Public Policy Commons^™

Umass Chooses A Political Executive: The Politics Of A Presidential Search, Richard A. Hogarty

New England Journal of Public Policy

Horace Mann, the father of American public education, had served as president of the Massachusetts Senate prior to becoming the state's first secretary of education. Since then, as reformers succeeded in removing politics from the sacred groves of academe, appointing a politician to head the state's educational system fell into disfavor. Relatively recently, however, there have been two abortive attempts by politicians to reach the executive pinnacle of public higher education. Both James Collins, in 1986, and David Bartley, in 1991, were defeated in the quest to achieve this goal. Historical understanding of these battles is necessary to comprehend what …

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

In a paraphrase of Yogi Berra's immortal words, we came to a fork in the road and we took it. Which is all in the way of introducing this issue of the New England Journal of Public Policy. The articles featured here, while spanning a very broad spectrum of public policy, have several unifying themes. They are all case studies in one way or another of the incompetence that is an essential feature of the public policy process in a democratic culture, of the constraints in the way of making change, no matter how obviously desirable or in the …

Research To Practice: Trends In Supported Employment: The Experiences Of 94 Community Rehabilitation Service Providers From 1986 - 1991, Dana Scott Gilmore, John Butterworth

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

A follow-back study (data from 1986 and 1991) examined service patterns of community rehabilitation providers for supported employment, competitive employment, and sheltered workshops.

Research To Practice: Multiple Perspectives On Implementing The Rehabilitation Act Amendments Of 1992, Jean Whitney-Thomas

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

This summary of a qualitative study reports the results of focus groups with administrators and counselors in Massachusetts's vocational rehabilitation agency. The findings highlight differences in perspectives on how the 1992 Rehabilitation Act Amendments have been implemented.

Research To Practice: Shared Responsibility: Job Search Practices From The Consumer And Staff Perspective, David Temelini, Sheila Fesko

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

A review of a national study of the job search practices used by community rehabilitation providers and independent living centers, focusing on the relationship between these practices and employment outcomes such as job satisfaction, wages, and hours.

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

This issue of the New England Journal of Public Policy is devoted to further consideration of the public policy implications of specific topics that are of concern to the Latino community and in need of urgent redress. This must be a priority if the United States is not to find itself hopelessly mired in the ramifications, blithely ignored at the end of the twentieth century, of the complexities the changing ethnic composition of the country will create in the opening decades of the twenty-first century.

Understanding Latino Ethnic Identity Development: A Review Of Relevant Issues, Azara Rivera-Santiago

New England Journal of Public Policy

One of the most promising areas in cross-cultural psychology is the development of identity among various ethnic groups in the United States. This article has a twofold purpose. First, it offers the concept of ethnic identity as defined and studied within the social sciences — sociology, anthropology, and psychology — including a review of some of the recent work on ethnic identity development proposed by leading investigators in the field of psychology. The author discusses their generalizability across ethnic groups. Second, it presents a number of dimensions considered important in conceptualizing and studying Hispanic ethnic identity development. These include acculturation, …

Human Rights And Community Development Through Low-Income Women's Leadership: The Voice Of An African-American Organizer, Claudine Michel

William Monroe Trotter Institute Publications

In this essay, I argue that grassroots organizing appears as one of the most viable option worldwide until women are better protected through legislation and public policy. I also posit that it is important to learn from divergent leadership philosophies, from the different values, roles and styles that women adopt in various parts of the world in the course of their day-to-day activities and in their efforts to organize, to support current community programs, and to train future community leaders. This essay relates the experiences of a grassroots organizer and presents what I believe to be a successful model of …

Research To Practice: Consumer And Family Perspectives On The Meaning Of Work, Sheila Fesko

Research to Practice Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

Findings from a study that obtained the perspectives of people with significant disabilities and their family members about their employment experiences, outcomes, and expectations.

Improving Health Care For Disadvantaged Local Communities: Proposing User Fees Based On Some International Experiences, Saskia Wilhelms

Trotter Review

The fact that national health care reform in the United States has been stalled is not reason for resign. More than ever, one has to design and implement creative options to achieve satisfactory health service at low costs. The political turnover in Congress shifts more responsibility to local governments. This means less funding and less willingness by the national government to be held accountable for health and social services. On the other hand, this situation may carry opportunity to impact social policies on a local level.

