The Learning Projects of Municipal Elected Officials

The purpose of this exploratory study was to describe the learning projects related to the governmental role of a selected sample of elected municipal officials in a geographic region of a Southeastern state. The study includes the revision of Tough’s (1975) learning projects interview schedule and the addition of eight demographic items.

Participants were selected by using a random number generator to choose 12 cities from seven population groups, creating a stratified sample of 68 elected officials, 41 of whom agreed to be interviewed. Demographic information revealed that the participants were a mix of mayors (26.8%), vice-mayors (19.5%), and city councilmembers (53.7%). More than half (56.1%) served in cities with city managers or chief administrative officers and 29.3% were in their first two years of service. Nearly three-fourths (73.2%) were men; 87.8% were age 50 or older; and, 61% held a bachelor’s degree or higher.

Data analysis revealed that the participants conducted a mean of 6.68 learning projects during the previous year. The predominant primary planners of the 274 learning projects were the learners (32.1%), peer groups (20.1%), and groups with a professional (19.3%). Participants in city manager cities spent significantly fewer hours (M = 62.18, SD = 87.03) per learning project than participants in cities without a city manager (M = 90.00, SD = 135.02), t (246.93) = 2.05, p = .042, d = 0.25, 95% CI [1.04, 54.60]. An ANOVA showed that the effect of elected office on the mean number of hours spent conducting each learning project was significant at the p < .05 level, [F(2, 271) = 9.17, p < 0.001]. Post hoc comparisons using the Tukey HSD test indicated three significant pairwise comparisons. First, mayors devoted significantly (p < .001) more hours (M = 119.74, SD = 152.89) per learning project than did vice-mayors (M = 36.77, SD = 43.57). Mayors spent significantly (p = .029) more hours (M = 119.74, SD = 152.89) per learning project than did councilmembers (M = 76.59, SD = 113.21). Finally, councilmembers spent significantly (p = .043) more hours per learning project than did vice-mayors.