MLDP Recap: "21st Century Public Service" with David Uejio

 

As part of MLDP, we encourage student participants to attend other Rockefeller Center programs in order to enrich their Dartmouth experience. Read a student account of a Rockefeller Center program, and for more information about MLDP, click here. 

I am very glad I attended Dave Uejio's session "21st Century Public Service," which turned out to be an awesome discussion. Uejio covered public service, what it is, why students should consider careers in public service, etc. One of the main takeaways was the difference between politics and policy. Uejio told us that "Policy is action," eloquently explaining that politics is more focused on advocating to accomplish something while policy is concerned with efficiently operationalizing policies. Uejio also told us how he really doesn't care much for politics because at the end of the day, what matters most is not necessarily what policies should or shouldn't be passed, but rather what policies are being done and whether they are achieving the desired result.

At the beginning, he explained his very unique background and how he ended up working for the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau (CFPB). He discussed very interesting topics including some of the illegal practices the CFPB discovered credit card companies doing, how government agencies are organized, how the CFPB is unique and the overall differences in the implementation of policies in this century as compared to past centuries.

Uejio's talk was very relevant to Dartmouth students as we talked about the common trend of students going into the financial sector because of pressure to make a lot of money which he found to be very problematic. He believes that our talents could be more meaningful to us if we use our skills in the public sector to discover solutions that benefit everybody instead of using our skills for a company that merely cares about increasing profit margins. Uejio clarified that working in finance is not a bad thing and some people do enjoy it, but he wants to encourage all Dartmouth students to use their skills to benefit our society, which I found extremely thought provoking. 

-- Written by Latrell Williams ’16, MLDP participant Fall 2013