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The Second Year Policy Analysis (SYPA) is an integral part of your MPA/ID Program experience.

Your capstone project is an opportunity for you to apply the skills you’ve acquired during the program, integrate your coursework, and provide specific policy recommendations for a concrete development problem. For many of our students, the SYPA is also an opportunity to deepen the work they undertook during their summer internship.

In the SYPA, you will choose a current development issue of interest to you, select your faculty advisor, and draw on the tools of economics, management, and institutional analysis to define the problem, analyze the evidence, develop alternatives, and produce practical policy recommendations. 

Second Year Policy Analysis Seminar

You’ll write the second-year paper while enrolled in the Second Year Policy Analysis Seminar (DEV-250Y).

Under the guidance of a faculty member, the seminar provides an environment for you to think about general research issues, give and receive feedback on outlines and drafts, and practice your presentation skills. After defining your topic, you’ll familiarize yourself with the relevant literature, gather and organize data, develop an appropriate methodology, identify and evaluate a course of action, and develop recommendations. The final product is a clear and persuasive paper—no more than 40 pages—that includes an executive summary summarizing your findings, followed by your analysis of the issues and your recommendations. 

Award-winning SYPAs

Mitigation of Groundwater Depletion in India
Amitha Ablud Jayaram MPA/ID 2024

Teacher Shortage in Venezuela: Leveraging Positive Deviance in a Humanitarian Setting
Catalina Reyes Villegas & Maria Andreina Cantele Saenz MPA/ID 2024

Charging Ahead: A Supply Chain and Capability Perspective on India's EV Industrial Policy
Leandro Urbano & Rushabh Sanghvi MPA/ID 2024

Trade Agreements in the UAE: Signing the Maximum Number of Deep Agreements in the Shortest Possible Time
Enzo Rafael Dominguez Prost MPA/ID 2023

Increasing Access to Basic Medicines Through the Private Sector Supply Chain in Kenya and Tanzania
Paige Taylor MPA/ID 2023

Unlocking the Kenyan Mango Value Chain
James Bien & Isabella Soehn MPA/ID 2022

Saving Democracy: Reducing Gang Influence on Political Elections in El Salvador
Eleno Castro & Randy Kotti MPA/ID 2022

Climate Change, Developing Countries and Trade: How to leverage the EU's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism to incentivize decarbonization investments in developing countries
Maria Fayos Herrera MPA/ID 2022