Administrative Law and Service Learning: Clients, Repetition, and Race

• Author: Faith Gibson Hubbard,Nicole DuPuis,Susan Sterett
• DOI: 10.1177/0095399717690016
• Published date: 01 May 2017
• Date: 01 May 2017

https://doi.org/10.1177/0095399717690016

Administration & Society

2017, Vol. 49(5) 679 –699

© The Author(s) 2017

DOI: 10.1177/0095399717690016

journals.sagepub.com/home/aas

Mini-Symposium on Law in the PA Curriculum

Administrative Law and

Service Learning: Clients,

Repetition, and Race

Susan Sterett1, Nicole DuPuis1,

and Faith Gibson Hubbard1

Abstract

The public service mission of public administration programs invites

rethinking the exclusive focus on federal court decisions in administrative

law courses. In spring 2015, we worked together in a course on the legal

environment for public administration. The course included elements of

the standard administrative law syllabus as well as a service component.

The class worked with a city on a project that required the class to gather

information about civil liability, policing, and racial inequality. A service

project allows deeper learning while upending expectations of education as

absorbing material presented to students. We argue service projects can be

part of administrative law courses.

Keywords

administrative law, service project, race, equity, policing, civil liability, service

learning, higher education

Introduction: Integrating a Service Project Into an

Administrative Law Course

In spring 2015, we worked together in a course on the legal environment for

public administration. The course included some of a standard

1Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, USA

Corresponding Author:

Susan Sterett, Center for Public Administration and Policy, Virginia Tech, 1021 Prince St.

Alexandria, VA 22314 USA.

Email: ssterett@vt.edu

690016AASXXX10.1177/0095399717690016Administration & SocietySterett et al.

research-article2017

680 Administration & Society 49(5)

administrative law syllabus, including judicial review of agency decision

making, adjudication, and notice and comment rulemaking. The course also

included a service component, working with a city to convene a meeting on

civil liability and policing. I had spoken to the city attorney before the course

started to find what we could do to extend our partnership, and I had set

some readings knowing the students would be working on a presentation on

civil liability and policing. We argue that service projects are invaluable to

learning because they open up room to rethink administrative law for public

administration and link it to other course work as well as practice. A service

learning course where the class must figure out what to present to the client

means everything is on the table, inviting cross-curricular application within

public administration. Part of the value comes from loosening the ties to the

traditional administrative law curriculum, instead turning to the political

environment administrators work in. The public service mission of public

administration programs makes service learning a great fit even in adminis-

trative law courses because service learning can connect programs to com-

munity groups or local governments to explore legal accountability in public

administration practice.

Public administration programs have expanded administrative law courses

to include analyzing the many dimensions of the legal/political environment

in which public administration operates. For example, faculty augment the

tradition of learning about administrative procedure through federal court

decisions with analysis of interest group influence in administrative pro-

cesses. Redefining administrative law courses by integrating the administra-

tive legal process with other political processes could also mean building in a

service project to allow deeper learning. By requiring students to craft learn-

ing for a client, service learning upends our expectations of education as

absorbing material presented to students (Whitaker, 2004). Practica are

already central to public administration programs, but we argue that service

projects have much to offer students in traditional subject matter courses,

including administrative law.

This article reflects on a case study of service learning in a course on the

legal environment for public administration. First, we argue that a service

project fits well with public administration teaching and learning, and with

social scientific analyses of what law does. Following that, we outline our

particular project. We reflect on our experiences integrating the project into

the curriculum as, respectively, the professor and two students. The project

was to convene a meeting of city officials to discuss empirical evidence con-

cerning civil legal accountability and policing. In the spring of 2015, race

was central to discussing policing. The centrality of race in the legal environ-

ment for public administration is not surprising, given that justice claims are