Patria de Lancer Julnes, director of the School of Public Administration at the University of New Mexico, has been selected to serve as the president of American Society of Public Administration, the top professional association for public service with more than 10,000 members and an annual budget of $13 million. Dr. Julnes will serve a two-year term as president.
“It is an honor to have been elected and take the oath to serve as president of ASPA. As a young person from the Dominican Republic, it never occurred to me that one day I would come to play a role in developing theory and supporting the practice of a field that has a monumental impact on the lives of so many people. Public administration is at the center of solutions,” she said.
Dr. Julnes has worked with governments and universities in Latin America and Europe to improve education in and practice of public administration, building partnerships to improve government capacity, support democratic governance and address the needs of traditionally underserved populations, including helping low-income high school Hispanic students through partnerships with universities, schools, governments, businesses, and nonprofit organizations.
Dr. Julnes joined the University of New Mexico in 2021 as the inaugural Rosenthal Endowed Professor of Public Administration. Earlier, she served as associate dean and prrofessor at the Marxe School of Public and International Affairs at Baruch College of the City University of New York. She has held positions at the University of Baltimore, Pennsylvania State University-Harrisburg, Utah State University, the University of Illinois at Springfield, and Fairleigh Dickinson University in Teaneck, New Jersey. Dr. Julnes is the co-editor of Innovation In The Public And Nonprofit Sectors: A Public Solutions Handbook (Routledge, 2015).
Dr. Julnes is a graduate of Rutgers University-Newark, where she majored in economics. She earned a master of public administration degree at Fairleigh Dickinson University and a Ph.D. in public administration from Rutgers University-Newark.