GovernmentExecutive.com

House and Senate lawmakers plan to reintroduce legislation in the coming weeks that would draw young people into government careers through the creation of a public service academy.

The measure would establish a 5,000-person undergraduate academy, on par with the nation's military academies, to inject prestige back into public institutions and to highlight the importance of public service.

The academy would be free to students, at a cost of $205 million a year to taxpayers. Students would be nominated by members of Congress in a process much like that at the military service academies, and would be required to study abroad and to complete internships with nonprofit and military organizations. They also would undergo a summer of emergency response training.

After graduation, they would repay the country for their free education by spending at least five years working for the government, at the local, state or federal level. In a departure from the version of the measure introduced last year, they would not be allowed to fulfill this requirement by working at nonprofit charitable organizations.

The original bill was unveiled late last congressional session and did not make it out of committee. But Chris Myers Asch, who came to Washington to lobby for the academy after founding a nonprofit to encourage college attendance in the poverty-stricken Mississippi Delta, said the initial introduction helped garner early support nationwide.

Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., and Arlen Specter, R-Pa., plan to reintroduce the bill in their chamber. Reps. Jim Moran, D-Va., and Chris Shays, R-Conn., are planning to introduce companion legislation in the House. The lawmakers are set to hold a press conference as early as next week to announce the bill.

"Now, more than ever, it is imperative that our nation improve its capacity to groom future public servants," Clinton said in a statement. "The establishment of a public service academy is an innovative way to strengthen and protect America by creating a corps of well-trained, highly qualified civilian leaders."

One factor driving the push for the academy is the pending retirement wave across the government, with 60 percent of federal employees expected to retire in the next decade, Asch said. "The consequences are only going to grow larger as time goes on, as these shortages become acute," he said.

The bill also addresses the need to develop qualified leaders to respond to potential terrorism, natural disasters or other emergencies.

Given the tight budget, new appropriations could be difficult to secure. But Asch was optimistic. "We, being the American people, fund things that we consider priorities and we value," he said. "We think that investing in public service leadership is a priority ... and we need the political courage to pass this legislation."

In the meantime, Asch is encouraging high school and college students as well as recent college graduates to sign a letter to convince skeptical lawmakers of the youthful grass-roots support for the academy.

"We appreciate all the support from lawmakers thus far," Asch said. "We need to inspire young people to see public service in a different way, and to do that you need something inspiring and bold that will fire young people up about public service."

COMMENTS

• What an excellent idea! It's about time that our society see the importance and value in public service and how it can develop future leaders of tomorrow. Jen Posted July 30, 2007 5:55 PM
• This idea of a public service academy does have merit but it should not select students via the existing Congressional Nomination process. The Coast Guard Academy was able to bypass this antiquated system because they started out with "six men and a boat" and before Congress figured out that they were out there they were beyond and out of reach. The USGA is not having any difficulty filling their class each year.The class size of 1250 is also too large. Everyone knows that a third of all academy classes are awesome, a third, average and other third, awful. Author Bruce Fleming pointed out in his book Annapolis Autumn that nearly 50% of appointments to the US Naval Academy " failed to meet academic requirements." We can do better than this! Brian M. Douglass Posted June 5, 2007 12:16 AM
• Wow! Lots of emotions on both sides of this proposal. Here are a couple of thoughts. First, many of the problems complained about by those commenting are due to poor management. Does this not suggest the need for some improvement in this area that this institution might provide? Yes I know about the political nonsense, but you are always going to have that to contend with, even in the private sector. Second, is everyone clueless as to the size of federal budgets and expenditures? The cost of providing such an academy is dwarfed by the amounts that could be saved by only small percentage of improvements in the management of these expenditures. I agree that these grads should not be fast-tracked over currently serving feds. They need to be mentored in the real world. I also agree that more should be done to provide access to advanced education and degrees by currently serving feds. It is shameful and stupid that more has not been done in this area of graduate training previously. Today's world is complex. We don't need a partisan litmus test for entry. We just need a merit and ability based system where the sharpest minds and best qualified people are running things instead of those chosen by the politically correct special interest group lottery system. Merit should prevail. Let the best ideas win, and the ablest people rise, and everyone including the taxpayer will benefit. Give the students a good mix of theory, education and practical experience. You can't really get that at all the existing Schools of Public Administration since these are profit making institutions and often focus on State and local government problems not federal ones. GovExec.com reader Posted March 20, 2007 5:05 PM