Latest News and Events

 UN Award conferred

On June 23rd, Director Jacek Czaputowicz was hosted at the United Nations Building in New York, the occasion being his receipt – on behalf of KSAP – of the UN Award for “Advancing Knowledge Management in Government”. Fuller coverage on this historic moment in the history of the National School will follow.

Preparing to introduce new educational standards for “Administration”

June 17th 2009 saw the National School play host to a Conference on ”Proposals for new educational standards as regards tertiary-level courses in the subject Administration”. The Polish Association for Education in Public Administration is also co-organising the event, which enjoys the patronage of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education.

Civil Service Recruitment Exams

On June 27^th, KSAP will be running the latest (2009) round of testing of knowledge, skills and managerial predispositions under the statutory procedure qualifying potential candidates for Poland’s Civil Service. The required exams are to be given at the Expo XXI Centre in Warsaw.

”The Financial Crisis – Challenge and Threat for World and Region"

A Conference of the above title was held at the National School on May 30th 2009. The joint organisers were the Academy of Young Diplomats (Akademia Młodych Dyplomatów) and KSAP, and the proceedings were opened by a lecture from former Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Prof. Grzegorz Kołodko.

Edition II of the European Senior Civil Servant Course, 18 – 22 May 2009, Caserta, Italy

As a project partner in the ESCS, the National School of Public Administration is pleased to announce a second running of the European Senior Civil Servant Course on the above dates at Caserta. The Course, which is targeted at higher-level civil servants and those thinking of taking up a managerial post in public administration, comprises e-learning and in-class components and addresses the five subject areas of:
· Institutions of the EU and its legal framework
· The political and legal frameworks of EU Member States
· Managerial tools and behaviour
· Ethics
· Statistics and economics
Countries – detailed insights into relevant institutional and economic issues (France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Poland and the UK).

Pilot Judgments Conference

On May 14th-15th inclusive, the National School of Public Admnistration played host to an International Conference devoted to the Pilot Judgments Procedure of the European Court of Human Rights

KSAP encourages participation in case-study competition

In May 2009, the National School announced that it was inviting entries for its first running of a Polish-language case-study competition seeking to promote the teaching and understanding of economics in Poland. The competition will be open to all, but it is particularly hoped to attract the interest of those in their first year of Economics studies at Poland’s higher-education institutions. Entrants will be competing for First, Second and Third Prizes of 4000, 3000 and 2000 PLN respectively, with a special award of 3000 PLN to be awarded by the Director for the best study concerning the public sector’s role in the economy.

German civil servants pay visit

A group of German officials 16 strong visited KSAP between May 11th and 15th, to participate in a further edition of the training successfully co-organised for many years now by the National School and BAKöV (the Bundesakademie für öffentliche Verwaltung). The German guests’ visit comprised lectures given at KSAP, plus a number of opportunities to meet with representatives of Poland’s administration.

Tunisian officials hosted

The period May 11-14th inclusive also saw the National School of Public Administration play host to a group of civil servants from Tunisia. The visit was jointly organised by KSAP and ENA (France’s Ecole Nationale d’Administration), with a view to the participants becoming better acquainted with Polish-EU administrative cooperation. A series of valuable meetings with higher-level Polish officials were therefore set up to meet the needs of the North African visitors.

UN recognition for KSAP’s work

The National School of Public Administration is thrilled to have been declared the 2009 winner of the United Nations Public Service Award in the category ”Advancing Knowledge Management in Government”. It was the Prime Minister’s Chancellery that put the National School’s name forward for the award – in the context of the UN’s Public Administration Programme – which is given to outstanding organizations worldwide operating in the name of public service. The successful candidate for this particular Award was to meet criteria that included roles in: increasing administrative efficiency, promoting accountability and transparency, introducing new concepts, and transforming a given country’s administration. The Award is to be conferred upon KSAP at a ceremony at UN Headquarters in New York on June 23rd 2009 (UN Public Service Day). The Secretary-General and other senior UN figures are to be present, as are leading public-service experts and practitioners.

