Elective Courses
January 2024
Fall 2023 (Grid View)
- EXEC-GP 2106 Community Organizing
- EXEC-GP 2135 Human Resources: Leading Talent Development
- EXEC-GP 2174 The Intersection of Operations, Policy, and Leadership
- EXEC-GP 2201 Institutions, Governance, and Public Sector Reform
- EXEC-GP 4101 Conflict Management and Negotiation
- EXEC-GP 4151 Inclusive Leadership
Spring 2023 (Grid View)
- EXEC-GP 2170 Performance Measurement & Management for Public, Nonprofit, & Healthcare Organizations
- EXEC-GP 2413 Strategic Philanthropy
- EXEC-GP 2430 Multi-Sector Partnerships
- EXEC-GP 4126 Leading Values-Based Culture in Nonprofit Organizations
- EXEC-GP 4129 Race, Identity, and Inclusion in Organizations
- EXEC-GP 4137 Communications and Branding for Nonprofits
- EXEC-GP 4154 Management Consulting for Public Service Organizations
Search across the Wagner curriculum for courses that tend to be offered in the fall, January, spring, or summer term.
Fall:
January:
Spring:
Summer:
Cities
Communication Skills
Data Science & Data Management
Education
Environment, Climate Change, & Sustainability
Health Policy & Management
Inequality, Race, & Poverty
International Development and Humanitarian Action
Nonprofit & Government Organizations
Philanthropy & Fundraising
Program Evaluation
Social Justice & Democracy
Transportation
MPA-PNP: Advocacy & Political Action Specialization
Core Courses
MPA-PNP: Advocacy & Political Action Specialization
Tools & Skills Focus Area
The Tools and Skills focus area highlights what you need to bring to your advocacy work. Research and planning within the context of a specific organization, coalition, or campaign, are the essential ingredient to success. Long before your campaign becomes public, you need to think about mission, strategy, teams and the data necessary for planning. These courses will help those who plan to run campaigns gain requisite depth in the structural elements of advocacy.
MPA-PNP: Advocacy & Political Action Specialization
Policies & Issues Focus Area
The Policies and Issues focus area is a deep dive into issues for which we build and launch advocacy and political campaigns. Depending on your own areas of interest, you can develop critical intimate knowledge in the specific issue area you most care about through these courses, and consider how to apply your learnings to issue campaigns, grassroots organizing, lobbying, and political campaigns. This will allow you to hit the ground running, bringing your knowledge of the issue into the real-world of policy and political change.
MPA-PNP: Financial Management & Public Finance Specialization
Public Economics & Finance Focus Area
This focus area allows students to apply the principles of economics to specific sectors, topics, or issues concerned specifically with resource allocation, generation, and distribution.
MPA-PNP: Financial Management & Public Finance Specialization
Financial Management Focus Area
This focus area allows students to concentrate on planning and controlling organizational resources. This focus area is designed to cover both short-term operating and long-term capital financing topics applied to nonprofits, governments, and healthcare organizations.
MPA-PNP: International Development Policy & Management Specialization
Growth, Sustainability, & Inequality Focus Area
Global relationships are being reshaped by economic growth together with widening inequalities. Building from PADM-GP 2203 Economics of International Development, these courses explore growth and inequality among countries and regions.
MPA-PNP: International Development Policy & Management Specialization
Organizations & Management in International Contexts Focus Area
Courses in this focal area draw on theory and practice from organization and management studies to explore the human, behavioral, functional and operational dynamics of organizations operating in a global context or focusing on development goals within an international political economy. Clusters below allow students to concentrate on particular entry points or to mix and match in ways that help address career preferences.
MPA-PNP: International Development Policy & Management Specialization
International Finance Focus Area
Courses in this focal area draw on theory and practice from public and social finance and social impact investment. Many of the courses have some international focus and all have international relevance. There are two clusters, one which focuses more on public sector finance and one which covers social enterprises and social impact investment.
MPA-PNP: International Development Policy & Management Specialization
Health, Human Rights, and Humanitarian Aid Focus Area
Courses in this focal area focus on operational challenges to operating in fragile, conflict, and disaster settings, supporting advocacy to advance health, human rights and humanitarian concerns, and understanding the contextual factors that shape operational and policy success.
