Introduction
What do we do here in the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies?
Simply stated, the Andrew Young School strives to inform real-world policy by conducting research, educating policy makers, students, and citizens, and engaging in policy outreach. The School has always been founded on a rigorous, discipline-based research, with a special emphasis on significant policy involvement at local, national, and international levels. We have never seen ourselves as a traditional school, either in our mission or in the role of faculty. Our goal is to be one of the best policy schools in the country, by taking our research and using it to improve real-world decision making in the policy arena – by governments, private enterprises, and non-profit organizations.
Are we successful in our efforts?
A quick look at our Annual Reports over the last dozen years demonstrates that this vision, in combination with the gifted leadership of our founding dean, Roy Bahl, has brought great success in a short period of time: a strong publication record in scholarly and practitioner outlets, extensive policy involvement from departments and centers, large graduate programs, a new building, substantial success in raising external funds, high visibility within Georgia State University… the list of accomplishments goes on and on. By any metric, we have had remarkable success.
Do others share this belief?
Well, we have increasing “external” evidence of our success. The U.S. News & World Report, in its most recent ranking of public affairs programs, placed us 27th overall of 269 schools nationally. In our flagship area of public finance and budgeting, the School was ranked 5th in the U.S., and in several of our other main fields of concentration – city management and urban policy, nonprofit management, public policy analysis – we were in the top 20 of all programs. Faculty in our Department of Public Administration and Urban Studies consistently are ranked among the very top tier of productive scholars. As for our Department of Economics, a recent article in the Southern Economic Journal ranked 129 Ph.D. granting economics departments in 17 subfields, based on scholarly productivity over the previous 20 years. Overall, our Department of Economics ranked 50th. And it ranked considerably higher in several subfields within economics: 8th in urban and regional economics, 11th in public economics, 14th in general economics, 16th in history of thought, 20th in resource economics, and 23rd in labor economics. All of this speaks to our growing national reputation as a policy school.
This Annual Report provides the basis for these external recognitions, and gives the many details behind these many accomplishments.
Our enrollments are strong. We taught 10,000 students in our classes in 2007, more than at any other time in our history, and these students show a remarkable diversity: 52 percent of our students are women, 52 percent are minority (African American, Hispanic, or Asian), and 30 percent of our graduate students are from other countries.
Our faculty scholarship is also impressive. Last year, our faculty and research associates published 291 papers and books, presented at over 238 professional meetings and conferences, both domestic and international events, edited 11 journals, served on the editorial advisory boards of 27 others, and refereed for over 105 different journals.
Our departments are large and growing. Just this last year, eight new faculty members were hired in the two departments – and this happened at a time when many departments around the country were actually shrinking in size.
Our research centers are engaged in a booming business in policy analysis. The Georgia Health Policy Center is the advisor of choice on many matters of state and national health policy, ranging from rural health to health care financing to children’s policy. The Fiscal Research Center informs virtually all aspects of the State of Georgia's fiscal policy, and its research now extends well beyond the borders of the state. The Experimental Economics Center is the pre-eminent experimental center in the South. The Nonprofit Studies Program has been the driving force behind our growing national reputation in nonprofit management, as shown by our top 20 U.S. News & World Report ranking. The Public Performance and Management group continues to help a wide range of state and local government administrators strengthen strategic and operational performance. The International Studies Program worked in over 40 countries in 2007, providing research, technical assistance, and training in support of sound public policies. These research centers worked with a “stock” of $36 million in research money. Indeed, for every dollar that we received from the University, we raised one dollar from external funds, and most all of this came through the research centers.
Reading about all of these accomplishments in our 2007 Annual Report, I am very proud to be the dean of a school with such distinguished and hardworking colleagues. And I know that things will only continue to get better.
James Alm
Dean
June 6, 2008