participants with practical, hands-on training in dealing with real-world problems or simulations that give them the opportunity to apply what they have learned and thereby reinforce what they have learned during the instruction period(s). It will provide participants with many of the requisite practical skills necessary to meet a growing need for professionals who possess the requisite background and skills to guide corporations and government agencies through the myriad of laws and regulations dealing with international and domestic trade law compliance. In addition to learning and applying practical skills, participants will be able to participate in long-term research and writing projects to support demands from industry and government for analyses of trade compliance issues.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 FA26
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course will provide students with an introduction to the primary international rules, regimes and organizations governing international trade and international investment. By understanding the principles of international trade law and how it is applied through a treaty regime developed to monitor and enforce international trade law, students will gain an appreciation of the crucial role these that international trade law and its enforcement play in shaping and determining the flow of international trade and investment. Students will gain an understanding of the specific rules and regulations that govern international trade and how those rules and regulations are applied and enforced. Students will gain practical experience in applying these rules and regulations to real world international trade disputes in order to gain an appreciation of the process involved in resolving these disputes. As a result, students should be able to determine whether or not a particular state’s action(s) is (are) a violation of an international trade regulation and more importantly, how a trade dispute arising from an alleged violation(s) is resolved.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 SP26 FA26 SP27
    offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course introduces students to the skills and concepts at the core of a dynamic and rapidly developing interdisciplinary field. Network analytic tools focus on the relationships between nodes (e.g., individuals, groups, organizations, countries, etc.). We analyze these relationships to uncover or predict a variety of important factors (e.g., the potential or importance of various actors, organizational vulnerabilities, potential subgroups, the need for redundancy, social and economic ties, growth within a network, …). Although the security field has received the greatest amount of recent attention (covert or terrorist networks), these tools can offer valuable insight into a variety of disciplines. The combination of – often stunning – visual analytic techniques with more quantitative measures accounts for much of the increasing worldwide popularity of this field.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 FA26
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    Is global inequality increasing or decreasing? Experts differ on the right answer to that straightforward question. In this course, students will explore various concepts of economic inequality, including a consideration of measurement and data issues. The course will review key theories of the relationship between economic inequality and economic development, including the causes and consequences of inequality levels. Student’s work will include group projects, written and oral communication, and reading of a variety of technical and non-technical texts. The course, which satisfies either of the Development Paradigms or the Economics requirement, will be offered in-person and will be accessible to remote learners.
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course will introduce you to the methods of effective program management, drawing on analytics and implementation science. We will look at program management through the lens of different social sectors and development priorities. This course is designed to deepen your analytical abilities so that you can better understand the complexity of program implementation, place programs and policies in context, and understand how interventions interact and affect stakeholders. And, we will develop your managerial skills so that you can translate evidence to effective practice.
  • Offered in:
    SP26
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    Students will learn how to conduct a rigorous public education campaign by working with the local non-profit organization, Gathering for Women. The class will work with the organization’s leadership to advance the local public’s understanding the issue of homelessness in Monterey County, especially how it affects women.
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course provides a deep exploration of the intricate relationship between climate change, development, and migration. It offers through an interdisciplinary approach a comprehensive understanding of the multifaceted challenges and opportunities presented by climate-induced displacement. In this course, students will not only review the latest research in the field but also actively engage in the process of translating these findings into actionable solutions for addressing urgent policy challenges.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 FA26
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    Developing effective programs and successful proposals requires professionals to achieve a thorough understanding of the evidence base. Often, social change and human development initiatives operate in isolation, with the lessons-learned confined to donor reports, episodic webinars, and academic publications. A systematic review is an applied research method that pulls together related individual outputs, and through structured synthesis and interpretation, advances the research base to inform decision-making and evidence-informed programs and proposals.
  • Offered in:
    FA25
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This hands-on course focuses on analysis of qualitative data. “Qualitative data”, refers to interview, focus group, written reports and visual records; hundreds of pages of them. Qualitative data sets will be provided, as there is no time in this short course to engage in primary data collection. Our entire focus will be on a) deciding how to interrogate the data (what is it you wish to know, demonstrate, reveal, test?), b) developing code books and coding, c) inter-coder reliability, and d) a wide variety of analytical approaches you can use, once you have qualitative data reduced and organized. This course emphasizes the importance of learning-through-doing, making mistakes, and collaborative analysis (qualitative inquiry is almost always improved through collaboration). Your final product will be a written analysis that summarizes your findings.
