The order gives no specific reason for discontinuing either program, which date to the Carter and Kennedy administrations. Image: Michael Candelori/Shutterstock.com
By: FEDweek StaffPresident Trump has ordered the end of the Presidential Management Fellows program and the Federal Executive Board program, among other entities, as the beginning of what the order calls “a reduction in the elements of the federal bureaucracy that the President has determined are unnecessary.”
The Presidential Management Fellows program has been the primary to place those with advanced degrees mostly in public administration and related areas into fellowship type positions in federal agencies, with the opportunity to convert to mid-management positions in the competitive service status after one year of satisfactory performance.
The order, does not address those currently in the program, but it does specify continuing the other two prongs of the Pathways Program that also provide potential routes into federal employment: the Recent Graduates training program for graduates of colleges, community colleges and vocational schools; and the Internship Program for high school and college students to familiarize them with government work.
The Federal Executive Board program has been the primary means of coordinating among agencies in a geographic area on issues ranging from weather-related closings to emergency response, and from career development training to operating the Combined Federal Campaign.
The order gives no specific reason for discontinuing either program, which date to the Carter and Kennedy administrations, respectively, other than as part of a general “reduction of the federal bureaucracy.”
The order also requires a review of the “non-statutory components and functions” of the Presidio Trust, the Inter-American Foundation, the United States African Development Foundation, and the United States Institute of Peace, and reducing the operations and personnel “to the minimum presence and function required by law.”
It further requires abolishing a half-dozen advisory commissions, with a 30-day internal White House review for any “additional unnecessary governmental entities and federal advisory committees that should be terminated on grounds that they are unnecessary.”
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