For more information contact:
Sylvia Williams, Director of Communications
Fielding Graduate University
Santa Barbara, CA 93105
805.898.2947
sawilliams@fielding.edu

Santa Barbara, CA (December 3, 2007) - Mid-career professionals from around the world are studying how to improve dialogue in their communities and organizations as a way to strengthen democracy. Called Dialogue, Deliberation, and Public Engagement, this unusual 19-week certificate at Fielding Graduate University has attracted participants from Latin America, Australia, Asia, Europe, and the United States.

The goal of this educational experience is to enable practitioners to create useful dialogue that contributes to greater participation in decision making and public policy. An important component of this goal is to increase international exchange of information around dialogue and deliberation.

Simon Wright, a current student, describes it this way, "I feel extremely fortunate to be working for an organization charged with developing policy advice to the New Zealand government by promoting, and participating in, dialogue with the public. We are currently hosting a national deliberation on the pre-birth testing of human embryos and fetuses. For the first time in New Zealand, a National Issues Forum approach is being tried by a government agency. That's because my colleague, John Pennington, took this Fielding course last year."

Representing fields such as non-profit management, government administration, conflict resolution, international diplomacy and urban planning, this diverse group is working to become experts in the practice of dialogue and deliberation. Nicole Hunter, Manager for Community Engagement for the Environment Protection Authority of Victoria, Australia, is a good example of this diversity. "I have worked for state government organizations for the last 15 years and in that time I have worked in many different forms of engagement - with farmers, farm families, then on to organizational change and succession planning, through to public land management issues such as forestry, fire, and marine parks."

Students learn a variety of skills and methods to apply in their particular fields, including interacting in complex, cross cultural environments. "Working for the UN in Latin America and the Caribbean, I am particularly interested in advancing the practice of dialogue for conflict prevention and democratic governance," stated Marc-Andre Franche, a current participant of the program.

The program uses a scholar-practitioner model of reflective practice that emphasizes how to apply dialogue and deliberation in ways that strengthen citizen engagement. Guest lecturers have included Carolyn Lukensmeyer, AmericaSpeaks, Jane Mansbridge, award-winning deliberative democracy scholar, Robert Stains, Public Conservations Project, Janette Hartz Karp, Australian innovator of deliberative approaches, Frank Barrett, Appreciative Inquiry Summits, Shawn Spano, Public Dialogue Consortium, and Juanita Brown and David Isaacs, World Café.

The next enrollment date is July 2008. For more information, please contact Nathan Lewin at nlewin@fielding.edu.

This program is offered jointly by Fielding Graduate University and the University of Sydney, Australia. "This partnership provides the opportunity for participants from different countries to interact and adds an important international dimension to the learning. Participants are welcome to attend workshops in either country," points out Dr. Jan Elliott, lead faculty member of the program. The program was developed in collaboration with the International Institute for Sustained Dialogue, the Kettering Foundation and the Public Dialogue Consortium.

The Institute for Social Innovation supports graduate scholarships, educational programs, and research and professional practice projects that create social capital. Housed in Fielding's School of Human and Organization Development, ISI supports projects that: 1) promote social innovation through collaborations between the nonprofit, for profit, and government sectors; 2) strengthen individuals and institutions through participatory and collaborative change; and 3) integrate knowledge from theory and professional practice for sustainable change. "The Institute has a track record of support for innovative approaches that produce systemic change in individuals, organizations and communities," said Katrina Rogers, Director. "By supporting committed and talented people who are doing creative work, we are building a sustainable and socially humane future." For more information on the Institute, contact krogers@fielding.edu.

Fielding Graduate University is headquartered in Santa Barbara, CA, where it was founded in 1974. It is a world-recognized leader in graduate education, having created one of the first and most successful distributed learning models for mid-career adults. Fielding is an accredited, nonprofit graduate university offering programs within three schools: Psychology, Human & Organization Development, and Educational Leadership & Change. The Fielding community is dedicated to lifelong learning; social justice and change; and innovation in organizations, communities, and society. For more information, visit www.fielding.edu.