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    Indo-Pacific is a dynamic region of great importance by virtue of its population size, economic dynamism, and political and security challenges. The region is characterized by diversity in historical, civilizational, and ethno-cultural backgrounds, political systems, levels of economic development, and foreign relations, as well as global impact, making regional relations very complex and their management very difficult. This course will examine a broad range of foreign policy, trade, and (human) security issues that present both opportunities and challenges to the regional countries and the United States. The United States and China stand at the center of the security and development dynamic in Indo-Pacific. What policy moves they adopt in the region will have a profound regional and global influence. This course aims to help students gain an understanding of the state of security issues and development challenges in Indo-Pacific today. Following a brief discussion of Cold War security structures, history and memory, we will then focus on three current policy areas: security challenges in Indo-Pacific, economic development and regional integration and non-traditional security issues such as energy security, migration and environment. This course will engage a diverse array of approaches including a simulation of South China Sea dispute settlement, encouraging students to explore different levels of analysis and paradigmatic approaches to understanding this critical region in global political economy.
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    Public sector has been lagging behind others in innovating its services and the ways it operates, makes, and implements policies. Meanwhile social challenges it is expected to tackle are increasing in scale and complexity. To remain relevant and effective, leading public organizations from around the world have been applying innovative methods with promising outcomes. This course helps students learn and synthesize cutting edge social innovations and methods, and apply them to real life local projects. The innovation skills and knowledge from this course can be applied to other sectors and interventions.
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    In this course, student teams will work on a consulting project with actual clients, including local government and nonprofits. This course will provide an opportunity for students to develop and reinforce core skills applicable to a range of different careers, including communicating and managing relationships with peers and clients, team effectiveness, engaging in systematic inquiry, synthesizing information from various sources, ideating, and developing solutions tailored for a given situation. The course helps students apply and integrate insights and tools from organizational development, applied research methods, design thinking, and systems thinking.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 FA26
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    In the context of a more integrated yet unequal global economic system, of growing international and national security concerns, humanitarian crises and skill shortages, migration and immigration have become central to economic, political and social debates. This seminar is meant to engage in these debates by studying the intricate links between the ever increasing flows of peoples across borders; the national and international security dilemmas facing states and regions; and the urgent need to fully implement and redefine the international and domestic laws pertaining to Human Rights.
  • Offered in:
    SP26
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    Since 1944 (Bretton Woods creation), the international community has touted ‘partnership’ and ‘collaboration’ as essential to ‘development.’ These ideas actually have a deeper history, and are, in the most part, exquisitely colonial. This class updates these ideas to 2025, and will parse both a) long standing failures that we keep repeating and b) wildly wonderful emerging ideas/practices that few grad students are being taught.
  • Offered in:
    FA25
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    Focuses on strategic negotiation in a setting advocating and implementing complex public policy in an intense political environment. It relies heavily on critical analysis of conflicts and problems-solving strategies that lead to agreements. Builds on a behavioral studies foundation. In particular it begins with the neuro-science of effective communication, the psychology of negotiating, and moves quickly to value-building and problem-solving exercises. The course highlights cross-cultural, gender and cross-generational differences; and the hard-nosed tactics of creating and claiming value from ‘the deal.’
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This course takes various forms, ranging from regular (legal) and irregular (illegal) migration, refugees and asylum-seekers, internally displaced persons (IDP), human trafficking and people smuggling, unskilled and skilled labor to temporary and permanent residency. Migration issues range from migrants’ rights, national and human security implications to economic and social impacts in sending and receiving countries. Moreover, immigration policies are the result of domestic forces, including inter and intra-institutional power dynamics, public opinion, national identity considerations, partisan struggles, social and economic requirements, demographic and population changes, national security, and foreign policy. This seminar will focus on the different factors and categories of migration and the state policies that manage and control migration flows. Each student will develop a comparative analysis of two countries’ immigration policies that share similar policy challenges. The research will include a description of the shared policy challenges with a policy analysis of the similarities, differences, and effectiveness of their migration policies.
