Executive mpa 2014 Faculty & Practitioner Biographies 2014-2015

Executive MPA

2014

David Birdsell, Dean of the Baruch College School of Public Affairs and Special Assistant to the President for Institutional Effectiveness, has centered his academic work on the nexus of communication, media, and information technology in politics, government and nonprofit administration. An expert on political debating and widely published on communication theory and practice, David is a regular guest commentator on debates and other aspects of political communication for local, national, and international television and print media. His work has been supported by the Pew Charitable Trusts, the IBM Endowment for the Study of Business and Government, the Lyndon Baines Johnson Foundation, the New York Community Trust, the JPMorganChase Foundation, the United Way of New York City, the Markle Foundation, and other funders. David serves on the New York City Broadband Advisory Committee and on the Executive Council of the National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration. He chairs the board of the Volunteer Consulting Group-Governance Matters and serves on the board of the New York Census Research Data Center and the Advisory Board of the Human Services Council.

He received his B.A. and M.A. degrees from the University of Virginia and his Ph.D. in Public Communication from the University of Maryland.

Gregg Bishop, Deputy Commissioner, NYC Department of Small Business Services

PAF 9132 Governing NYC, Year 2

As Deputy Commissioner of the Business Development Division at the NYC Department of Small Business Services, Gregg is responsible for NYC Business Solutions, Business Incentives, the Business Outreach Team, the Corporate Alliance Program, and the SBS Customer Service Center.

Gregg has also served as the Senior Manager of Workforce Development at NPower, where he was responsible for doubling the capacity of Technology Service Corps, a nationally recognized technology training program for young adults 18-25. Gregg also served as Vice President of Technology Operations at TheStreet.com, where he helped build and maintain the company's internal and external technology infrastructure.

Gregg received his B.S. in Business Administration from Florida A&M University and Masters in Integrated Marketing and Management Communication from The Florida State University.

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Prior to his current position, Mark was the Managing Director of Binder and Binder, a national law firm handling Social Security Disability. He led the corporate giving program at Philip Morris Companies (presently known as Altria) and has over twenty years of public policy experience, having worked in Washington, D.C. and in Albany, New York. An informal consultant to numerous nonprofit organizations, he has been a presenter at national and regional grant making conferences, including the Council on Foundations and was a past Chair of the Board of Philanthropy New York and served on the Board of the Edwin Gould Academy, and serves on the Dean’s Council at the Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Human Development at NYU and on the Board of Overseers at the Rockefeller Institute. He served on the adjunct faculty at the Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at New York University and is currently a member of the adjunct faculty at Baruch College.

He is a graduate of the School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University and attended the National Law Center at George Washington University.
Laurel Brown, J.D., Executive Director of Operations + Administration for Downtown Brooklyn Partnership

PAF 9136 Urban Economic Development, Year 2

Laurel currently serves as the Executive Director of Operations + Administration for Downtown Brooklyn Partnership (DBP) -- a nonprofit local development corporation -- and its three affiliated business improvement districts. Overseeing a collective budget of $7.1 million, Laurel is charged with managing, activating, and beautifying approximately 1.5 million sf of public space, implementing innovative "green tech" initiatives, steering capital investment projects, and overseeing the general financial and administrative needs of the four organizations.

Prior to joining DBP, Laurel served as the Executive Director of the Jamaica Center Business Improvement District – a bustling central business district in the borough of Queens.  Her success as a revitalization expert included the launch of a comprehensive retail attraction program, the creation of an innovative destination marketing campaign, and the production of a marquee fashion event -- all of which ultimately earned her a 2013 BID Leadership/Neighborhood Achievement Award and recognition from NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Laurel, a former Wall Street attorney, practiced real estate law and financial restructuring. She earned her J.D. from Harvard Law School and her Bachelor’s Degrees in Economics and Computer Science from New York University, where she graduated magna cum laude.

PAF 9120 Public and Non Profit Management, Year 1

John Casey has published extensively and given numerous presentations in the fields of government-nongovernment relations, immigration policy, policing, and university teaching.

From 1999 to 2007, he was a Senior Lecturer in management, leadership and governance at the Australian Graduate School of Policing and Charles Stuart University in Sydney. He was also a visiting lecturer in criminal justice at the University of Maine at Augusta and the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and an adjunct lecturer in community management at the University of Technology in Sydney.

Before his academic career, Dr. Casey worked as a public sector and nonprofit manager. From 1992 to 1998, he was the Executive Officer of the Masters in Public Management program at a three university consortium in Barcelona, Spain and a consultant to the European Union working on public sector development in Eastern Europe. Previously, he had been the Director of the Mayor's Office of Adult Literacy for the City of New York, USA and a social services manager in Sydney, Australia.

He received his B.A. from the University of Sydney, B.S.W. from the University of Sydney, M.P.A. from Baruch College, and Ph.D. from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona in Political Science.