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Institute for Public Administration to deliver nine months of training for New Castle County legislative staff
Summary
The Institute for Public Administration at the University of Delaware proposed a nine-workshop professional development program for New Castle County Council members and legislative staff covering communication, ethics and research; workshops will be recorded and tailored to county procedures.
The New Castle County Personnel Committee on June 17 heard a proposal from the University of Delaware's Institute for Public Administration to provide nine professional-development workshops for county council members and legislative staff in fiscal year 2026.
Sarah Marshall and Chase Barnes of the Institute for Public Administration (IPA) described a program of monthly workshops designed to improve technical writing, meeting efficiency, ethics and public policy research and offered to tailor certain sessions to county-specific items such as legislative-document formatting and parliamentary procedures.
"We will design, conduct and evaluate nine professional development workshops," Sarah Marshall said. IPA plans to deliver workshops in person or via Zoom, provide materials in advance, record sessions and share recordings with the county for future staff use. Chase Barnes said IPA will coordinate pre-meetings to incorporate New Castle County's procedural specifics into the training.
Planned topics listed by IPA include effective meetings and communications, ethics, technical writing and use of Microsoft Office tools, social-media guidance for officials, and a primer on the public-policy process. The instructors said the program is intended to be context-specific; Councilman Carter encouraged emphasizing how New Castle County's structure differs from other municipal governments in Delaware.
Committee members supported the proposal and discussed scheduling considerations; council recess in August was noted and IPA said recorded sessions would allow staff who miss a live session to catch up. The committee did not take a formal vote; presenters said they would follow up to finalize scheduling and materials.
Why it matters: The training is intended to standardize and strengthen legislative support functions and technical skills for staff who support 13 elected council members, with recordings available for onboarding and refreshers.