  • Offered in:
    SP26
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    Many of the problems that students at MIIS want to work on are structural, complex (meaning non-linear), have long success horizons (i.e., no 1-5 year project can truly solve them), and are only partially amenable to standard approaches and methodologies for assessing impact. Indeed, the difficulty of “measuring” structural progress in things like racial, economic, gender, and climate justice incentivizes projects and programs with short time spans, highly quantified “outputs” and “outcomes” which can be successful during their life spans but frequently fail to produce long-term impacts. Our class will a) unpack the reasons for a reliance on project modalities in social development work (spoiler: it’s not because donors or public officials or NGO leaders are stupid), and b) introduce learners – at a conceptual level – to 8 approaches to assessing impact in complex, nonlinear, emergent contexts, approaches that can help us avoid “dumbing down” projects to measuring that which can be quantified, or counted.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 FA26
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This seminar introduces participants to a variety of monitoring, evaluation, adapting, and learning (MEAL) approaches that are used by public sector and nongovernmental professionals in organizations engaged in social change and human development work. We will engage with the meaning, perspectives, and methods of evaluation, as well as power dynamics that influence the profession. This includes choosing designs appropriate to the stages of a program cycle, identifying and meaningfully engaging different stakeholders through participatory approaches, collecting data that is most useful to stakeholders, monitoring implementation, understanding causality, appreciating the limits of what can be measured through evaluation techniques, upholding ethics in evaluation, and using information generated through evaluations to improve programs and policies and to promote organizational learning. Seminar participants will review and critique evaluations of social and human development projects sponsored by foundations, civil society organizations, governments, and multilateral agencies. The course concludes with participants presenting an original monitoring, evaluation, adapting, and learning plan where they apply critical seminar concepts to a project of their choice developed iteratively over the semester.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 FA26
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    Are economic and social development legitimate concerns of global governance for developing countries? This course identifies the critical issues and challenges of global development policy in a highly interdependent world and formulates policy responses to them. The policy areas that we will study include trade, financial stability, development financing, sustainable development, foreign investment, intellectual property rights, global data governance and climate Change mitigation. This graduate seminar provides a conceptual overview and empirical illustrations of the foundations of, and negotiated changes in, global development policy. The course combines lectures, class discussions, group projects, role-playing negotiation simulations, and student presentations.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 FA26
    offered in: FA25
    not offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    not offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    TBD
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    This class builds on Data Analysis for Public Policy and covers advanced topics commonly used in very diverse areas of policy analysis, specifically data reduction techniques (factor analysis) and non-linear models (logistic regression). The course also includes minor sections on data manipulation, formatting of raw data (flat, text files); databases; and proprietary data formats.
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    The timeliness of the topic at the national and global scale matches by its political, economic, and social relevance. The sustainability of urban areas is assailed by a combination of threats never seen before. At a time when—for the 1st time in history—more than 50% of humans reside in cities, the discussion of these topics is unavoidable. Those looming threats demand multidisciplinary approaches both to understand them better and to provide sensible solutions that mitigate the negative effects while amplifying the potential benefits. This class addresses those dimensions (economic, social, environmental, and political) as well as their interactions; it offers a framework under which the potential or already observed impacts are quantified and analyzed; and it surveys the policies implemented around the world. Although there are no explicit pre-requisites, students must have a cursory understanding of economics and basic quantitative analytics.
  • Offered in:
    SP26 SP27
    not offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    not offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    It is often said economics has become more important than ever in today’s international relations, yet we work with much less than full understanding of what goes on when government negotiators bargain over trade, finance, data, labor, state-owned enterprises, services sector, agriculture, intellectual property rights, e-commerce, fisheries subsidy and the rules-making in free trade agreements and investment treaties. The process of trade and economic negotiation shapes the world political economy. This essential process can be better understood and practiced with the role-playing simulations of the ongoing trade and economic negotiations. The purpose of this course is to explore the challenges confronting international trade and economic policies, as well as to consider current negotiations designed to address these circumstances. The approach will be interdisciplinary and will focus on political, economic, and legal considerations. What happens in these negotiations? What determines their outcomes? Could the negotiators do better? This seminar concentrates on this ubiquitous process of international negotiation over trade and economic issues and helps students launch original research on this subject. This course is designed to help improve your skill as a negotiator, while you learn more about bargaining theory in the context of global political economy. It offers a conceptual framework to help you diagnose most bargaining situations. It begins simply and adds complications one at a time. You will practice applying these ideas through in-class role-playing simulations on real-world trade and economic negotiations.
  • Offered in:
    FA25 SP26 FA26 SP27
    offered in: FA25
    offered in: SP26
    offered in: FA26
    offered in: SP27

    Course Description

    While undertaking an approved professional practicum in their field, students will be responsible for completion of an applied project demonstrating your application of degree program learning goals and the project’s connection to your professional community of practice. Practicum is a learning opportunity that enables you to demonstrate, integrate, apply, deepen, and reflect on the core competencies of your degree(s). This course is the culmination of your degree and provides you with the opportunity to apply knowledge and skills developed in public policy and administration. Students will propose, design, and implement an applied project for a host organization, client, or research community that covers program-specific thematic and technical competencies. (e.g. learning goals for MPA, IPD and ITED) and apply higher-level reasoning, critical thinking and intercultural competence/JEDI knowledge to analyze findings and develop recommendations. Students in the course will present their project to a professional audience and to the MIIS community. The course involves collaboration with peers, faculty, and industry professionals and critical reflection on interpersonal development, the practicum experience, and the student’s professional goals. Students will complete one of the following projects: (1) An applied project benefiting the intern’s host organization; (2) a consultancy project for a partner organization; or (3) independent qualitative and/or quantitative research project