Kathy Quick, who will join the Humphrey School this fall as an assistant professor of leadership, is interested in building individual and organizational potential for solving public problems.

Quick originally trained in ecology and environmental affairs, earning a Master of City Planning degree from the University of California-Berkeley and a doctorate in planning, policy, and design from the University of California-Irvine. She worked in the environmental movement in Indonesia for several years between her master's and Ph.D. degrees, which gave her the opportunity to observe the intersection of environmental planning and development.

Quick has seen some more successful--and less successful-- models of civic engagement and public leadership over the years.

"I worked a as a stringer for the local newspaper when I was in college [at Swarthmore] and I was stunned by the lack of leadership at the local level in that part of rural Pennsylvania. Some of the cities had such dysfunctional responses to problems," she says.

By contrast, the city of Grand Rapids, Michigan--which was the subject of Quick's dissertation--"has made persistent and successful attempts to engage citizens in creating solutions together, which has helped the city weather a lot of hard times."

But, even in a city with a strong commitment to civic engagement, some efforts turn out better than others. Based on hundreds of interviews with senior government managers, political leaders, and community members, Quick has compared several efforts to engage the citizenry, including the management of a citywide environmental master planning effort, a process to address neighborhood gentrification conflict, city budgeting choices, and organization of a major new international art competition in Grand Rapids.

Her dissertation focused on what she describes as "inclusive public leadership practices," which are practices that facilitate adaptive community change through involving a broad array of public and private sectors to address public issues. She found that the inclusive nature of leadership generated several positive impacts, such as facilitating new connections among people and issues that produce new ways of seeing and addressing problems; generating additional resources to address problems; enhancing leadership; and strengthening buy-in and capacity for ongoing engagement and implementation of related policies and programs.

Quick says that she is excited about her move to the Twin Cities and to the Humphrey School.

"Irvine is lovely, but I am ready for some real city living," she says.

The classroom may be the most exciting place for Quick of all. "I have been impressed by Humphrey students--their energy, their enthusiasm--at conferences. Meeting them has confirmed that. This really is a very outward-looking institution, and I welcome that."

Aided by the Humphrey School's information technology team and a grant from the University's Digital Media Center, Sandfort set out to leverage the power of technology to turn written case studies into interactive, multimedia experiences for students.

"By providing information in multimedia formats, students experience the problem and potential solutions unfolding in ways that much more closely approximate the complexities of practice," says Sandfort. "It's as if they are really there, in the situation."

The goal of the enhanced case studies is to help students learn the role of nonprofit organizations, define and analyze difficult problems, understand the ramifications of policy decisions, and use accessible analytical tools to arrive at solutions.

In Sandfort's first case, students are presented with information about a complex public policy problem: predatory lending practices. Some national tax preparers subvert earned income tax credits into "refund anticipation" loans. These tax credits are meant to compensate low-wage workers, but end up costing them much more in high interest rates.

Students assume the role of the executive director of a small nonprofit firm that provides free tax preparation to low-income citizens. They navigate their way through the process of solving the problem, considering potential avenues to expand their services.

The students make these leadership decisions based on multimedia tools-video interviews with key stakeholders, audio segments with photographs, and reports around relevant topics. All of these tools help them understand the assets and limitations of the organization and choose possible solutions to maximize the impact it could have.

When it comes time to implement their decisions, each student's individual outcome is documented as part of a final report that he or she evaluates with the instructor.

"The tools also require that students articulate why they made the decisions they did about how to proceed," Sandfort says. "This forces them to make their 'hunches' more explicit and ground them in analysis."

Although still in nascent phases, Sandfort already is evaluating the multimedia case study's effectiveness. "We are focused on evaluating student learning outcomes with this tool," she says. "Not just compared to traditional, written case studies, but also the possibility that this will change the way students learn."

This cycle of awards, together with the recently released Local Government Innovation and Redesign Guide, are part of PNLC's mission to enhance the ability nonprofit, philanthropic, and public sector organizations to work together--and with the private sector--to advance the common good and serve the public interest.

This year's awards focus on service redesign. Winners were selected for innovative work that integrated redesign strategies, such as creating greater accountability; using incentives, charges, and targeting; funding consumers; and other innovative strategies.

The winners are:

Anoka County Emergency Management adopted a staffing system similar to what is used by the majority of fire departments to achieve needed staff enhancement for the department. When the 'call' goes out, these paid on-call staff member come to provide quick and effective support to the department. This system is a first for Minnesota and potentially the country.

Anoka County Human Services has shifted from a court-centered, no-risk model in addressing child protection issues to a safety model, with impressive results. The county has witnessed a turnaround in recidivism and skyrocketing out-of-home placement costs in just two years. Costs dropped $1,117,000 over two years. The number of children in placement fell 27 percent. Best of all, families are better served. Trained staff work with the families, focusing on their strengths and building plans that focus on child safety.

