Portland State University’s Center for Public Service Fellowships are based on a simple premise: the attraction and capture of high potential talent across a broad spectrum of disciplines is a critical success factor for the continued and future success of public service organizations in Oregon. This proposition looms particularly true as general fund budgets struggle for the resources required to achieve mission excellence and the attainment of needed public outcomes.
PSU’s Center for Public Service (CPS) sets out to build a continuous pipeline of talent from the leading graduate schools of public affairs across America. There are now more than 60 graduate institutions from which we recruit — leading universities such as Harvard, Duke, Michigan, Wisconsin, Washington, Cal-Berkeley, USC, and Texas—as well as Oregon’s own UO, OSU, Willamette, and, of course, PSU. We deliberately focus on graduate students who are committed to public service by virtue of their enrollment in advanced degree programs such as public administration, public policy, and public affairs. We also seek to provide a way back to Oregon for students who have left the state to pursue their professional education elsewhere and are now looking for a pathway home.
In recent years we have expanded our recruitment strategy to address the growing desire for diversity (in racial, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds, multi-lingual skills, work and life experience), and to capture ancillary disciplines such as I.T. and data science, business and finance, industrial engineering, and, very recently (mindful of the threat of the 9.0 Cascadia earthquake), students with specializations in emergency preparedness, disaster recovery, resilience, communications, and public health.
The Oregon Summer Fellowship is a 10-week paid experience for currently enrolled masters and doctoral students who are looking to apply their classroom learning and research to real-life, on-the-ground summer projects. This Fellowship also allows sponsoring agencies, which pay a $11,816 sponsorship fee to PSU, a low-cost, low-risk way to competently address projects, studies, and budget notes on their to-do list and to identify talent for possible recruitment after graduation.
The Hatfield Resident Fellowship is an eight-month paid experience with a sponsor fee of $48,420 that is designed for recent masters and Ph.D. graduates who have completed their advanced degree work and are looking to activate their professional pursuits with an agency whose mission aligns with the fellow’s career aspirations. The longer term of the residency program allows more meaningful opportunities for both the fellow and sponsor to work on heftier projects that can provide material benefit to both parties. It also gives the resident fellow the opportunity to obtain meaningful, local content on their resume, while building their local network. Not surprisingly, our Hatfield fellows frequently produce exceptional value for their sponsors and end up getting hired… which is our ultimate aim: to replenish Oregon’s public service with professionals of extraordinary talent, education, and commitment.
CPS also offers a Public Service Fellowship when the needs of the sponsor or a fellow's qualifications fall outside of the two main fellowship types. Public Service Fellows are qualified to complete the same types of projects as Hatfield Resident Fellows, but may have different eligibility criteria and Institute and professional development options than Hatfield Resident Fellows.
Since 2002, the Center for Public Service has placed over 500 of our fellows with more than 100 federal, state, local, and nonprofit organizations across Oregon. You can learn more about this year’s class by contacting the program team at psfellows@pdx.edu or calling 503-725-8261.