Athens, Ga. – Hal G. Rainey, Alumni Foundation Distinguished Professor in the University of Georgia School of Public and International Affairs, has been selected to receive the 2008 Dwight Waldo Award.
The Waldo award is the highest honor for scholarship conferred each year by the American Society for Public Administration. It recognizes those who have made “outstanding contributions to the professional literature of public administration over an extended career.”
A professor in the department of public administration and policy, Rainey joined the UGA faculty in 1988. He is considered one of the nation’s leading experts on public management and organizational theory, and has published extensively on the similarities and differences among organizations and managers in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors, and on the privatization of public services.
“Dr. Rainey is an exceptional scholar and teacher,” said Edward J. Kellough, head of the department of public administration and policy. “This award is a much-deserved acknowledgment of the significant contributions Professor Rainey has made, and continues to make, to the literature on public management.”
Rainey is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including his election as a Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration, an association of experts chartered by the United States Congress to conduct studies and offer advice to Congress and other federal authorities on administrative and policy issues.
The Dwight Waldo Award will be conferred on Rainey at a ceremony in March. He will become the 29th recipient of the Waldo award since 1980 and the third faculty member of UGA’s department of public administration and policy to receive the honor in the past 15 years.
“The Waldo award is an important recognition of Hal Rainey’s scholarly achievements, and is yet another illustration of the outstanding cohort of senior faculty in the school’s department of public administration and policy,” said Thomas P. Lauth, Dean of the School of Public and International Affairs.
The department of public administration and policy is home to UGA’s highly-ranked Master of Public Administration (MPA) degree program. Currently ranked as one of the top four programs in the nation by U.S. News and World Report, UGA’s MPA program is tied for 4th with Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School.