Bloomington School District shared the goal of reducing the 35 percent dropout rate in Hennepin Country with Hennepin County Juvenile Court, the Bloomington, Brooklyn Center and Intermediate 287 schools districts; and TIES. A new process for school districts to share real-time, online information with juvenile court services about student attendance, academic performance and behavior is increasing student accountability and reducing at-risk behaviors, as well as saving staff time previously spent collecting information that is not available instantly.

Cloquet Area Fire District, City of Cloquet, Perch Lake Township, City of and Scanlon, Fond du Lac Indian Reservation began a collaborative provision of fire and EMS services. Perch Lake Township and the City of Cloquet started with a joint powers agreement for fire and EMS, which led to work at the legislature in 2009 with the Special Taxing District Language. A contract with the sovereign nation of Fond du Lac was signed for fire suppression in 2010 and the City of Scalon in 2011. The Incident Command System now has 58 fire personnel working out of three stations, which has saved $250,000 and improved service to all area citizens.

City of Rosemount Parks and Recreation wanted to do something to bring people together to focus on a common goal of bettering the community. They chose to reinforce a sense of community by collaborating, publicizing, and focusing efforts to promote one book title to the residents of Rosemount to promote literacy. They worked to involve community leaders, schools, churches, families, and teens by choosing a book that would have intergenerational appeal.

Crow Wing County Sanity Landfill took advantage of Landfill Gas (LFG) generation and voluntarily installed an active gas collecting and control system for energy recovery and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This concept of collection LFG for benefit through enhanced generation via leachate recirculation is referred to as Recirculation to Energy (RTE). Collected LFG is sent to a heat recovery boiler. The boiler is used to heat both a maintenance shop and a heavy equipment storage building onsite.

Lake Country Service Cooperative built upon a proven 25-year history of providing shared services and examined the possibility of providing financial services with tremendous quality while maintaining value. LCSC now provides financial management and assistance to several school districts and other nonprofit entities. These services range from full scale financial management for three school districts (Perham-Dent, Hawley and Cambell-Tintah) to payroll, grant management, fiscal hosting, and a number of other temporary services for their members.

Maplewood Parks and Recreation, together with the City of North St. Paul, signed a Joint Pow Agreement to provide recreational programming for North St. Paul, including its community center and parks. The collaboration has led to new offerings for North St. Paul and Maplewood residents at a fraction of the previous cost by using the economies of scale that exist between both communities.

Olmsted County developed the weight loss program, W82GO (pronounced Weight to Go), for adults on the Olmsted County Employees' Health Plan. The program provides a connection to dietitians, fitness trainers, and nurse care manager. Participants learn what they can do to live healthier and take away knowledge and tools that can be used for life.

Southeast Service Cooperative started the Mobile Science Lab Program as a collaboration of the Southeast Service Cooperative, Mayo Clinic, and Rochester Area Math Science Partnership. They developed two traveling trailers with equipment and supplies to conduct molecular biology and agricultural bioscience experiments in high school classrooms, supporting the training that teachers receive in the Mayo Clinic Educator Academics.

SW/WC Service Cooperative began the Improving Student Achievement Initiative, a consortium of 25 school districts in southwest Minnesota who collaborate for a flexible learning year. Known as the "FLY," this consortium has agreed on common staff development dates, contributed funds for joint activities, and committed staff time for meetings and workshops--a plan no district could have done on their own.

The City of Eagan set out to celebrate 150 years since its founding and recognized there were many families struggling to meet basic needs. With this in mind, the Eagan 150th Anniversary Executive Board embarked on a remarkable goal of rallying the entire community to serve hungry families by raising food and funds for two local food shelves.

The City of Excelsior concluded that the city's small tax base could not afford additional parking downtown, so it created a parking impact fee ordinance that allows properties to satisfy the parking requirements by paying an annual parking impact fee in lieu of providing parking. The annual fee will be used to acquire and develop any future municipal parking space.

"When I was considering graduate programs in public policy, I met with several professors and alumni of programs to make my decision," says Jennifer Godinez (MA '99), associate director of the Minnesota Minority Education Partnership. "Bill Diaz was someone who took great interest in my pursuit of learning about the impact public policies and public institutions could make within the Latino community. When I came to the Humphrey, he advised me and mentored me into the local Latino nonprofit sector. I will never forget how Bill was engaged in my journey through graduate school before, during, and after the Humphrey School."

Godinez is just one of dozens of graduates who called Diaz friend and mentor. Since his death from a brain tumor in 2002, the Professor Melissa Stone and others with the Public and Nonprofit Leadership Center have been trying to continue his legacy.

