Bridging the learning divide between theory and practice

Postgraduate courses designed for public servants are viewed by participants as a useful device for career advancement. Courses such as the Graduate Certificate in Policy Analysis (GCPA), which is offered to a sponsored cohort... [ view full abstract ]

Postgraduate courses designed for public servants are viewed by participants as a useful device for career advancement. Courses such as the Graduate Certificate in Policy Analysis (GCPA), which is offered to a sponsored cohort of mid-level public servants from local, state and Commonwealth governments and taught by staff at Griffith University’s School of Government and International Relations, help bridge the divide between theory and practice. Academic teaching combined with practical insights from senior practitioners and industry experts provide different perspectives of the work that policy officers undertake. An ongoing challenge for academics teaching public servants is how to make normative theoretical approaches relevant to their work. This paper analyses the nexus between researchers and practitioners gathered through three different surveys. The first surveys the 2015 cohort of public servants undertaking their final course in the GCPA; the second surveys the GCPA alumni cohort (2007-2014) about the theories they have found particularly relevant to their work, while the third will survey the incoming cohort of students for 2016. We seek to examine what these different groups find useful and what they find more difficult in the study of policy analysis. This paper uses a bottom-up approach to understand the different perspectives academics and practitioners bring to the learning environment with the aim of extending the teaching toolkit.