The living conditions in some of our communities equal those in so-called third world …

Programmatic Responses To The Aids Epidemic By Communities Of Color In Massachusetts, Ron E. Armstead

Trotter Review

The Centers for Disease Control found that minorities now account for more than half of all the HIV cases in the United States. For African Americans, the rate was more than 5 times as high as that for whites. Further, the disease has equally affected women and children in the African American community; 84% of the AIDS cases involving children age 12 and under can be found in the African American community. AIDS has now become the second leading cause of death for African American women. This essay describes a research project focusing on the factors involved in developing and …

Introduction, James Jennings

Trotter Review

The Summer 1995 issue of the Trotter Review, "Public Health and Communities of Color: Challenges and Strategies," provides a range of essays and two personal commentaries on facets of public health, race, and ethnicity in urban America. The essays are written by scholars and activists familiar with public health and issues of race, access, and diversity. The first article is the Executive Summary of the Institute of Medicine's national report, Balancing the Scales of Opportunity: Ensuring Racial and Ethnic Diversity in Health Professions. This report focuses on the problem of underrepresentation of Blacks, Latinos, and Native Americans in the …

Foreword, Edwin Meléndez

New England Journal of Public Policy

This is the first of two parts of "Latinos in a Changing Society"; Part II is scheduled for Fall/Winter 1995 publication. The following articles provide new insights into several key areas of concern: immigration, employment and income, and political participation. Part II articles will address education, health, and identity and ethnicity.

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

These two issues of the Journal focus exclusively on the Latino community in the United States, which is the fastest-growing minority in the country. It is a development that poses profound questions regarding the course this country will take into the twenty-first century and the way in which it will define itself. It will sever the almost metaphysical distinctions between the melting pot and multiculturalism, opposites on a philosophical curve that are as much self-created as self-evident.

Three areas of Latino experience are examined in this volume — the impact of immigration policies, employment and income opportunities, and the degree …

An Economic Profile Of Women In Massachusetts, Randy Albelda

Publications from the Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy

This report provides a profile of women's current economic position in Massachusetts. It examines the age, race, and geographical distribution of women and girls across the state; family structure, income and poverty; and women's labor force participation, occupational and industrial distribution in jobs, and earnings. When relevant 1990s Massachusetts data are compared to national data and to Massachusetts data from the 1970s.

Women across the Commonwealth have experienced tremendous changes in their lives over the last two decades as a result of changes in the economy and family structure. For women, the changes provide new opportunities, but they also exacerbate …

The Competitive Advantage Of The Inner City: Does Race Matter?, Philip S. Hart

William Monroe Trotter Institute Publications

Following up on his important work on the competitive advantage of nations, economist Michael Porter has turned his attention to the competitive advantage of the inner city. In his work on the competitiveness of nations—a five-year study often leading trading nations—Porter found that no nation was competitive in everything. He noted that competitive success tends to concentrate in particular industries and groups of interconnected industries, or clusters.

By turning his attention on the inner city, Porter has helped to reinforce the emerging sense that it is important to concentrate on the assets of such locations rather than on their liabilities. …

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

With a great deal of pride, the New England Journal of Public Policy is pleased to announce a new partnership. Beginning with this issue, the journal becomes a joint publication of the John W. McCormack Institute of Public Affairs, University of Massachusetts Boston, and the Center for Policy Analysis, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. Both bring to the joint venture special skills that complement each other; both are committed to holding the quality of the publication to the same rigorous standards that intellectual integrity demands, and both are committed to maintaining the degree of accessibility that has been a hallmark of …

Access To Capital And Technical Assistance, Richard J. Ward

New England Journal of Public Policy

This article summarizes and analyzes the views of select leaders in business, labor, banking, the government, and academia with regard to the constraints, obstacles, and recommendations to achieve economic growth in Massachusetts. The role of the state government in addressing these issues receives special attention. Access to capital and technical assistance had been regarded by many as the key constraint, particularly during the recession of the early 1990s. The author analyzes inconvenient government systems, bottlenecks, and bureaucracy as throttling the flow of capital to small-business entrepreneurs. The analysis concludes, however, that unless the state cum federal government finds ways to …

The Impact Of School Spending On Student Achievement: Results Of Meap Statewide Tests, Robert D. Gaudet

New England Journal of Public Policy

Examining school spending and student achievement as measured by the Massachusetts Educational Assessment Program tests on a community-by-community basis indicates that high spending in and of itself does not ensure achievement. While every community must have adequate funding to deliver an acceptable level of education services, there is a wide variation in achievement in similar communities with similar spending. The data suggest that other factors influence outcomes at least as much as spending.

Parent Involvement In Urban Schools: The View From The Front Of The Classroom, Frances Gamer, Kathleen Mccarthy Mastaby

New England Journal of Public Policy

American educational reform movements focus on efforts to restructure our schools to include all interested parties, especially parents, in the decision-making process. Nowhere is involvement more crucial than in America's inner-city urban neighborhoods. As parents are given a greater voice in their child's school, educators must join them as collaborators. This article identifies elements that impeded parental involvement and recognizes positive and encouraging techniques leading toward successful family-school-community partnerships. An alliance between groups too long seen as opponents rather than proponents must be established.

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

In this special issue of the New England Journal of Public Policy, we explore some of the more perennial but nonetheless substantive issues involved in the ongoing debate about the shape educational reform should take from different points of view, and seek that most sought-after and elusive alchemist, common ground.