"The connection between public policy and philanthropy was central to Bill's work," Stone says. "He was very broad and original in his thinking, really exploring the concept of philanthropy in the public interest."

Thanks to a recent gift from the Diaz family, more students will be able to follow in those trailblazing footsteps. The donation brings the William Diaz Fellowship--begun some years ago as a tribute to his life and work--to the endowed fellowship level, helping it continue in perpetuity and making payouts from the endowment eligible for University matching funds. The fellowship will support a research assistantship for a student within the public and nonprofit management area.

"We really want to take Bill's work on philanthropy in the public interest and embed it within the Institute and provide more funding and support," says Stone. "Having an RA focused on the relationship among charitable giving, public policy, and the nonprofit sector will be of great help."

"As much as Bill enjoyed having a fuss made, he was very generous of spirit and really, really enjoyed seeing people that he knew do well," says Diaz's widow, Dorothy Thompson. "He would be delighted that this fellowship could help move some younger person out into the world of nonprofits and help people in need. If he could have a hand in helping students move forward, he would be pleased."

"We provide succinct recommendations from hard-driving young professionals looking to gain experience in the real world," says Adam Faitek, a second-year MPP student, and chair of Common Grounds.

"The work is hands-on and applicable," he adds. "Our members get the opportunity to work for a client whose challenges are multifaceted, and our recommendations impact the clients' short-and long-term decisions and strategies."

Lars Leafblad, an alumnus of the Carlson School and principal with KeyStone Research, began the program in 2004. "It seemed like graduate students on the West Bank were not fully leveraging the physical proximity of the 'leadership development ecosystem' created by having Humphrey, Carlson, and the Law School within a two-block radius," he says.

"Bringing these students together created a community of student leaders who saw the value of building relationships across sectors, industries, and academic research areas," he says.

This fall, Common Grounds helped the Clean Energy Resource Teams (CERTs) confront their challenge of connecting energy resources to promote efficiency with renters. Some of the students' suggestions included targeting management companies through industry associations, exploring opportunities for energy companies to work together, and the creation of a model energy efficient rental building supported through a public-private partnership.

The group previously has offered recommendations to the Minnesota Home Ownership Center, Minnesota Civic Education Matters, Children's Heartlink, and the Minnesota Bar Association.

According to Mary Pawlenty of Children's Heartlink, "The Common Grounds experience was very affirming for our organization. The students made specific recommendations that are new and thought-provoking. [They] forced us to start thinking strategically about a question that's central to our development as an organization and the integrity of our mission."

"We took [Common Grounds'] ideas and were able to put them into practice immediately," says Brian B. Bell of the Minnesota State Bar Association.

"The current leadership team and members have exceeded my expectations for the ongoing growth of the organization," says Leaflad. "They have created a valued experimental learning and leadership development opportunity by linking the collective talents of the membership with the needs of an external organization and truly have harnessed the collective vision our initial group had and turned it into something actionable, impactful, and sustainable. All alumni of Common Grounds are excited to see where the group will go as the future unfolds."

Common Grounds continues to seek new clients. For more information, visit www.commongroundsmn.org or e-mail info@commongroundsmn.org.

"The Census is important because of its breadth, depth, and timeframe," says Faitek. "It impacts everyone. A community can lose $1,200 for every person not counted, and it only happens every 10 years."

"[Cedar-Riverside] community leaders estimate they were underrepresented in the 2000 Census, leaving out two-thirds of the Somali population," adds Evans.

"Citizenship is not a requirement to be counted in the census," Evans continues. "The entire community receives the maximum benefit if everyone participates. And because all residents use the roads, are protected by public safety, or may need hospital care, there is little reason to think that 'the Census doesn't affect me or my neighbor.'"

The group began their research last fall by attending community meetings and speaking with local leaders. They secured funding from multiple sources and recruited fellow University students to help in their effort.

"We analyzed local promotion efforts so that we could target the areas that weren't receiving outreach," says Evans. The group then worked with such local media as Somali and Ethiopian television and radio and brought together local faith and housing groups to heighten public awareness.

"We held eight neighborhood events promoting the Census and helped members of the community fill out hundreds of forms," says Faitek. "We recruited 17 neighborhood liaisons, and collectively knocked on more than 1,000 doors. In the end, the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood has performed strongly compared to what was expected."

"The project was impactful because it empowered neighborhood residents to work on their own behalf," says Swanson. "The community was more receptive to messages about the Census because the information came from sources within the community."

"The students' efforts will have a significant long-term impact on our neighborhood," says Merrie Benasutti, associate director of student initiatives for the Center of Integrative Leadership. "They have created new and effective partnerships between the University and the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood and strengthened local networks. They have worked across disciplinary and cultural boundaries to truly make a difference."

