Category: Social inequality & justice

Victor Basile, counselor to the Director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and a national leader in the LGBT community, will speak at the UMass Center for Public Policy and Administration (CPPA) on Thursday, April 21, from 1-2 p.m. in Gordon Hall 302-304. 

The talk, “Navigating the Maze: Working for Social Justice and Gay Rights in the Nation’s Capitol,” will draw on Basile’s long career of government and nonprofit service and his work for social justice for LGBT people. 

Following the talk, a reception will be held in the Gordon Hall atrium to welcome Basile to campus and provide an opportunity for informal conversation with the speaker. 

The U.S. Office of Personnel Management oversees the recruitment and development of almost 2.8 million federal workers.  Basile was appointed to his position at OPM under the Obama administration.

Basile has been an advocate for LGBT rights since the late-1970s.  He served as the first executive director of the Human Rights Campaign and later co-founded the Gay & Lesbian Victory Fund to help openly gay candidates run for political office.  He was executive producer for the award-winning documentary After Stonewall and for the PBS series, In the Life.

He also served as the executive director of Moveable Feast, Inc., a Baltimore-based nonprofit serving the HIV/AIDS community.

Basile graduated from UMass Amherst in 1970 with a bachelor’s degree in public health and health sciences.  His early work as a VISTA volunteer set him on a path of public service and advocacy.

Basile’s talk is open to the public.  For additional information about the event, please contact CPPA director M.V. Lee Badgett (lbadgett@pubpol.umass.edu).

On Friday, March 11, five members of the CPPA community traveled to NYU’s Wagner Graduate School of Public Service to attend the NYU-UCLA Social Justice Regional Dialogue.

CPPA Director Lee Badgett, Associate Director Satu Zoller, and students Christa Drew, Jennifer Smith, and Jeff Hofer joined representatives from thirteen other higher education institutions in a fruitful discourse on incorporating social justice as a core aspect of graduate education in public policy, social work, urban planning, public affairs, leadership, and nonprofit management.

Part of a larger initiative led by UCLA’s Luskin School of Public Affairs and funded by the Ford and Kellogg Foundations, the event assembled faculty, staff, and students to discuss the importance of including a social justice lens as an essential analytical tool in public policy and administration training.

The event’s proceedings included speakers on social inequality and social change, exercises on innovative leadership for the public good, and small group discussions on the roles that faculty, staff, and students play in advancing social justice within their programs.

Participants took advantage of many great opportunities to make connections and exchange knowledge on a variety of topics such as curriculum, community engagement, and extra curricular activities.

CPPA’s participants emerged with new ideas and renewed commitments for supporting The Center’s mission “to realize social change and solve problems for the common good” through teaching and conducting research.

The Center’s five attendees developed an idea to host “social justice cafés” at which CPPA community members could congregate for larger inter-departmental conversations on social justice while enjoying healthy local foods.  Thoughts about advancing plans for the concept are welcome!

A corresponding West Coast regional dialogue is scheduled to take place on March 28 at UCLA’s Luskin School of Public Affairs.  More information about the initiative can be found athttp://publicaffairs.ucla.edu/content/social-justice-initiative-0.

On Monday, March 28th, the CPPA Diversity & Social Justice Committee hosted a special panel discussion on integrating social justice work into careers in public policy and administration. The event started at noon and took place in Thompson 620.

The panel members represented a variety of interests in both the nonprofit and public sectors. Among them were the following:

• Emily Mew, CPPA alumna ’09, Program and Development Coordinator, Hogar Luceros del Amanecer, The Sunrise Foundation, Camoapa, Nicaragua. Ms. Mew has experience applying CPPA training in community-based nonprofit international work. Her current organization focuses on working with disadvantaged children.
• Laura Valdiviezo, Ed.D, Assistant Professor, School of Education, UMass. Professor Valdiviezo conducts work on reforming schools as loci of change for social justice, especially through multicultural education and diversity, and the political role of educators in informing policy making.
• Jen Berman, Executive Director, Maverick Lloyd Foundation. Ms. Berman has seventeen years experience in social change and public policy advocacy work. She currently leads an organization in collaborative efforts for policy change in renewable energy and death penalty abolition.

This panel was designed to assist all UMass students thinking about careers related to social justice work, and was especially relevant for first-year students enrolled in this year’s Professional Development Seminar, led by Satu Zoller and Rachel Trafford ’11.

This was a brown bag lunch event and was open to the public.