Annex 22:

2-2TA: The Modification of the State and Municipal Management Curriculum in Content and in Delivery, and the Development of Special Courses in Public Finance for Full-Time and Part-Time Students at UAPA.

1. Project description

2.  Project purposes and goals

The project proposal stresses that academic staff of UAPA and managers and politicians in municipal and regional government revealed both the need and desire to re-orientate the practices of municipal management towards a more outward-looking (rather than inward-looking) approach to service delivery.  Themes, which assumed significance for UAPA, relate to the refinement of the state and municipal management curriculum in content and in delivery, as well as the need to develop a special course on public finance, including surveys on the goals and mechanisms of the public management of government financial resources with a specific focus on the goals of international development. The newly-designed course was planned to be compulsory for all students in the third year of their full-time or part-time studies.

            It was expected that approximately five staff at UAPA will be contributing to the project to varying degrees.  In addition, two staff at UNM were to be involved, conducting training workshops for the academy faculty and delivering lectures and seminars to the students, thus exposing both the faculty and students to alternative teaching methods and new content.

The plan was to organize four workshops for the faculty, two lectures for the students, three seminars for the students and individual consultations for the faculty (as needed) during the two weeks of the American experts’ stay in Yekaterinburg. The American professors were also expected to visit classes conducted by their Russian counterparts in order to analyze the teaching methods used, with recommendations for future improvements.

The course modules in public finance, which will be developed through the partnership, were expected to be assessed in terms of quality provision and accredited by UNM/UAPA as an integral part of the curriculum. 

The dissemination of results was also expected to be realized via eight UAPA branches throughout the region.  The courseware for the modules can be easily transferred from one branch to another by virtue of the peripatetic approach to teaching and learning which already exists.  The peripatetic approach was expected to allow for focused dissemination in the eight branches and, by extension, gradually  to cascade throughout the region by the sharing of best practice, facilitated by the extremely close ties which currently exist between UAPA and senior staff in municipal and regional governments in the Urals.

3. Project realization

No major problems occurred during the project realization; all team members and other participants actively cooperated in the project, fulfilling their roles and responsibilities on time and with quality work.

Some slight changes in the time schedule were caused by objective reasons and did not influence the final achievements. The site visit was postponed because of different teaching periods of UNM and UAPA. 

As an extra contribution, Dr. Gleason traveled to Russia and visited UAPA in June and in August, 2003; he met with Y. Sazonova and other staff of UAPA to discuss the initiation of activities.  These two visits represented an off-budget contribution by UNM to the inter-institutional collaboration.  The purpose of these visits was twofold.  First, Gleason was to develop an agenda for the visit to be made by Dr. Perlman and himself under the NISPAcee grant.  The information from these initial meetings served to further discussion and development of a work plan.  Second, Gleason was invited by Y.Sazonova to participate in a conference at UAPA on October 30-31, 2003, on the “Role of Non-Government Organizations in Interest Articulation.”  Dr. Gleason chaired a training session on public-private partnerships.  The session was well-received.

4. Project outputs, outcomes and impacts

The goal of this project was to develop a new generation of public finance and public management materials for instructional purposes.  The project assumed that direct interactions between specialists at the University of New Mexico and the Urals Academy of Public Administration could lead to a regular and continuing exchange of information and materials that would support pedagogy and encourage collaborative research activities. 

As the result of interaction between Russian and American partners a new course in public finance and financial and budgeting policy was developed and introduced at UAPA. The site visit also led to proposals for follow-up activities. 

The Russian participants have incorporated the materials, insights and lessons learned into their teaching materials.  Several of the materials have been translated into Russian, published and made available for application. The course is scheduled for delivery from September 1, 2004. The basic textbook for this course is Public Finance and Management by Bruce Perlman and Gregory Gleason (manuscript) and Wiley GAAP for Governments Field Guide 2003 by Warren Ruppel.  The reading material covers a wide spectrum, ranging from scholarly analysis drawn from the world of academia and research think tanks to coverage of contemporary events drawn from international organization project documents. The reading materials include policy analysis produced by governments, international organizations and non-governmental organizations. Relevant materials from Russian sources were incorporated in the textbook and cover Russian practices of public budgeting and financial management. Several abstracts from the NISPAcee textbook “Public Finance—Theory and Practice in Central European Transition” were translated into Russian and are used as reading materials for the students.

The potential impact of this project lies in its contribution to the paradigm of change in training and ultimately in service delivery in municipal and regional government.  Such a contribution has been effected through staff development activity and curriculum development.  The staff at UAPA has developed expertise and experience in content, delivery and assessment and students have been introduced to the elements of a new paradigm.