MPA-PNP: Management & Leadership Specialization
Core Courses
MPA-PNP: Management & Leadership Specialization
Relationships Across Difference Focus Area
The courses in this area address varied aspects of creating relationships and working together across varied interests and a range of differences. Some of the courses focus on particular social identities, like race, gender and disability, and how to jointly address systemic inequities based on those identities. Others focus more on the processes that enable collaboration across differences, like negotiation, partnerships and participation. Focusing in this area will enable students to connect more authentically with people different from themselves, and also strengthen their capacity to build more equitable organizations and create collaborations among groups with varied interests.
PADM-GP 2129, Race, Identity and Inclusion in Organizations, and PADM-GP 2430, Multi-Sector Partnerships: A Comparative Perspective, are foundational/strongly recommended courses in this area.
MPA-PNP: Management & Leadership Specialization
Organizational Performance Focus Area
Learn to plan and manage the day-to-day work of organizations by building appropriate infrastructures and systems to ensure their success. Gain the skills to manage operations, measure performance, analyze data, and report outcomes for all stages in the production process.
MPA-PNP: Management & Leadership Specialization
Strategy & Leadership Focus Area
Through these courses, you'll develop an understanding of the multiple stakeholders for which organizations are responsible and the collaborative and competitive dynamics in fields and sectors. You will learn to design organizations, systems, and strategies that anticipate and respond effectively to dynamic and complex environments.
MPA-PNP: Public Policy Analysis Specialization
Core Courses
MPA-PNP: Public Policy Analysis Specialization
Policy Advocacy & Creation Focus Area
Creating policy through direct advocacy, working for advocacy or interest groups, or mission-driven organizations, e.g., political, social interest, etc. (potential titles and roles: interest-group advocacy, lobbyist, think-tank analyst, legislative or committee staffer, government relations for the nonprofit or private sector)
MPA-PNP: Public Policy Analysis Specialization
Policy Design Focus Area
Economic analysis and design of policy (potential titles and roles: policy analyst, staffer for office holder, public office staff roles, program officer, program manager, urban and regional planner, local government manager, consultant)
MPA-PNP: Public Policy Analysis Specialization
Policy Analysis & Program Evaluation Focus Area
Analysis of policy outcomes, synthesizing the literature, prospective analysis of policy proposals, and ex post evaluation of program and policy impacts form the core toolkit of the policy analyst (potential titles and roles: policy analyst for government, nonprofit, think tank or consulting firm; program evaluator)
PADM-GP.2875, Estimating Impacts in Policy Research, and PADM-GP 2172, Advanced Empirical Methods for Policy Analysis, are strongly recommended courses in this focus area.
MPA-PNP: Public Policy Analysis Specialization
Data Science Focus Area
Understanding, analyzing, presenting, and managing data (potential titles and roles: policy or data analyst, data scientist, data manager, database manager, fundraising officer/ manager, researcher, consultant).
PADM-GP 2172, Advanced Empirical Methods for Policy Analysis, and PADM-GP 4503, Introduction to Data Analytics, are strongly recommended courses in this focus area.
MPA-PNP: Social Impact, Innovation, and Investment Specialization
Social Enterprise Focus Area
The pursuit of social impact and innovation through entrepreneurship and formation of enterprises.
PADM-GP. 2132 Social Entrepreneurship and Innovation By Design is the foundational course in this area.
MPA-PNP: Social Impact, Innovation, and Investment Specialization
Social Finance Focus Area
Courses that explore the use the tools of finance to address societal changes. These courses focus on sustainability, investing and managing businesses with multiple social goals to achieve financial returns alongside social returns.
PADM-GP.2311, Social Impact Investment; PADM-GP.2142, Financial Management II; and PADM-GP.2147, Corporate Finance & Public Policy, are foundational courses in this area.
MPA-PNP: Social Impact, Innovation, and Investment Specialization
Social Innovation, Design, & Technology Focus Area
Courses that explore the process of ideation, and the use of data and technological tools to achieve social innovation.
PADM-GP.2145 Design Thinking: A Creative Approach to Problem Solving and Creating Impact is the foundational course in this area.
MPA-Health: Health Finance Specialization
Core Courses
MPA-Health: Health Finance Specialization
Health Services Financial Management
The Health Services Financial Management specialization prepares students to organize and interpret financial information as the basis of decision-making.
