Public Administration Field Placements for Online Universities

This paper is a proposal that online universities should establish partnerships with city governments to create field placement opportunities for graduate students of public administration. The research was accomplished by reviewing current articles on field placements for traditional universities and by disseminating a 9-question survey to 100 cities across the United States. The findings from the literature reviewed noted that universities, host organizations, and students all benefit from field placement programs. The data gathered from the 9-question survey found that most city governments are interested in establishing field placement opportunities with online universities, had confidence in the abilities of online students, and would consider hiring online graduates after successful completion of a field placement. Introduction Today, most students live within 100 miles of a university, and federal grants and loans are now available to people from all socioeconomic backgrounds. As the Internet evolved, so did access to education through fully online universities. Thus, students no longer need to leave home and live in expensive dorms or apartments to receive a quality education. However, the cause and effect of evolution is always competition for resources. With so many traditional brick and mortar and online universities competing for the same students, online universities must also evolve or go extinct. Institutions of higher learning, such as the University of Memphis, have partnered with local non-profit organizations, city, state, and federal agencies within their area to offer field placements to their students in many fields of study. Further, a traditional university can simply add online courses or degree programs to its curriculum in order to expand its accessibility and its reputation. Therefore, it is imperative that online universities adapt their educational models to include the creation of educational partnerships with organizations to compete with traditional universities. This research project proposes that online universities, such as American Military University, should implement field placement programs where possible. The focus of this study was to demonstrate that by creating partnerships between online universities and city governments, students seeking degrees in public administration would be better prepared to enter the public-sector workforce. As the field of public administration encompasses a wide variety of components spanning human resources, organizational management, leadership development, and health policies, city governments offer numerous opportunities for practical learning. In addition, online universities are actually in a better position to offer field placements than traditional universities. While many students of traditional universities struggle to balance school, family, and employment, online students have a greater amount of scheduling flexibility because classrooms, lectures, and assignments can be accessed anytime, anywhere. This is especially important for non-traditional students, working professionals, and those serving on active-duty in the Armed Forces. Further, this project will demonstrate that by partnering with city governments, online universities could increase their reputation and credibility by producing higher quality graduates who would be better prepared to enter the public-sector workforce. In addition, this research showed that partnerships between city governments and online universities for field placements of students of public administration programs would be beneficial to the city governments, the universities, and the students. The city governments would gain needed staff augmentation; the universities would gain additional credibility; and, the students would gain the hands-on experience needed to begin successful careers. This was accomplished by using a 9-question survey designed to test the project’s hypothesis: “Online universities can create field placement programs for their students of public administration by building partnerships with local governments to ensure online student receive the same learning opportunities as traditional university students. ” The survey was disseminated to city governments across the United States and analyzed to discover the probability of creating educational partnerships for field placement positions. Academic learning at the master’s level provides an excellent baseline of knowledge for starting a new career in any given field of study. However, classroom knowledge seldom provides the necessary hands-on skills required to be successful on the job in the real world. While many traditional universities offer field placement opportunities for programs such as social work, nursing, public health, education, and public administration, these opportunities are rarely if ever offered to students attending online universities. However, online universities are in a far better position to offer field placements opportunities than traditional universities. The goals of field placement programs are to help students gain field of focus identity, build self-confidence, and gain first-hand knowledge of the practical application of academic studies in a supervised environment. While textbooks and lectures provide lists, definitions, concepts, and theories on how a given field of study is supposed to functions, they cannot give the student the experience of observing and participating in the use of these competencies.