����vlog����

Harvard Kennedy School is one of the University’s most international schools with more than half of the student population coming from outside the United States representing more than 100 countries and territories. Over 1,000 students are enrolled across the School’s degree programs. 

Harvard Kennedy School introduces a new Data and Research Methods track—a Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM)-designated pathway—for MPP, MPA, and MC/MPA students. (The MPA/ID Program is already STEM-designated.)

—

����vlog���� faculty members create the first-ever artificial intelligence (AI) tutor bot: StatGPT.

—

The School launches “Candid and Constructive Conversations” implementing strategies developed by a committee of faculty, staff, and students to further foster an environment conducive to the robust exchange of ideas.

at Harvard University joins the Harvard Kennedy School campus to unite expertise focused on cities across disciplines and schools.

The Public Leadership Credential (PLC) is established: an online learning program that equips public officials and leaders with skills and knowledge to advance the public good.

����vlog���� hosts multiple commemorative events to honor the 100th anniversary of John F. Kennedy’s birth, including the John F. Kennedy Centennial Symposium.

The School breaks ground on the Campus Transformation Project, beginning construction of three new buildings that will add 91,000 square feet of space and fully connect the ����vlog���� campus.

The Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy is renamed, becoming the .

The Kennedy School celebrates its 75th anniversary as Harvard celebrates its 375th year.

—

The Harvard Kennedy School community includes 46,981 alumni (16,888 degree and 30,093 Executive Education), representing 203 countries and territories.

The School admits its first combined degree students with Harvard Business School, offering two degree options: the MPP-MBA and the MPA/ID-MBA. The School also offers combined degrees with Harvard Law School, along with concurrent degrees with more than a dozen other universities.

Close to 1,000 degree students enroll, of whom 43% are from outside the United States, and more than 3,000 Executive Education participants enroll, of whom 48% are from outside the United States.

_

An effort to diversify portraiture at the School begins with the addition of a portrait of journalist and activist Ida B. Wells.

Professor David Ellwood, an economist focused on social policy and former assistant secretary of health and human services, is appointed dean.

For the first time, the majority of incoming students (52%) are women. 

The Center for Public Leadership is established to inspire and enhance the capacity for principled, effective public leadership in government, politics, civil society, and business. 

—

The Rappaport Institute for Greater Boston is established.

The Council of Women World Leaders chooses the Kennedy School as the location for its inaugural summit. 

—

The School launches its first institutional web site on the World Wide Web.

The Public Service Fellows program is established to encourage and support students intending to work in public service through the provision of financial aid. 

Seven hundred and seventy students enroll at the School.

The Malcolm Wiener Center for Social Policy is established to elevate understanding and public discourse around social issues to strengthen policy and practice.

—

The , established in 1959 as the Joint Center for Urban Studies of Harvard and MIT, moves its base solely to Harvard as a collaborative unit of the Kennedy School and the Harvard Graduate School of Design. 

—

Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam is appointed dean. 

A five-acre park bordering the School, established by the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation, is dedicated as the John F. Kennedy Memorial Park.

The School establishes the Office of Alumni Affairs. Alumni number more than 8,000.

—

A year-long National Security Fellows program is established, enrolling senior military officers. 

The Center for Business and Government is established to advance knowledge and policy on the most challenging problems at the interface of business and government.

—

Executive Sessions are established, bringing academics and leading practitioners together to develop approaches, such as community policing, that apply innovative solutions to public problems.

Forty-three U.S. federal participants inaugurate the Senior Executive Fellows executive education program, which runs for 13 weeks. 

—

Executive Education’s Senior Managers in Government, a three-week summer course for senior federal employees, begins.

The John F. Kennedy School of Government’s new home opens at 79 Boylston Street (soon to be renamed John F. Kennedy Street).

—

Executive Education’s first program—Senior Executives in National and International Security (NIS)—begins.

—

The Kennedy School Case Program opens to support the School’s use of the case study method, a teaching tool that examines real-world topics to aid in the understanding of how government works and public policy is made. 

A new location for the School is planned. School leaders along with members of the Kennedy family shown here surveying models.  

The Master in Public Administration program begins offering a two-year MPA2 degree. The one-year MPA program is renamed the Mid-Career MPA program.

—

Second-year Master in Public Policy students participate in the first Policy Analysis Exercise (PAE), in which they produce substantive analytic reports for real-world clients.

A new biennial program for newly elected members of Congress is established. Four members attend in the first year.

—

“We constantly ask ourselves ‘What do we think a student needs in order to certify him for public service? The answer, unfortunately, is more than we can possibly do in one or two years. There is far too much to do.” 

Edith Stokey, lecturer, school secretary, often referred to as the “founding mother” of the Kennedy School, quoted in the Harvard Gazette.

The faculty doubles over the previous decade. Of the School’s 88 faculty members, 11 are now solely Kennedy School appointments.

Following a two-year study, the Faculty of Public Administration recommends establishment of the Master in Public Policy program.

—

The Faculty of Arts and Sciences votes to authorize the PhD in Public Policy.

The curriculum committee recommends creating a new course for students with no previous math training, “intended to provide...an introduction to quantitative methods.”

—

Ninety-two students enroll at the School.

Eighty-eight students enroll at the School.

—

Don K. Price, Jr., the Ford Foundation’s vice president, is appointed dean. 

The faculty votes to admit women on an unrestricted basis.

—

“The political profession needs to have its temperature lowered in the cooling waters of the scholastic pool. We need both the technical judgment and the disinterested viewpoint of the scholar, to prevent us from becoming imprisoned by our own slogans.”

Senator John F. Kennedy, remarks at Harvard University, June 14, 1956

Dean Mason chairs a small committee of the School’s faculty to review the current scope and future direction of the School’s mission. Enrollment increases to 98.

Harvard economist Edward Mason is appointed dean.

The Harvard Graduate School of Public Administration (GSPA) leadership decides to continue the arrangement of drawing faculty from other Harvard faculties.

The first Littauer Center opens, located on the site of the old Hemenway Gym on Harvard’s campus.

—

The first Administration Fellows, primarily recent college graduates, are enrolled for the 1939–1940 academic year. 

The Dodds Commission, appointed by Harvard President James Conant to review a university education for public service and chaired by Princeton University President Harold Dodds, files a report with recommendations for planning and organizing the School.

—

Lucius Littauer (right) gives a $2 million gift to establish the Harvard Graduate School of Public Administration. It is the largest single gift from an individual that Harvard has ever received.

—

The Harvard Corporation makes its first 12 GSPA faculty appointments. All those named hold appointments elsewhere at Harvard.

_

“Harvard should train men to be citizens in that high Athenian sense which compels a man to live his life unceasingly aware that its civic significance is its most abiding.”

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, President of the United States, at the Harvard Tercentenary Celebration in 1936.