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The Role of Higher Education in Public Leadership 11 Paul C. Light Public leadership has become a central concern in higher education, but it remains a concept in flux. The goal remains the same: build an entire generation of public leaders. But there is a new movement underway to transform what used to be seen as a dry, bureaucratic , top-down hierarchy into a vibrant, collaborative, and inclusive system of leadership that reflects the values and vision of a new generation of young people . That system eschews the still-powerful “star system” that focuses on finding and supporting a handful of future leaders. In contrast, the new model assumes that every student, no matter how young or old, has a capacity to contribute to and participate in something larger than herself or himself. This new concept of leadership, however, requires different ways of thinking about how we educate for leadership. Traditionally, young people interested in becoming leaders were directed to business or management schools, where they learned public speaking, goal-setting, and budgeting. Now, as young people become more interested in leadership as public service, there must be new thinking about the ways in which we educate and train for those positions. This is a point to be discussed later in this chapter. Higher education is critical to that equation. It acts as a gatekeeper into the world of public leadership and plays a crucial role in shaping student attitudes about public service of all kinds, starting with volunteering as an introduction to public leadership across the sectors. Anyone can lead a life of public leadership, be it in government, private business, or nonprofit agencies. Too often, however, higher education sees volunteering and other forms of public leadership as something students should do in their free time. Too many career counselors view Americorps as little more than a ticket to graduate school, and public leadership as a second-choice destination compared to the exhilarating , high-prestige jobs that once existed in the private sector. 222 moving forward The Current Conversation Higher education may have the right intentions, but it is still at some distance from changing direction. It tends to focus on what students can do, not on what students might do. Higher education focuses almost exclusively on short-term indicators of service such as the numbers of students who belong to clubs, participate in days of service, or take public leadership courses. All are responsible measures of important activities, but they do not indicate public leadership. The ultimate outcome ought to be social impact in addressing urgent threats that students care about, not marking time with antiquated images of service. It is no surprise that the conversation about public leadership might be sharply divided within academic borders: The conversation is sharply divided between research and practice, as if re- • search is somehow an adversary of action. Although there is high-quality research underway throughout the academic community, there are barriers between the results and needed fine-tuning of specific programs. The conversation is also sharply divided across academic disciplines and • their schools. Even when they are housed in the same building, the disciplines seem unable to communicate as they fight over ownership of the latest fashions such as social entrepreneurship. Business schools have been at the forefront of social entrepreneurship training, leaving political science, public policy schools, sociology, anthropology, the humanities, and the hard sciences well behind or even ostracized. The conversation involves too many gatherings of too few people. The in- • dividuals and organizations involved in public leadership often stick to themselves, whether because they are isolated from more traditional views or because they choose to remain separate. They are old-school leaders after all—they see themselves as competitors for a relatively small number of positions that exist primarily at the very top of government. The conversation focuses almost exclusively on stories about lone wolves • who struggle mightily against the odds to make an impact, even though we now know that collaborative creativity actually produces more success and fewer failures. As a result, collaboration is rarely discussed as a leadership tactic, in part because it produces few stars who get credit for impact. The conversation tends to be drawn to big goals, but not always particularly • rigorous measurements and plans. Collaboration is the hot new concept, as it should be, but building successful social networks requires the same rigor that business entrepreneurs use to produce the waves of creative destruction [18.223.196.59] Project MUSE (2024...

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