After laughing
and chatting in close-knit circles, it’s finally time for a group of Nigerian
state legislators in the living room of UC Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public
Policy to hear the day’s lecture — a lecture that aims to bring them one step
closer to implementing better public policies in their state.
The group of
40 legislators from the Delta State House of Assembly in Nigeria arrived in
Berkeley on July 29 to take part in a newly designed two-week executive
leadership program focusing on governance and policy development in areas such
as housing, higher education and sustainable energy. They will be returning for
the next two summers to participate in additional two-week training programs.
The Honorable
Victor Ochei, speaker of Nigeria’s Delta State Legislature, said that when the
House Assembly was originally looking at educational programs abroad, they were
choosing between various prestigious schools, including UC Berkeley.
“We thought
Harvard was the best, actually, but Goldman was the top-rated school,” Ochei
said. “Here in Berkeley, it’s different because the style is more open and more
practical. For every time there’s a lecture, there is a field trip. ”
Staff members
at the Goldman school said they view the program as an exciting opportunity not
only to teach theoretical public policy frameworks but also to see how those
theories are put into practice by active world leaders. The school also
partners with the Jiangsu province in China, Kochi University of Technology in
Japan and the Civil Service Bureau of the Hong Kong special administrative
region to create similar programs.
“We want to
implement international policy and understand how other countries are thinking
in order to be able to work with them,” said Sudha Shetty, assistant dean for
global alliances at the school.
Different
issues are addressed each day during the two-week program, providing a
comprehensive education in each area of public policy the leaders wish to
reform.
Wednesday’s
itinerary included a discussion with Henry Brady, dean of the public policy
school, concerning the dynamics of higher education and what it does for
society. The discussion was followed by a group field trip to Sacramento to see
California legislators in action.
On another
day, legislators worked on developing innovative ways to engage Nigerian youth
in issues like job access and education, which, according to the Honorable Barr
Princess Pat Ajudua, has posed a significant challenge.
“The youth are
restless — restless from unemployment and lack of education,” Ajudua said.
“When youth get out of school and find themselves without a job, they turn to
all kinds of criminal things to get money to leave their parents and get
married and lead a good life.”
Because of the
program, Ajudua believes that the Assembly has already learned strategies to
confront the issue, such as instating more facilities provided for youth to go
to school, financial grounds for students to get an education they otherwise
could not afford and initiating new training programs for teachers.
Despite the
seriousness of the political problems the program aimed to tackle, the
atmosphere in the lecture hall was both academically rigorous and social.
Assembly members shared many laughs and side conversations between PowerPoint
slides on global governance.
“So far, the
program’s been fantastic,” Ochei said.
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