Contact: Morgan Tubbs
STARKVILLE, Miss.--One former and two current Mississippi State graduate students are finalists for the 2012 Presidential Management Fellows program.
"The preparation necessary to get to this stage of the process is extraordinary," said Cassandra Latimer, associate director of the university's Career Center.
"For three Mississippi State students to get to this stage is quite a feather in the cap for the university and a tremendous honor for these students," she observed.
The MSU student finalists join peers from other universities and colleges around the country, including Cornell, Harvard, Princeton, and Yale; Mississippi State was the only school in the state with student finalists.
The trio includes:
--Susan Mary Bruce Alford of Jackson, a master's degree student in public policy and administration;
--James C. Bayne of Waynesboro, a 2008 MSU industrial technology graduate who also received a master's degree in business administration during last December's fall commencement; and
--Jesse R. English of Marianna, Fla., a 2008 MSU business administration graduate now pursuing a master's degree in landscape architecture.
Considered a "training ground" for graduate students in areas of public policy, management, and leadership, the Presidential Management Fellows program was created by Executive Order in 1977 during the Carter Administration.
Participants receive salary and benefits, formal classroom training, and challenging assignments through employment with one or more federal agencies. Many program alumni continue to work in these agencies, as well as in the private sector, for nonprofit organizations or in education fields.
To become an official Presidential Management Fellow, each finalist has one year to gain employment at any of the federal agencies participating in the program. (For more, visit www.pmf.gov/.)
For more information about Mississippi State University, see www.msstate.edu.