According to Professor Hal G. Rainey, Alumni Foundation Presidential Professor, of the Department of Public administration and Policy at the University of Georgia, "Strategic planning and strategic management have become ubiquitous topics in public and nonprofit administration, just as they are in business administration. Many people have done valuable work on strategic planning and strategic management, but John Bryson clearly stands as the leading scholar and expert on the application of this topic in public and nonprofit organizations. He has served for at least two decades as the primary leader and contributor on a central topic in theory and practice of public and nonprofit administration.

"His record obviates the need for hyperbole because the facts speak for themselves. His books on strategic management for public and nonprofit sectors have sold over 150,000 copies... These numbers show the value of Bryson's work to a broad population of scholars and practitioners, but they are only numbers. Space constraints preclude a deeper description of the exceptionally high quality of Bryson's approach to strategic planning, and of how well-conceived it is, along with being sensible and sensitive to the realities that public and nonprofit administrators face.

"Bryson's related work on leadership and power sharing in community and collaborative settings, in
Leadership for the Common Good, and in Shared Power, was ahead of its time in the sense that it predated the current upsurge in interest in collaboration in the public and nonprofit sectors. Although Google Scholar lists 543 citations to the Leadership for the Common Good book, it has still received less attention than it deserves. His coauthored book, Visible Thinking, derives from his numerous experiences as a facilitator of community and collaborative decision-making initiatives."

More information about the Dwight Waldo Award

Doctoral candidate Deborah Pembleton will discuss her research into the factors that have contributed to the success and sustainability of the crossborder management education alliance between the Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration in Bangkok and the graduate schools of business at Northwestern University (Kellogg) and the University of Pennsylvania (Wharton) in the United States at 12 p.m. on April 22, in Room 1-136 at the Carlson School of Management. This study explores the intercultural working relationships between U.S. and Thai faculty who work within the alliance and examines how the leadership within these organizations has contributed to the success and sustainability of the alliances. Registration is required at http://managementeducationalliances.eventbrite.com/.

The Humphrey School's Public and Nonprofit Leadership Center (PNLC) announced today the winners of the fifth annual Local Government Innovation Awards (LGIA), which recognize outstanding cities, counties, and schools in Minnesota that demonstrate results in improving local services. Winners will be honored at an awards ceremony from 3 to 5 p.m. on April 13 at the Humphrey Center. The event is open to the public, and will be followed by an informal reception. To RSVP to the awards, please e-mail heapx004@umn.edu. See the full list of winners at http://www.hhh.umn.edu/features/LGIA_Winners.html.

The Public and Nonprofit Leadership Center will host an event discussing ways to generate economic value by creating social good at 12:30 p.m. on Tuesday, April 12, at the Humphrey Center. Our current economic and political environment has created pressure for continued innovation and government redesign. Among current efforts are human capital performance bonds, also referred to as "pay for success." These efforts provide a financing system that attracts new investment capital while holding providers and government accountable for generating economic value from social programming. Steve Rothschild, founder and president of Invest in Outcome; Susie Brown, public policy director at the Minnesota Council of Nonprofits; Senior Fellow Jay Kiedrowski, former commissioner of finance; and Isaac Wengerd of the Office of Economic Opportunity will take part in this discussion, moderated by Associate Professor Jodi Sandfort.

With over 20 years of service to the United States Navy, Commander Chip Laingin observed and practiced integrative leadership from a unique and important vantage point. His military experience included leading helicopter detachments during various conflicts and operations at sea, squadron command ashore, and service to the Secretary of the Navy Staff at the Pentagon. Laingen will discuss his experiences at 12 p.m. on Friday, April 8, in Room 1-142 at the Carlson School of Management. The event is free and open to the public, but registration is required at www.militaryintegrativeleadership.eventbrite.com.

The Center for Integrated Leadership's Executive in Resident Steven Snyder will speak about leadership during troubled times from 11:45 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Friday, April 16, in Room 1-135 of the Carlson School of Management. The discussion will center on the current financial crisis and how industry leaders can be effective during tough economic times. The event is free and open to the public and lunch will be provided. RSVP to cil@umn.edu to reserve a seat. For more information, please visit www.leadership.umn.edu/news/Snyderleadershiptalk.html.

The Center for Integrative Leadership will host a presentation and panel discussion of "The Top Companies for Developing Leaders: Findings from Hewitt Associates' 2009 Top Companies for Leaders Study" on Tuesday, April 13, in Cowles Auditorium at the Humphrey Center. There will be a social hour with light refreshments from 5 to 6 p.m., and the presentation and panel discussion will take place from 6 to 8 p.m. The panel will be facilitated by Louis Quast, the Hellervik Endowed Chair in Leadership and Adult Development. Panelists will include leaders from General Mills, Cargill, 3M, and Target. To RSVP or for more information, please visit http://www.leadership.umn.edu/news/HewittLeadersStudy.html.