For more information, see: http://www.unpan.org/DPADM

Seminar on ”Queen Jadwiga and the beginnings of a multinational Poland”

On April 29th a seminar of the above title was held to reflect upon the life and times of the selected patron of KSAP’s 19th Year Class (Jadwiga of Anjou who reigned in Poland between 1384 and 1399, and is the patron saint of Queens and of a United Europe). Prof. Henryk Samsonowicz presided, describing to participants the geopolitical situation of Poland and Central Europe at a crossroads in history when the dominance of Poland’s ruling Piast dynasty was coming to an end, and the Jagiellonian era beginning to take shape. The fact that leading Cracovians of the period had swung behind the candidacy of Jadwiga of Anjou for the Polish throne was considered to have heralded the emergence of a multinational Poland that would go on to become a quite unique structure by the standards of those times.

"The Reform of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the light of other states’ experiences"

In the course of this seminar held at KSAP on April 22nd, Director-General of the Diplomatic Service Rafał Wiśniewski addressed the planned reform of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as regards the operations of the DS. He noted that the reform in question had been necessitated by changed expectations of the state’s role in the international arena. While the primary task up to the end of the 1990s had been to ensure “hard” security by way of international relations, the new circumstances meant that the securing of economic security for society as a whole was becoming ever more important. That in turn denoted promotion of Poland’s economic interests, the safeguarding of energy security, and so on. In Mr Wiśniewski’s view, the instruments necessary in achieving such goals included development assistance, consular care and lobbying, as well as a fuller recognition of the new approach to DS operations ushered in by Poland’s EU accession – most of all the inevitable blurring of the once-rigid division between matters internal and external. In regard to the latter, Mr Wiśniewski noted that the necessary change in mentality had already been achieved, so it was only now a matter of pursuing the necessary organisational and remit-related adjustments.

Chinese delegation visits KSAP

On April 21st, KSAP played host to a 5-person delegation representing the People’s Republic of China, and more specifically the People’s Political Consultative Conference and People’s Government of Guangxi. The activities of the National School were discussed during the visit, and there was an exchange of experiences as regards the training of public-administration personnel.

Seminar on Polish higher education policy

A seminar on the reform of Poland’s national policy in the area of tertiary education was held at KSAP on April 8th. It was led by Prof. Grażyna Prawelska-Skrzypek, Under-Secretary of State at the Ministry of Science and Higher Education, who presented for discussion both the key elements of national policy in this area and the proposals now being drawn up for its reform. Among changes potentially in the pipeline are a new procedure for obtaining doctoral and doktor habilitowany titles, as well as more wide-ranging modifications in the way the institutions operating in higher education are administered. Photo

Success for soccer squad in Sixth French Ambassador’s Cup Tournament

March 28th saw a KSAP football team comprising Krzysztof Czajkowski, Grzegorz Gmyrek, Damian Jakubik, Sławomir Mosór, Daniel Pławiński, Tomasz Rejment, Robert Senger, Tomasz Smoleń and Paweł Wnuk give their all at the Sixth Annual Tournament for the Cup awarded by the French Ambassador, in a 24-team competition perfectly organized by the Chambre de Commerce et d'Industrie Française in Poland. The squad made it into the so-called “Final B” Competition, in which they won 3 matches and lost 3, in this way finishing in a creditable second place. An invitation to take part next time has already been extended. Photo

“The Civil Service in Poland – History, Current Situation and Prospects”

On Tuesday March 24th 2009, from 14.00 onwards, the National School played host to a panel debate with the above title. Participants were Minister Adam Leszkiewicz, Deputy Head of the Prime Minister’s Chancellery; KSAP’s Director Prof. Jacek Czaputowicz; Władysław Stasiak in his capacity as Deputy Head of the Chancellery of the President of the Republic of Poland; Robert Bartold, Director-General at the Ministry of National Education; Dagmir Długosz as Director at the Department for the Civil Service and the National Personnel Reserve of the Prime Minister’s Chancellery, Angelina Sarota as Director at the Legal Department of the PM’s Chancellery and Rafał Siemianowski in his capacity as Chair of the KSAP Graduates’ Association. Photo

“Lobbying as a Sector of Economic Activity in Poland and Europe”

A seminar titled as above was held at KSAP on March 18th 2009, with the participation of Gilles Teisseyre and Grzegorz Ziemniak representing the world of lobbying, Dagmir Długosz of the Prime Minister’s Chancellery, and Małgorzata Molęda-Zdziech as moderator of the discussion. Since lobbying remains at an earlier stage of development in Poland than in other EU Member States, there remain to be resolved here certain dilemmas of both a legal and conceptual nature that are of great relevance in shaping the way lobbying goes on to develop. Photo

