STUDENTS

Like Father Like Son
Father and Son Put Kennedy School Lessons to Work

WHEN ROBERT CASTELLI MPA 1996 decided to run for office, he sought advice from David King, his old Kennedy School professor. He also turned to one of King’s students this past year, who shares much in common with the candidate: military service, Republican politics, a desire to run for elective office, and, most important, his last name.

Buttressed by his year in the Kennedy School’s Mid-Career Master in Public Administration Program, R. Christian “Chris” Castelli MPA 2004 has helped his father in his campaign for state assembly in New York, just as he plans to tap the experience to embark on his own run for public office in the future. “I learned quite a bit about what the whole process entails, from creating Web sites to the actual mechanics of a campaign and winning votes,” says Chris.

Robert Castelli is taking on an incumbent Democrat for a seat in the 89th District of New York, which encompasses rural hamlets and the well-to-do suburb of White Plains. Previously a councilman in Lewisboro for four years, he runs his own security firm while teaching criminal justice at Iona College and John Jay College. His expertise in homeland security distinguishes him from his opponent and others who serve in the New York state legislature, he says. “I would hope to bring a different and enlightened perspective on something that is pretty much unknown to people,” says Robert.

Though the Castellis are linked by common experiences and politics as well as by blood, Robert didn’t steer his son on a course similar to his own, he says. Yet he did instill in him a passion for public service that led both of them to a school dedicated to that mission.

“Public service to me is the most noble profession in the world,” says Robert, who also came to the school and enrolled in the Mid-Career Program. “I have the most profound respect for a school like the Kennedy School which is dedicated to public service. I think there is a larger purpose to the school, and it serves that purpose well.”

For the father, public service meant volunteering for the Vietnam War and serving for more than 20 years on the New York State Police before attending the Kennedy School. For the son, a major in the United States Army Special Forces, it has meant tours of duty on the front lines of some of the world’s most dangerous locales, like Somali, Haiti, Bosnia, and Afghanistan three times. Coming to the school with dissimilar backgrounds and political philosophies from many of their fellow students, they agreed that they were able to collaborate with and learn from them despite their differences, just as they offered their classmates something valuable too.

“It really opened my eyes to different walks of life, and different things I’m not really accustomed to because I lived and worked in a very controlled, strict, rigid environment for the last 12 years,” says Chris, who hopes to gain a high-level position in the federal government or Department of Homeland Security when his military commitment ends. “I came there with firsthand knowledge of the issues that are talked about so frequently at the Kennedy School and a unique perspective, and I think I brought that to the classroom.”

He has learned, too, that political allegiances are often shaped by those who are closest to you, whether it’s in school or around the dinner table at home.

“One of the things they teach in the courses,” Chris says, “is that your strongest political influences are the people around you, your immediate family, your parents.” — LR