That observation is certainly true of leadership education. As a multidisciplinary subject area of broad intellectual interest, “Leadership” nevertheless requires practical application—especially in the context of a graduate professional school like the Kennedy School of Government.

Since opening its doors five years ago, the Center for Public Leadership (CPL) has helped to exert a salutary influence on leadership education at the School. Overall student enrollment in leadership courses, for instance, has increased some 70 percent. Enrollment in the optional Leadership concentration has been the highest of all concentrations for five years running. In academic year 2004-05 alone, CPL core faculty developed or assisted in the development of several new degree program courses and one new executive program. And CPL produces an annual Guide to Leadership Courses, which has recently been expanded to include social entrepreneurship courses.

Generally speaking, formal curricular instruction at the School occurs in two arenas: degree programs and executive programs. The former refers primarily to the one or two-year master’s degree programs (though the School also has three Ph.D. programs that engage a comparatively smaller number of its faculty and students); the latter refers to recurring one- to four-week programs for mid-career professionals. While both junior and senior faculty teach in degree programs, senior faculty generally teach in executive programs.

With this context in mind, here are a few recent curricular highlights from the degree and executive program arenas:

Degree Programs

Executive Programs