ASU creates pathways to public service careers for military students
An F-35 fighter jet takes off from Luke Air Force Base. The School of Public Affairs will begin offering some graduate degree courses on site at the base next year. Photo by Charlie Leight/ASU News
The School of Public Affairs at Arizona State University is making careers in public service easier to access for military students through two degree programs and a fellowship.
In the spring semester, the school will begin offering an online associate degree in emergency management in a partnership with the U.S. Naval Community College, according to Akheil Singla, associate professor in the School of Public Affairs.
“These are active-duty service members who could be deployed anywhere in the world, and the courses are asynchronous, which is perfect for them,” Singla said.
Emergency management graduates are in high demand not only in local, state and federal governments but also private industry, he said.
“Natural disaster risks are going up with climate change — more hurricanes and wildfires,” he said. “And emergency management is not only about natural disasters. The jobs cut across different careers. You could be helping on the preparation side, coming up with plans on how to evacuate people.”
The Associate in Science is designed so that all the credits would transfer into the Bachelor of Science in emergency management offered by the School of Public Affairs.
This will be the fourth associate degree program ASU offers through the U.S. Naval Community College. The others are military studies, organizational leadership and maritime logistics, as well as certificates in those disciplines. The college is open to active-duty Navy, Marine and Coast Guard personnel.
“This program is exciting because we think we can help them but mostly because we think these folks can help the world,” Singla said.
Also next year, the School of Public Affairs will start holding graduate courses on site at Luke Air Force Base on the west side of the Phoenix metro area, offering an in-person course to Air Force personnel every semester, according to Justin Stritch, associate professor in the School of Public Affairs.
The course will be one in the core curriculum in the Master of Public Administration program, which offer classes in online, in-person and hybrid modalities.
“This is a good opportunity for us to engage in direct outreach and give these students the ability to engage with the online and hybrid curricula that we offer that meets their flexibility needs,” Stritch said.
The new degree offerings are among many ways that the School of Public Affairs supports the military community — a commitment that has led to ASU’s selection to the new Service to Service initiative by the Volcker Alliance to help veterans transition to careers in public service.
“As a member of the first cohort, ASU will be part of a community of practice to think more intentionally about our master’s of public service curriculum,” Stritch said.
ASU students who are veterans or military family members can become fellows in the Service to Service program and learn how to translate the skills they gained through military service into experience for careers in local government.
ASU is one of 12 universities in Service to Service, including Cornell and the University of California, Berkeley.
“We’ll all be going through the process of learning and experimenting with how best to engage veteran students and learning what’s working elsewhere,” Stritch said.
One-fifth of the graduate students in the School of Public Affairs — more than 100 — are in the military community. Also, more than 140 military-affiliated students are enrolled in undergraduate degree programs in the school.
In addition, the school already has many connections to local government through internships, fellowships, student organizations, career services and the Center for Urban Innovation, which gives master’s students the chance to work on research projects with local governments.
Service to Service is a natural fit, Stritch said.
“This is a group of folks that have already committed themselves to the public good and have already made extensive sacrifices,” he said.
“These are folks that people want in their organizations.”
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