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The Picker Center for Executive Education
The Picker Center was founded in 1999 by gift from former Dean Harvey Picker. The Center is dedicated to meeting the educational needs of mid-career learners unable to attend school full-time. The Picker Center offers degree programs and non-degree programs for covering a wide range of topics and serving very diverse constituencies.
The Executive Master of Public Policy and Administration (EMPA)
The largest and oldest of the Center’s academic programs is the Executive Master of Public Policy and Administration. The program now has over 160 students taking courses and by the end of 2006, there will be 260 graduates. The EMPA offer a cohesive curriculum of seven core courses, six context courses and eight concentration courses organized into two fields—“Advanced Management and Finance” and “International Economic Policy and Management”. The program also has a healthy alumni association, the EMPA Forum.
The Picker Center also hosts an active schedule of public events that promote the study and practice of effective public policy making, including the annual Rose Osborne Lecture.
Executive Training
Over the past seven years, the Picker Center has also built an impressive list of non-degree, customized executive training programs. There are have on-going relationships with the Fire Department of the City of New York, the 92nd Street Y/Ford Motor Company International Fellows, and Guangdong Province of the People’s Republic of China. The Center also offers programs for the United National Development Program, Shanghai Media Group, China Central Television, and the Northern Ireland Community Builders. The Center is currently in discussions with the United Jewish Appeal to do a management program for their young executives.
In 2002,the Center secured a three-year state department grant to build a partnership with the École Nationale d’Administration. (ENA) in Algeria to help train government officials about advanced public management techniques and the tools of management innovation. SIPA faculty also teach in partner executive programs at Peking University in Beijing, China and the National University of Singapore.
The Picker Center has also assisted the Fire Department of New York on the development of its diversity initiative and evaluation of its innovative CPR program. The Picker Center has assisted the New York City Department of Citywide Services with its leadership training initiative and the United Nations Development Program with its LEAD recruitment initiative and Virtual Development Academy.
Non-Degree Programs
The School of International Affairs in collaboration with the World Bank Institute has partnered to create a state-of-the art, comprehensive two-week course in trade policy for development.