Getting Your Foot in the Door: The Impact of Public Sector Fellowships on Career Trajectories.

Governments face significant challenges in attracting and retaining younger talent, leading to a workforce increasingly skewed towards older employees. This study examines the impact of public sector fellowship programs as alternative pathways into government roles for early career professionals. Le...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Publicado en:Public Administration Review Vol. 86; no. 1; pp. 235 - 258
Autores principales: Sciepura, Brenda, Wall, Alec, Linos, Elizabeth
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: Wiley-Blackwell Jan/Feb2026
Materias:
Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
fields @attributes:
  recordID: 1
pdfLink:
plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=190956087&site=ehost-live
header:
  @attributes:
    shortDbName: ssf
    uiTerm: 190956087
    longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson)
    uiTag: AN
  controlInfo:
    bkinfo:
    jinfo:
      jid:
        00333352
        PBA
      jtl: Public Administration Review
      issn: 00333352
      maglogo: Y
    pubinfo:
      dt: Jan/Feb2026
      vid: 86
      iid: 1
      pid: 480
      pub: Wiley-Blackwell
    artinfo:
      ui:
        190956087
        10.1111/puar.13958
      ppf: 235
      ppct: 23
      formats:
        fmt:
          – @attributes:
              type: T
          – @attributes:
              type: C
          – @attributes:
              type: P
              size: 754KB
      tig:
        atl: Getting Your Foot in the Door: The Impact of Public Sector Fellowships on Career Trajectories.
      aug:
        au:
          Sciepura, Brenda
          Wall, Alec
          Linos, Elizabeth
        affil:
          University of California, Berkeley California,, USA
          Harvard Kennedy School, Harvard University, Cambridge Massachusetts,, USA
      su:
        United States
        Public sector
        Career development
        Political science
        Internship programs
        Skilled labor
        Scholarly method
      sug:
        subj:
          Public sector
          Career development
          Political science
          Internship programs
          Skilled labor
          Scholarly method
          United States
          Professional and Management Development Training
          Vocational Rehabilitation Services
      keyword:
        fellowships
        public sector careers
        recruitment
        retention
        fellowships
        public sector careers
        recruitment
        retention
      ab: Governments face significant challenges in attracting and retaining younger talent, leading to a workforce increasingly skewed towards older employees. This study examines the impact of public sector fellowship programs as alternative pathways into government roles for early career professionals. Leveraging data from 17 cohorts of applicants across four US fellowship programs over 19 years (N = 2141; 31,153 individual‐year observations), we employ a staggered difference‐in‐differences approach to compare the career trajectories of fellows and similarly motivated finalists. We find that fellowship participants are 30 percentage points more likely to pursue government careers, with a significant employment effect persisting up to 8 years after the launch of the fellowship. These findings suggest that scholarship can look beyond motivation‐based theories of who enters and stays in government to better understand how to bring new and different people into the public sector.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
    refInfo:
    copyright:
      @attributes:
        flag: N
    holdings:
      @attributes:
        islocal: N