The Kriegel Fellowship Graduation: Class of 2025-2026
By Carla Sinclair, Communications Project Director
The 2025-2026 Kriegel Fellows celebrated their graduation at ISLG’s Midtown office this spring. Over the last several months, these chiefs of staff, deputy chiefs of staff, legislative directors, and other office leaders engaged in discussions with policy experts, network, and built the skills to support them in their current roles and their future journeys in public service.
This May, more than 40 legislative office leaders from across New York State graduated from CUNY ISLG’s Kriegel Fellowship for Public Service Leaders. The largest cohort in the Fellowship’s five-year history, the event was a chance for these policy professionals to celebrate their work developing and honing the unique policy, management, and leadership skills their jobs require.
The Kriegel Fellowship is a professional development program designed to support the unique needs, demands, and responsibilities encountered by staff of legislators who represent New York City and State communities. Since its launch in 2019, the Kriegel Fellowship has grown from its initial focus on chiefs of staff to include deputy chiefs of staff, legislative and policy directors, and other senior office staff.
To focus on the unique needs of these different roles, the 2025-2026 cohort had two sections: one for chiefs of staff and one for senior staff (e.g., deputy chiefs and directors within offices). Creating separate spaces for these cohorts allowed ISLG to design a more tailored learning and networking experience for Fellows, who often have overlapping but different priorities and responsibilities for supporting their constituents.
“Informed and adept leadership is such a crucial component to successful policymaking, but there aren’t many professional development opportunities for public servants. That’s what Kriegel is designed to provide,” said Siobhán Carney, CUNY ISLG’s Policy Director. “We’re continually working to refine the program so Fellows can get the leadership and policy education to successfully serve their communities and continue to grow as leaders.”
“Informed and adept leadership is such a crucial component to successful policymaking, but there aren’t many professional development opportunities for public servants. That’s what Kriegel is designed to provide,”
- Siobhán Carney, CUNY ISLG Policy Director
These roles deal with “a bit of everything,” described New York State Assembly Chief of Staff Diana LaMattina Abdella, who serves a district in Syracuse. “I deal with communications, grants, scheduling, legislation, community outreach, and research.”
In an interview with CUNY ISLG, LaMattina Abdella said the policy discussions, in particular, were valuable learning opportunities.
“In these positions, you don't get constant training that some other professions do because you're constantly moving and working. You learn by doing,” she said. “So having the opportunity to sit through a class and hear about what is most effective and how others are approaching certain issues and tasks gives you new ideas.”
Besides hard and soft skills, networking is a crucial component of the Fellowship. As Fellow Julian Martin, Deputy Chief of Staff in the New York City Council, said in a chat with CUNY ISLG, “So much of the work we do in the Council and in local government overall is relational. Your network, being able to call someone up to help solve a problem, is really important to getting your work forward.”
“Having other people in the same space means we can all do our jobs more effectively, because we know each other,” Martin said. “And it's an amazing learning opportunity to hear from people in similar roles from across the city and state who are facing many of the same issues we face, but approaching them from a totally different perspective.”
“And it's an amazing learning opportunity to hear from people in similar roles from across the city and state who are facing many of the same issues we face, but approaching them from a totally different perspective.”
- Julian Martin, NYC Council Deputy Chief of Staff
Ultimately, working in these legislative office roles is going to be different depending on the day, the constituencies being served, and the pressing policy issues of the time. But even though “nobody gives you a handbook and says, ‘this is how you should be chief of staff for this office,’” said Chief of Staff Jacob Sherretts. “Hearing all the varying perspectives in the Fellowship helps facilitate whatever your own strategy is.” Read more about Sherrett’s conversation with CUNY ISLG on our blog.
Get to know the full cohort in our press release.