Better High Schools: What Would Create Them?, Theodore R. Sizer

New England Journal of Public Policy

The American desire to improve education has set off a flurry of activity to reform schools. In such a climate of restructuring, Sizer explores what better secondary schools might "look like" if indeed they existed. His consideration of the improved high school is based on five particular conditions — all of which support teachers and students in their engagement with the serious stuff of learning and all of which must exist in one form or another for schools to be effective. The conditions are cast as questions. Sizer locates the responsibility for school reform broadly, from the heart of a …

"Economic Development" Is Not "Community" Development: Lessons For A Mayor, Eugene "Gus" Newport

Trotter Review

Economic development is one of the most important elements of an effective community development plan. Economic development can mean jobs for the community, as well as the development of new businesses and the enhancement of a city's tax base, which provides the funds to operate the government. I had campaigned on the need for responsible alternative economic development. But, one of the first things I learned is that community development often gets misinterpreted as economic development. That is an unfortunate mistake, since the term community development has a much broader meaning, both conceptually and practically. Community development means development of …

Providing Quality Leadership In Roxbury: A Profile Of Leon T. Nelson, Harold Horton

Trotter Review

Poor leadership is often the cause for the inept functioning and eventual collapse of an organization or agency. This is because the leader sets the tone and to a great extent determines whether or not an organization will be viable. Leon T. Nelson, president of the Greater Roxbury Chamber of Commerce, has done his utmost to live up to the organization's motto, "Quod facis bene fac," which means doing whatever you do as well as you possibly can.

In a community that underwent drastic demographic changes during the 1970s and 1980s, when numerous businesses led the "white flight" to suburbia, …

Institute Brief: Employment Advisory Boards: The Ultimate Community Resource, David Hoff, Margaret Van Gelder, Martine Gold, Joe Marrone

The Institute Brief Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

Strategies for establishing links to the business community and relationships with prospective employers through the development of employment advisory boards.

Editor's Note, Padraig O'Malley

New England Journal of Public Policy

On April 23, 1993, the John W. McCormack Institute of Public Affairs celebrated its tenth anniversary. To mark the occasion, the Institute established the John Joseph Moakley Award for Distinguished Public Service, which will be awarded annually to a man or woman whose contribution to the public good merits our most grateful acknowledgment. The first recipient of the award was Congressman John Joseph Moakley, Chairman of the House Rules Committee, one of the most powerful and influential positions in Congress.

Among those who paid tribute to Congressman Moakley were Michael E. Haynes, Minister, Twelfth Baptist Church, Boston; Raymond G. Torto, …

State Strategy For Developing Base Industries: A Massachusetts Case Study, Chris Tilly

New England Journal of Public Policy

In developing strategies for economic development, state governments must target base industries that bring income into the state and drive the rest of the economy. This article presents a case study of industry analysis and development strategy for Massachusetts, focusing on the state's base industries. Particular attention is paid to the role of industry clusters — groups of industries linked through customer, supplier, or other relationships, and typically concentrated geographically as well. After assessing strengths and weaknesses of the state's economy, the author concludes that despite the current severe recession, the state possesses the basis for renewed growth. Policy implications …

Fiscal Smell Tests: A Mid-Term Reality Check Of Massachusetts Finances, Joseph S. Slavet, Joseph R. Barresi

McCormack Graduate School General Publications (active until 2013)

In his latest budget message the Governor points to achievement of a "real, but fragile fiscal balance. " On the credit side of the ledger, he cites four balanced budgets, reduced reliance on one-time revenues, no new taxes, five tax cuts, no deficit borrowing, and a triple upgrade in bond rating. On the debit side are continued spending pressures, slow tax revenue growth and burdensome levels of debt.

But is the fiscal condition of the Commonwealth stable, albeit fragile? Or would a careful reading of the numbers transmit another message?

The purpose of this report is to measure the Commonwealth's …

The Older Population In Massachusetts, 1980-1990, Gerontology Institute, University Of Massachusetts Boston

Gerontology Institute Publications

Massachusetts and the nation are aging! People 65 and older are growing in numbers more rapidly than other younger segments of the population, and the unprecedented growth of this group has created new demands on and new opportunities for every major sector of American life. But if we are to make constructive plans for an aging society, we must have sound information on the major changes in the make-up of the population.

This report shows how the older populations in Massachusetts and in the United States have changed in the decade between 1980 and 1990. It is designed to serve …

Latinos In Massachusetts: Growth And Geographical Distribution, Ralph Rivera

New England Journal of Public Policy

Massachusetts has undergone radical changes in its racial/ethnic composition in the last ten years. The Latino population, owing to its extraordinary growth rate during the last two decades, is the largest racial/ethnic minority group in the state. Yet relatively little is known about this population because of the "information gap." Based on 1990 census data, this article focuses on the growth and geographical distribution of Latinos in Massachusetts. It considers the undercount of Latinos, the growth of Latinos in the commonwealth from a national perspective, and assesses the increase of Latinos in the New England states. It explores the growth …