State & Hill

Matt Naud, environmental coordinator for the city of Ann Arbor, talks environmental innovation   Fourteen years ago, the City of Ann Arbor launched a new commission on the environment. The group would report annually on the state of the...

Two wars dominated the presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson. One was the war in Vietnam, whose escalation in 1964 triggered more than a decade of combat in Southeast Asia and discontent at home. The other was a wide-ranging package of social legislation...

In the face of modern day challenges, from HIV/AIDS to climate change, we are better positioned than ever to help communities kindle change where it is most needed. Carrie Hessler-Radelet, director of the Peace Corps, “Peace Corps in the 21st...

By Miriam Wasserman Jordan Matsudaira, PhD alum, stays second year to work as chief staff economist for President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers Only a very small number of economists get to work for the Council of Economic Advisers....

By Erin Spanier   In the 1950s, a half-dozen African nations had won their independence. In 1960, more than a dozen others followed. It wasn’t long before these new nation-states would send their top diplomats to Washington, DC to present their...

By Jeff Mortimer In the present, John Chamberlin is teaching an undergraduate course on U.S. inequality, even though he’s officially retired. In the past, he taught statistics, and values and ethics in public policy, and led the launch of the...

The New England Journal of Medicine published John Ayanian’s report on the first 100 days of the Healthy Michigan Plan, Michigan’s expansion of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. The plan is a good blueprint for other Republican-governed states...

We kicked off our Next Century Campaign as part of our Centennial Reunion celebrations. Here, two members of our development team, Dan Ginis and Sonia Gill, talk about our alumni campaign. S&H: Set the stage: what are our alumni campaign goals?...

Jennifer Niggemeier, director of graduate career services and alumni relations, and Elisabeth Johnston, alumni relations manager, sit down with State & Hill to preview The Centennial Reunion (October 31 – November 1, 2014). S&H: A centennial...

This year, Sheldon H. Danziger took a leave of absence to serve as the tenth president of the Russell Sage Foundation, the premier foundation devoted exclusively to social science research. With great happiness for him, and an equal measure of...

The spring 2014 edition of State & Hill magazine features a ten-page, photo-rich historical timeline highlighting the history of America's first graduate-level training program in public administration. The Ford School is now preparing a longer,...

[Make a contribution to the Burns Fund for Water Policy Education] Eunice Burns (MPA '70) holds up a photograph taken at her 90th birthday celebration. It's of her children—Catherine's the oldest; then there's Laurie, Robert, and Tamara. In the...

In an era of shrinking public education budgets, school districts cannot afford to make the wrong decision when they hire a teacher or cut a program. To make sure they reach the right answers, administrators are turning to Annenberg Professor Brian...

Public protests were common; drugs and riots weren't uncommon; and crowds of young people spent their summers in tents on city grounds - no jobs, no parents, no plans - simply because Ann Arbor was a happening place to be. "It was a very different...

In the summer of 1967, James B. Hudak (MPP '71) watched Detroit burn. He was between his sophomore and junior years as an undergraduate at Yale. A friend got him a summer job working the night shift at a Chrysler assembly plant in Detroit. He lived...

A woman in Cambodia recently released more than 1,000 photographs of people imprisoned by the Khmer Rouge—the genocidal Democratic Kampuchea regime that ruled the country from 1975–79. She had worked in the regime's prison system and, fearing...

People collaborate—it's what we do. We work together to tackle big problems. We work together to achieve big goals. We give favors, in hopes that they'll be reciprocated. We look out for each other, in hopes that someone else will look out for us in...

Being ladylike does not require silence There are photos and movies of Betty Ford in her family home from the 1960s. They show a caring homemaker and mother, busy looking after her husband and four young children in their suburban Virginia home....

It was the summer of 1971 when the first mandated round of redistricting was taking place across the nation. A series of Supreme Court decisions in the '60s had directed states to create new legislative districts every ten years to reflect...

State & Hill's Winter 2012 issue offers readers an opportunity to learn about the wide array of education reform and policy issues that our students, alumni, and faculty are tackling right now. Click through the magazine below to read about Susan M....

Whether we believe in charter schools or harbor our reservations, the fact remains that they're a vital part of our nation's education landscape. Today, some 5,000 charters across America enroll 1.6 million children, and those numbers are increasing...

New course takes students and faculty to China to study contemporary policy Ford School Assistant Professor Philip Potter developed a new course last spring that introduced MPP students to contemporary Chinese public policy in a rather...

With the last of U.S. troops exiting Iraq after nearly nine years, many veterans will be coming home and taking on new challenges—some, perhaps, in public policy. Earlier this semester, State & Hill spoke with a group of veterans in the MPP and MPA...

The 2011 Class Giving Campaign—"One Ford. One Community. One Pledge." —has ended with tremendous results, raising a total of $13,903 for the Graduate and Undergraduate Annual Funds. Nearly 76 percent of graduating MPP/MPA students participated in...

Across the nation, cities have been pioneers in restricting restaurant and workplace smoking, and making it harder for children to acquire cigarettes. As a political scientist, Professor Chuck Shipan’s work seeks to understand how these policies...

When students, staff, and faculty members at the Ford School take a seat, it's Jim Hackett (BGS '77) they should thank. A general studies major who played center on the football team under Bo Schembechler, Hackett never took a class on public...

John D. Ciorciari is an Assistant Professor of Public Policy. His interests include public international law, the theory and practice of international relations, and international finance. His current research projects focus primarily on Asia and...

Frank Szollosi (Annenberg Intern) came to the Ford School to 'sharpen his policy chops.' He joined the MPP class of 2010 with experience as a congressional press secretary, a political consultant, and a seven-year member of the Toledo City...