Conference entitled: “Modernisation of the Governmental Administration within European Social Fund Projects”

A Conference on the above theme and with the above title was held at the National School on March 12th 2009. It provided for a preliminary analysis of the most important challenges facing Poland’s public sector where human resources management is concerned. As Deputy Minister for Regional Development Jarosław Pawłowski emphasised, HRM is a crucial factor conditioning the competitiveness of the Polish economy. Photo

“Security in the Baltic Sea Region – Polish Interests”

March 11th 2009 brought the latest in a series of sessions held at KSAP and devoted to key national policies. This time, experts from the Natolin European Centre, Drs. Marek Cichocki and Adam Osica presented results from a project concerning the consolidation versus the disintegration of the security situation in the Baltic Sea Region, as well as the areas in which this touched upon Polish national interests. Photo

KSAP prepares Report on Management in the Health Service

In November 2008, the Director of KSAP, Prof. Jacek Czaputowicz signed a contract with the World Health Organization that provided inter alia for the drawing up and publication of a report presenting HRM mechanisms at the level of higher managerial staff in the main Health Service institutions. The Report is to lead to a Ministry of Health assessment of administrative capacity, as well as providing for comparisons in practice between Polish solutions and those arrived at elsewhere. An October 2009 Conference at the National School sought to summarise the results of the Project, and the now-published Report forms an integral part of a larger international undertaking coordinated by the WHO and striving to increase the efficiency of Poland’s Health Service.

New Publications from KSAP Students and Lecturers

KSAP has brought out three new publications. Unia Europejska wobec współczesnych problemów polityki (“The European Union and Contemporary Policy Issues”) comprises 10 studies on key aspects of EU operations (e.g. the Community method of decisionmaking, the administration of regional development, information policy, lobbying and the functioning of the Presidency). Strategiczne programowanie rozwoju – doświadczeń europejskie (”The Strategic Programming of Development – European Experiences”) in turn offers some 11 analyses showing how selected countries (France, Germany, Ireland and the UK / Scotland) – or else the European Union as a whole – are building strategic potential. Finally, Wspóldziałanie administracji rządowej z administracją samorządową (”Joint Action between the Governmental and Local Governmental Administrations”) concerns itself with the relationships between the centre and the various other tiers of administration. All three books are available at the National School of Public Administration, at present in Polish only.

Cooperation between KSAP and its Partner from Ukraine

On March 4th, KSAP hosted a 19-strong group of students from the Office of the President of Ukraine’s National Academy of Public Administration (UAPA) and the Higher School of Public Administration in Szczecin, Poland. The very welcome guests took part in a lecture entitled “The System of Public Administration in Poland” led by Krzysztof Banaś, Head of Division at the Department for the Civil Service and National Personnel Reserve of the Prime Minister’s Chancellery, as well as KSAP’s Deputy Director, Dr. Marek Haliniak. The visit represents a further stage in the long-term cooperation ongoing between KSAP and UAPA. Photo

Graduation Ceremony for the 17th “Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski” Year-Class and Inauguration of Studies for the new 19th Year-Class

The Ceremony held on February 27th 2009 featured the Inaugural Lecture given by former Prime Minister of Poland and now Member of the European Parliament, Prof. Jerzy Buzek, with the title: “The Functioning of the EU and the Challenges facing the Polish Public Administration”. Photo

“The Problem of Existence from the Viewpoints of Philosophy and Physics”

On February 25th 2009. Prof. Jerzy Janik of the Institute of Nuclear Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences, gave a lecture with the above title in which it was inter alia emphasised how many scientific disciplines had been generating concepts for which there is no place in everyday language. Photo

“European Experience with the Cooperation between Governmental and Decentralised Administrations”

Students of the “Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski” Year-Class hosted their Graduates’ Conference on February 18th 2009, the title being as given above. In his inaugural paper to the Conference, Prof. Michał Kulesza stressed the enormous importance of cooperation between the centre and the other tiers of administration, since this might do nothing less than determine the success of the public administration system as a whole. Photo