Most 10-year-olds are happy to make do with cake and ice cream at their birthday parties. But on April 18, the Stanford-in-Washington program will celebrate its first decade with a gala dinner at the U.S. Supreme Court.
The program opened its doors in the spring of 1988, and since then, more than 600 students have spent a quarter at the handsome brick building on Connecticut Avenue about two miles north of the White House. It's no stroll along the Mall: They study at night with Stanford faculty and work full time at internships in federal agencies, congressional offices, nonprofit organizations and media outlets.
"It's been something that participating students have really enjoyed," says Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, '50, JD '52, who sits on the program's advisory board and will help to coordinate the anniversary banquet. "Stanford was one of the first universities to develop a solid program to bring students here, provide a residential facility and have very good placements for the students in various agencies. It's been quite successful."
There were only 11 members in its first class, but today nearly 60 students apply for about 30 spots in the fall- and spring-quarter sessions. A winter-quarter program focusing on environmental and health-care policy, now five years old, enrolls about 15 students each year. Participants live "on campus" in the Robert M. and Anne T. Bass Center, a former hotel and restaurant built in 1921. (One perk: Each student room has its own bathroom.)
The main focus of the program is the internship experience. Director Adrienne Jamieson, like her two predecessors, has built a wide network of potential employers since arriving in 1994 from Cal's political science department. This year, students have apprenticed at the World Bank, the Senate budget committee and the Washington bureau of the Los Angeles Times. Besides working full time, they enroll in one of two seminars offered each quarter and participate in a policy tutorial.
Seminar leaders are Jamieson herself, another Stanford faculty member in residence for the quarter or University alums and friends living and working nearby. This spring, Jamieson's seminar, "The Politician," examines theories about what distinguishes office-seekers from others. Bruce Owen, PhD '70, a former Stanford economics professor now with a Washington consulting firm, is offering a class on economics and the law.
As many as nine tutorials are offered each quarter. They are geared to students' specific interests, and class size is limited to four. In fall quarter, an officer in the Washington court system led one tutorial on criminal justice, and a Smithsonian executive conducted another on arts funding.
Donald Kennedy conceived of the Stanford-in-Washington program when he was University president in the mid-1980s. He saw it as a way to give students an opportunity to work in public policy. "It was plain that the interests of a lot of students were in service in the public sector," he says. The idea found a receptive board of trustees, many of whom had served stints in government.
As an incubator of public servants, Stanford in Washington has already delivered. Its oldest alumni are only in their early 30s, too young to be seen in Congress. But recent alumni do include Hill staffers, aides to cabinet secretaries and civilian officials in the Pentagon. Many are in law school, picking up their degrees before continuing on to governmental careers.
One such leader is Erik Sten, '89, who was recently elected to the Portland, Ore., City Council. Sten, a Daily reporter, arrived in Washington excited with his internship assignment at Congressional Quarterly. But that job didn't work out, and he relocated to the intergovernmental affairs office of D.C.'s municipal government, tracking the district's issues before Congress. Today he's said to be one of the youngest city commissioners in the country.
Almost 300 of the program's alumni are expected to attend the three-day anniversary celebration. Planned to be "both celebratory and cerebral," Jamieson says, it will include an open house at the Bass Center, a brunch at the spacious home of Sen. Jay Rockefeller and Sharon Percy Rockefeller, '66, and a "day college" at the National Press Club. Scheduled participants include University President Gerhard Casper; Provost Condoleezza Rice; economics Professor Roger Noll, director of the Public Policy program; and political science Professor David Brady.
And then there's the dinner and reception for 250 at the Supreme Court. Chief Justice William Rehnquist, '48, JD '52, will be there along with O'Connor, and justices Stephen Breyer, '59, and Anthony Kennedy, '58, are invited, too. Not a bad guest list for a 10-year-old.
Jesse Oxfeld, '98, is a communication major from South Orange, N.J.
