Staff Profiles<\/a><\/p>\n[\/et_pb_accordion_item][\/et_pb_accordion][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_3″ _builder_version=”4.4.8″][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/21\/2020\/06\/John_Seley_485.jpg” _builder_version=”4.9.10″ _module_preset=”default” alt=”John Seley” title_text=”John Seley” align=”center” border_color_all=”#000000″ border_width_all=”1px” hover_enabled=”0″ sticky_enabled=”0″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.9.10″ text_font=”Open Sans||||||||” text_font_size=”16px” hover_enabled=”0″ sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n
Growing up, John Seley (Urban Studies) had often visited firehouses with his father, Dr. Gabriel Seley, a surgeon who later became Chief Medical Officer for the FDNY. Years later, returning home to New York after graduating from the University of Pennsylvania and teaching for a while in Minnesota, he complained to his father that he\u2019d never actually been on a fire engine.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cMy father said, \u2018Come on,\u2019\u201d recalls Seley. \u201cAnd he took me to his local firehouse, which was a block away on East 75th Street. He asked if I could ride with them and they said \u2018Sure. Come in tomorrow night.\u2019 They weren\u2019t going to refuse the chief medical officer,\u201d he confesses. Read more.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n\u201cSo, here I was, this kid with no experience, and I went in the next night. They put me in a coat and helmet and said, \u2018You sit there.\u2019 The very first run we had was a second alarm I remember to this day on 93rd Street. I was so amazed by the whole thing: traveling with the lights and siren going to the fire and watching everything that was going on. I said, \u2018You know, I think I\u2019m going to try this a little more.\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nA little more, he explains, was joining the city\u2019s auxiliary firefighter-training program. \u201cI went out to the Fire Academy on weekends and got trained, and then they let me ride.\u201d This was with Engine Company 44 on Friday nights and weekends, when it wouldn\u2019t interfere with his teaching responsibilities.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cIt was just a totally different experience to me, having been an academic up \u2019til then. . . . I fell in love with the whole idea. These guys were great guys, and most of them are still friends.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n*\u00a0 *\u00a0 *<\/span><\/p>\nJohn Seley certainly puts the lie to the maxim often quoted by the education-averse: \u201cThose who can, do. Those who can\u2019t, teach.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nTo be sure, Seley has been teaching for many years. A professor of geography, urban planning, and environmental psychology at Queens College and the CUNY Graduate Center, he has previously taught at Princeton, Cornell, and Columbia and was affiliate faculty at the Naval Postgraduate School. But combining that academic resume with the experience he has gained as a member of the firefighting community has made him uniquely qualified to do<\/em> an important service for the people of New York City. <\/span><\/p>\n\u201cI would describe my role as that of someone with academic and firefighting\u00a0experience who is trying to aid the FDNY in addressing critical fire and emergency response issues,\u201d says Seley from a chair in his office at FDNY\u2019s Brooklyn headquarters. <\/span><\/p>\nThat role has a title: Chairman of the Fire Commissioner\u2019s Advisory Council. It\u2019s a group he and Fire Commissioner <\/span>Daniel A. Nigro<\/span> founded that functions as a think tank. Its 15 members\u2014<\/span>current and former leaders of the department<\/span>\u2014perform studies and create reports on key aspects of FDNY operations and administration, including training new firefighters and fire inspectors and designing a management structure. Most recently, it developed a plan to modernize the department\u2019s field technology capabilities. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nThe council was created in 2014 following Nigro\u2019s appointment as fire commissioner. He asked Seley to head his transition team to help select new leadership for the FDNY. Nigro had already formed a strong opinion of Seley\u2019s qualifications from other work Seley had done for the department. This included research work for the Center for Terrorism and Disaster Preparedness, for which Seley received training as a Hazardous Materials Technician II. Nigro had also chaired the board on which Seley served, Friends of Firefighters, a nonprofit organization that addresses physical and mental health needs. <\/span><\/p>\nIn accepting the commissioner\u2019s offer to head the transition team, Seley suggested convening an advisory council for the task. Seeing how well the council members worked together and what a wealth of experience they had, Seley then suggested to Nigro that the council become permanent. No other NYC department had such a group\u2014and certainly no other city\u2019s fire department\u2014but Seley was aware of a similar group that advised the head of NASA. \u201cI suggested to the commissioner that we should have a permanent Commissioner\u2019s Advisory Council. He agreed and said, \u2018You should head it.