I had no idea what to expect from this course. I had only recently decided that I would major in Education Policy, and this was the only course in the policy sequence being offered at the time. I was also worried because I was taking the course out of sequence, as it was intended to follow EDUC 870, which I had not taken yet. The course involved a variety of atypical assignments and also served the purpose of developing a different skill in writing. Policy memos were concise and did not require APA citations unlike other research papers. The course also used a well-known policy framework developed by John Kingdon as a basis for learning in the course. However, throughout the course, I did not completely understand what a policy framework was or how it could be used to frame policy issues.

I did, however, see how Kingdon’s description of policy streams played out in my real-world experiences. Kingdon argues that a subject is most likely to rise on a “decision agenda” when the political, policy and problem streams are combined with political entrepreneurs. What I appreciated most about his model is that it recognizes that the policy process is fluid and non-linear, and that it involves a vast number of actors and forces. In my work experiences as a policy analyst, I saw how my role helped influence decisions that were made at the federal level and I could testify to the importance of political will in helping various policies reach the implementation stage. In one of my work assignments, our research findings on a policy related to teachers covered by Social Security retirement plans resulted in an amendment to the government pension offset provision in the Social Security Law. During this assignment, I could see first-hand how the problem, policy, and political streams interacted. Ultimately, I walked away from the course with a great understanding of Kingdon’s model but I was still unsure about what I could use it for. Perhaps that is why I should not have taken the course out of sequence!