In recent years, public service has become more and more popular, K-School officials say, and much of that interest has been directed towards the state and local levels. Twenty-three percent of Kennedy School graduates surveyed between 1981 and 1984 took their first job in state or local government.

Many associated with the school attribute those numbers to the Reagan Administration's policy of reducing federal involvement in local affairs.

"Basically Washington shut down," says New York City Deputy Commissioner of Income Maintenance E. Allen Kraus, who received a Master's in City and Regional Planning from the K-School in 1978. "Reagan came in and a lot of things changed. The job market shifted a lot and the fiscal condition of cities like New York and Boston improved. The K-School has to follow the market."

Kraus, who says he tries to hire Kennedy School graduates because they are well qualified for public service jobs, lauds the increased interest in local public service among K-School alumni.

"It used to be so hard to come to Cambridge to recruit people from Harvard to work for the Department of Sanitation," Kraus says. "Morgan Stanley would be in one office and the New York City Department of Sanitation would be in the other. It was a hard sell."

Teaching and Training

The Kennedy School runs a number of programs for state and local public servants, including executive training seminars for newly-elected mayors and senior agency officials. Graduates of those programs say that they provide students with sufficient training to handle the tasks facing state and local government.

"You need quick problem-solving ability and you have to be what I call, `witty with numbers,'" Kraus says. "The basic skills that the Kennedy school teaches--statistics, applied economics and policy analysis--are very helpful."

Amy Singer, a 1986 graduate of the school's mid-career Master's in Public Administration program and the acting assistant secretary of the Massachusetts Criminal Justice department, says that the K-School helped her prepare for work in state government, even though her courses didn't focus directly on state issues.

"Budgeting and dealing with the press are things that all government officials should know how to do, whether they be on the local, state or federal level," says Singer. "The classes were very practical. I don't think I was well-equipped to deal with budgeting or with the legislature in Massachusetts or the press before I went to the Kennedy School. It gave me more confidence."

Other graduates cite the ties to the school and the contacts they made while at Harvard as the most important part of their education.

"The benefits extended far beyond my time at the Kennedy School," Bogg says. "It's given me an opportunity to interact with experts around the country to ask for advice. The contacts were very important."

Research

But officials say that research, rather than teaching, will be the greatest area of impact at the Taubman Center. Several existing research programs will be incorporated into the new center, including the Ford Foundation Innovations program, which gives grants for outstanding state and local programs, and the Joint Center for Housing Studies.

Altshuler says that the Taubman Center will be involved in two types of research--structural research on the organization and management of states and local governments and substantive research on the problems those governments face every day. He added that real world practitioners will be included in the substantive research.