Baker Students Get Insiders View of Washington, D.C.
Stepping onto the Senate floor, looking out from the Speaker’s Balcony and looking at the teleprompter from behind the PBS NewsHour anchor desk were just a few of the exclusive experiences 12 University of Tennessee students encountered over two weeks in May as participants in the Washington Fellows program with the Howard H. Baker Jr. School of Public Policy and Public Affairs (Baker School).
The intensive course brought students from various majors interested in public affairs and connected them to some of the nation’s top public servants, researchers, and journalists. Through meetings with policy, communications, economics, and elected leaders, students had a chance to see how policy ideas develop.
Travelling to where major public policy is created, passed, implemented, and communicated, the students explored careers at every level of the process. Aimed at providing up close views of people working together to solve today’s biggest problems, the Washington Fellows program also allows students to bond and grow over shared experiences.
Rising senior Savannah Morrison, of Nashville, Tennessee, has been active in many Baker School programs and jumped at the chance to join the Washington Fellows. Studying social work and political science, with an interest in welfare, public policy, foster care, and resource accessibility, the trip gave her an opportunity to see how government might impact her career. Morrison looks to obtain her master’s in social work to become a clinical social worker in forensics or child welfare after graduation.
What attracted you to the Washington Fellows’ program?
I’ve done quite a few programs at the Baker School; along with loving the community I’ve found here, I have learned through these programs the importance of connections and networking. The Washington Fellows trip is a program that really emphasizes those skills and allows students to build personal and professional connections with people in a vast amount of careers in D.C.
What were you expecting from the program, and how were they met?
Going into the Washington Fellows program, I was most curious about all the different careers in D.C. As a social work major, I don’t know too much about all the different organizations that make up the bigger picture. This trip exceeded my expectations in the way that I met so many people and heard from so many companies that I didn’t even think about or knew existed, yet they are essential to how our country runs and to how our government operates. I am happy to have a more well-rounded view of the careers in D.C. I thought there wasn’t necessarily a place for me there, but I now see that there are so many roles that a social worker can fit into.
What was the highlight of the program for you?
Besides gaining so much knowledge about the various different types of policy we heard about, the highlight of the trip for me was navigating the city. Whether it was on the free weekend, navigating the train and bus systems to visit museums, or as a group learning about the symbolic structure of the city as a whole and how it represents power, it was so exciting to experience our nation’s capital in an intensive and educational way rather than just being a tourist! Going inside buildings and spaces that I only ever thought I’d see the outside of–the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, the Senate Floor and cloak room, the PBS NewsHour Studio–there were so many experiences that really helped me feel connected to these organizations and government.
What was something you gained from the program that you were not expecting?
Something I gained from this program was just an overall newfound confidence in professional settings. The trip was intense, and we were running low on sleep but the prestige of the settings we were in forced us to remain professional and still ask profound questions. If I can do it in those conditions, I can do it anywhere!
You’ve been involved in a few programs with the Baker School. How was this one different for you?
The Washington Fellows Program is different from any other program I’ve done at the Baker School in the way that it is immersive. We are living in D.C. for two weeks experiencing everything about it–the careers, the city itself, and the culture. It really surrounds you with a sense of what it could be like if you were to build your career there, too.