Dylan Russell Brings UNC Students into Local Government

Dylan Russell is an associate professor in the UNC Chapel Hill School of Government. He is the co-founder of Lead for America and the Executive Director for Lead for North Carolina, two organizations focused on placing college students in public service positions. Photo Credits: UNC Chapel Hill

Andrew Larsen, Podcasting Desk Lead for The Powderhorn

The UNC Chapel Hill School of Government holds a comfortable spot at number two in the country for its local government management program. Undoubtedly, Dylan Russell has been key to this achievement. Russell serves as the Executive Director of Lead for North Carolina, an organization focused on purposefully placing UNC graduates in public service roles across the state. 

“My job is to help people stumble into meaningful careers in public service,” said Russell. “Not a lot of folks know what is going on at the state and local level, and energy is focused on what’s happening nationally. But the decisions that happen in Raleigh, or in town council or county commissioner chambers, affect us just as much. As Washington has become gridlocked, the state and local governments are the best vehicles to address those big issues and topics that we want to focus on.”

The United States Government is set up so that people are represented best at the local level.  Local politicians then bring their grievances up to the state level, and so on. Yet, as Russell pointed out, people tend to focus on large-scale national issues over local ones. Encouraging further participation in government is one way to assist people in feeling represented at the local level. However, Russell sees issues with the work environment in state and local offices.

“My job is to help people see different career paths that exist within local and state government,” said Russell. “My research is focused on making state and local offices better employers, and making sure that when you have someone who’s starting out in state and local government, the organizational environment is conducive to making sure they want to stay and create their career in public service.”

Out of this desire, Russell founded Lead for NC in 2019. 

“Lead for NC started as a pipeline program to connect talented recent graduates with local government fellowships,” said Russell. “They’re paid, full-time employees in a local government, and working on issues that the local government identifies. It can be anything from creating citizen academies to make sure that underrepresented groups know what’s going on in town hall and how they can get involved, or it can be economic development projects. One of the strengths of the programs is that they’re designed to meet the locality’s specific needs.”

Russell argued that we don’t notice the government when it works well. Growing up in the Mabel community in Watauga County, Russell never noticed how local government interacted with the community until a summer job.

“I grew up in an unincorporated part of the county. I didn’t see how government interacted with the community,” said Russell. “And then my first job at the Blowing Rock Municipal Pool was really cool. Blowing Rock made a decision to invest in a public space for people to come and have access to recreational activities and enjoy the beautiful high country summers. And then, as I got more involved, the next moment that stood out was when I was student body president of App State, and the local board of elections moved the voting site off campus.” 

Russell subsequently petitioned the State Board of Elections and rallied the student body against this change. He went on to work in the White House, where he hired presidential personnel for the administration. For students interested in a path similar to Russell, UNC’s new Law, Government, and Public Service minor will provide opportunities. 

“At Chapel Hill, you can’t really major in law as an undergrad, and so they end up taking political science or public policy. There’s this disconnect,” said Russell, “because what they really want is opportunities where they can see themselves in public service. In political science, nothing currently focuses on the outcomes of governance. What does it take to be a good leader in a public organization? That’s why we created the minor, to expose students to different career paths that exist in public service and connect them to state and local officials. There are 100 different ways that you can get involved, and the minor was the vehicle to expose students to that.”

For most Watauga students, college is a few years out. Opportunities like the School of Government’s new minor are nice to look forward to, but some may want to get involved now. In the meantime, Russell gave advice for students looking to get involved during high school.

“We need more young people to go to town council meetings. We need young people to go to county commissioner meetings. We need young people to serve on boards and commissions,” said Russell. “We need folks to pay attention to what’s going on in Raleigh and the General Assembly, and how that affects what our day-to-day lives look like. If people were to do that, either through internships with council members or shadowing department heads, or doing these wonderful programs that we have, like the Senate page program, the House page program, and the governor’s page program, I think we would live in a more just and civic society.”