[Kathy2]

This course is new to 2010-2011, and is taught by Professor Flynn. It was toted as "If you want to work in the government public sector, take this class!" But I don't think it fit too well with any real-world application to the public sector.

It was all lectures, 3 times a week. No tutorials, no participation. The grade breakdown was:
Group research proposal - 20%
Group presentation - 20%
Group paper - 40%
Final exam - 20%

80% of your grade is based on group work. This worked out for me, because I had a great group - but I can imagine it was a huge pain for other groups. The groups were 4 people each, it was a 40 page paper, and you had to pick any policy issue in Canada and find a solution for it. It was kind of fun that we got to pick our own topic, especially since the project was so big. It was a lot of research and a lot of work, but if you get along with your group, it isn't particularly bad.

The lecture material isn't very interesting. I normally love Flynn's classes, but this one was boring and even he seemed somewhat uninterested. He posted the slides online but you still need to go to class and get all the information necessary for the exam.

It wasn't my favourite class, but this is the first time it has been run, so they are working out the kinks. I think it might look good to mention on a resume if you want to work in the public sector, but I had a government job and I don't see how much of this course material applied in any sense other than in theory. If you like Flynn and you like group work, this is the class for you. If you're more interested in a class with in depth, non-theoretical material, this maybe isn't the best course.