Public Policy

The Civil Grand Jury Public Policy will serve as a public policy experience for students.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

Radial cluster diagram of Public Policy’s Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities.
Radial cluster diagram of Public Policy’s Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities.

Individuals who complete Public Policy will acquire the following knowledge, skills, and abilities:

  • Knowledge gained include the interaction between civil grand jury reports and local government responses, how local governments act, or do not act, on findings and recommendations included in reports, and how the status quo is changed or kept.
  • Skills developed include proficiency in reading local government meeting agendas and minutes, describing the implications of local government action or inaction on the status quo, and explaining how keeping or changing the status quo can affect the local government and its constituents.
  • Abilities obtained include the capacity to analyze local government meeting agendas and minutes, capacity to explain how local public policy is made, and the capacity to describe how public policy directly effects individuals, communities, and businesses.

Learning Objectives

After conducting Public Policy, an individual will be able to:

  • Remember how local governments respond to civil grand jury reports, findings, and recommendations.
  • Understand how a local government acting, or not acting, on recommendations changes or keeps the status quo.
  • Apply agenda setting to determine how local governments act, or do not act, on recommendations.
  • Analyze written and oral arguments made by local government representatives to justify changing or keeping the status quo.
  • Evaluate the real-world impact of a local government’s action, or inaction, in response to recommendations.
  • Publish a public policy blog post, which analyzes a county civil grand jury report, the report’s specific findings and recommendations to a local government, the local government’s specific response, whether the status quo was changed or not, and what keeping or changing the status quo means to the local government and its constituents.

Deliverables

  • Public policy blog posts.
  • Public policy analysis of local government implementation of civil grand jury recommendations.