Our Man in Arlington

This is a time to look back over the year to assess successes and failures, to make New Year’s resolutions, and to spend quality time with family and friends.

Not me, however. With the exception of some quality time, I have been busy writing my field statement, which, as the phrase goes, is “in partial fulfillment of the requirements for a PhD in Public Policy.”

You read it right. Here is a 66-year old retired lobbyist spending his holidays staring at a computer screen trying to organize a mass of material into an intelligible essay. (Along with a lot of Free Cell time, surfing the net for obscure pieces of information, skimming through my new CD of New York Times cartoons, and reaching too often into the Christmas candy.)

Three advisors are anxiously (I wish!) awaiting the final product so I can move into the final phase of the program – writing a state-of-the-art dissertation.

It is difficult to explain why I am doing this. I am an all-but-dissertation type, all too common in the Washington D.C. area. I spent five great years from 1960 to 1965 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina working on a political science degree. In 1965, I decided to take a break from academia to get a taste of the “real world” in Washington. I never went back. I enjoyed a reasonably successful career as a congressional staff member and lobbyist. And yet – my failure to complete my degree constantly gnawed at my subconscious. Perhaps because of this, I continued to dabble in education. I spent some time on the Arlington School Board and eight years on George Mason University’s Board of Visitors, during which we established what ultimately became the School of Public Policy, where I am now pursuing my PhD.

A little over five years ago, I was quietly reading some education journal when I came across an advertisement for George Mason’s public policy program. It hit me like a ton of brick’s. Why not? I could finally redeem myself in the eyes of my family and friends. I could earn a PhD. in retirement. I entered the program in the fall of 1999 as a part-time PhD student.

When my wife said “why?” I said “for the fun of it!” “We can go to Paris for the fun of it” was her passionate rejoinder. I won’t bore you with the details except to tell you that graduate school has changed a lot since the sixties. The most obvious shift, at least in the type of degree I was pursuing, was the requirement that I learn both statistics and calculus. (My calculus professor, younger than my son, “I guess you will have to brush up on your calculus.” My problem, as I told him, was that I had nothing to brush up on.)

After I finished my course work and finally passed the all-important qualifying exam, I slowed down a bit. Then, a few months ago I got notice that I had to pass my field exam and get my dissertation proposal finished by September 2005. I had to buckle down, hence my hitting the books and the computer during the holiday season.

I’m still not sure what I will do with it when and if I get it. Most of my new graduate student friends have to finish to move on with their chosen careers. I don’t, but it would seem a shame to do all of the work and not put it to some worthy purpose. But that will be another story. Richard Barton may be emailed at rbarton@towervillas.com