MPA-Health: Health Finance Specialization
Healthcare Public Finance
The Healthcare Public Finance specialization gives students the concepts and skills needed for careers that focus on the financial aspects of healthcare policy and the healthcare delivery system. You’ll take courses in public expenditure analysis, social insurance programs, taxation, and debt financing, among others.
MPA-Health: Health Policy Analysis Specialization
This specialization prepares students to develop and evaluate strategies to improve the efficiency of the healthcare delivery system. Topics include evaluation design, descriptive and multivariate statistics, program implementation analysis, policy formation assessment, and cost-benefit analysis.
MPA-Health: Health Services Management Specialization
This specialization prepares students for leadership roles in healthcare organizations. Topics include design and control in health organizations, management of service operations, personnel and human resources management, information systems, marketing, and strategic planning.
MPA-Health: International Policy & Management
This specialization prepares students to work worldwide in a variety of health settings and in diverse cultures.
MUP: City & Community Planning Specialization
Core Courses
MUP: International Development Planning Specialization
Core Courses
MUP
Environmental Planning Focus Area
Whether it is air pollution, deforestation or climate change, as urban regions grow, they continue to have dramatic effects on the global environment. The world's cities will also be dramatically impacted by the very changes that they induce, and these effects will be most felt by already vulnerable populations. It is imperative to the survival of humans society on earth that we understand how to plan cities and regions with the natural environment in mind. What can you do? This focus area will prepare you to make meaningful contributions to the world's most pressing environmental challenges through urban planning and policy.
URPL-GP.2625, Environmental Infrastructure is a key course in this area (recommended to build expertise).
MUP
Global Perspectives Focus Area
The majority of the world’s population now lives in urban areas though rapidly increasing rates of urbanization are most expected in countries and regions of the world least able to prepare for—much less manage—this growth in the face of climate change, changing geopolitical dynamics, and limited resources. This focus area includes courses that cover the institutional, political and economic challenges of planning in least-developed countries and also topics such as international aid effectiveness, local government finance, water management, project appraisal, and more.
PADM-GP.2214, Constructing National Development Strategies and PADM-GP.2245, Financing Local Government in Developing Countries are key courses in this area (recommended to build expertise).
MUP
Housing & Economic Development Focus Area
Learn to plan and build thriving, socially- and economically-diverse communities. The courses in this focus area cover the key elements of a healthy community ecosystem: from the economic theories behind real estate markets to the social theories underlying the importance of community organizations. The focus area also builds practical skills, including how to analyze current planning and policy issues and create new ones.
PADM-GP.2416, Segregation and Public Policy; URPL-GP.4636/38, Housing and Community Development Policy I and II; URPL-GP.2639, Real Estate Finance; and URPL-GP. 2452, Public-Private Partnerships, are key courses in this area (recommended to build expertise).
MUP
Transportation & Infrastructure Focus Area
As the first point of contact in almost every citizen’s journey to an opportunity—be it healthcare, employment, or education—transportation sits at the heart of all major city planning decisions. This focus area emphasizes not only mobility—how quickly and efficiently transportation systems (streets, expressways, subways, buses, bike lanes, parking, ride-hailing) could move people or goods around, but also accessibility—namely the spatial distribution of all opportunities available. It will prepare you to be a new generation of transportation planners—technically savvy, policy sensitive, and socially responsible.
URPL-GP.2631, Transportation, Land Use, and Urban Form; and URPL-GP.2641, Urban Transportation Planning are key courses in this area (recommended to build expertise).
MUP
Urban Analytics Focus Area
Cities are becoming smarter: they’re using data to optimize services, infrastructure operation, and urban planning. Government agencies, nonprofits, consulting firms, and startups all recognize the importance of leveraging data to create effective public policy and urban plans but grapple with how to analyze large, complex datasets and apply the findings in urban planning environments. This focus area includes courses to help you understand data-driven approaches to tackle today’s most pressing urban challenges.
PADM-GP.2505, Big Data Analytics; URPL-GP.2618, GIS and Analysis; and URPL-GP.4650, Advanced GIS: Interactive Web Mapping are key courses in this area (recommended to build expertise).