\u2019\u201d <\/span><\/p>\nNigro then made his request for Seley\u2019s service in writing to CUNY Chancellor James B. Milliken, who welcomed it and observed in his responding letter: \u201cI speak on behalf of CUNY when I say we are very gratified that his [Seley\u2019s] knowledge and experience will be of assistance to your office and to the people of the City of New York.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nMilliken continued to support Seley\u2019s work at the FDNY for the 2015-2016 academic year. Seley has continued in his role while on academic sabbatical over the past year. <\/span><\/p>\nThree years on, Commissioner Nigro has nothing but praise for Seley: \u201cJohn has been a fantastic addition to my administration here at the FDNY. His strong academic background\u00ad\u2014and great devotion to the Department and the life-saving work our members perform\u2014made him the ideal chair for my advisory council.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n*\u00a0 *\u00a0 *<\/span><\/p>\nWhile Seley\u2019s areas of academic expertise are compatible with exploring the issues the council confronts, it\u2019s his firefighting knowledge that informs their application in his role as chairman. \u201cI know a lot about what happens in the field. And that helped me in making recommendations in terms of what I think would be more or less acceptable by firefighters.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\nLike many in the FDNY, Seley witnessed firsthand the devastation of 9\/11 that claimed the lives of 343 firefighters. He was among those who worked \u201cthe pile,\u201d and is reluctant to speak about that and those he knew who were lost there. Nonetheless, that experience remains ever-present in his memory and that of the other council members as they work to produce recommendations in the best interests of the nearly 15,000 members of the FDNY.<\/span><\/p>\nIn explaining how the council works, Seley says, \u201cWhen you try to introduce a new project, you want to make sure that it\u2019s piloted in the right place and that the right people are involved. From day one, we\u2019ve always involved people in the field in the research. Everyone on the council has either been in or is still in the fire department.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cIt\u2019s a very unique culture, the fire department,\u201d he continues. \u201cEach firehouse is a separate entity; it\u2019s like a big family. Everyone talks to each other as brother and sister. And they share lots of information\u2014not just about emergency response, but about their daily lives. They\u2019re pretty sensitive to what goes on in the world.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cEverything we do in the council is proprietary and we have only one client,\u201d he says, noting the extreme confidentiality of the council\u2019s reports and recommendations, which are given only to Nigro, who decides whether to share them.<\/span><\/p>\nSubjects have ranged from the extremely urgent, such as the need to improve communications, as dramatically brought home on 9\/11, to the almost amusingly surprising. Seley recounts, for example, a report the council produced about the education of probationary firefighters. Like many of society\u2019s time-honored institutions, the FDNY was having difficulty communicating with Millennials. The instructors typically were seasoned firefighters in their 40s, and the new recruits were 19 to 25.<\/span><\/p>\nNot averse to following someone else\u2019s lead if it produces a desired result, the council took heed of an NFL practice they learned about in the Wall Street Journal<\/em>. Rookies for the San Francisco 49ers were failing at the traditional practice of memorizing stacks of playbooks in preparation for weekly three-hour meetings with their coaches. The solution? \u201cThey gave them all iPads with video,\u201d says Seley, \u201cand they now never have a meeting of more than half an hour.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cWe brought in an expert on Millennials and a Millennial to talk to the instructors,\u201d he continues. \u201cWe ended up creating a two-day class.\u00a0 Working with Millennials was part of it. These were things the instructors weren\u2019t familiar with but, with a changing fire department, they needed to understand. And that class has become permanent. So now two days before each probationary class goes into the academy, the instructors have this two-day class. And all new recruits get iPads.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\nThe class also included a session on stress management.\u00a0 The FDNY has become a leader in addressing this concern by bringing in outside experts.<\/span><\/p>\nThis problem-solving process, Seley believes, illustrates how his teaching, research, and firefighting experiences complement each other in addressing issues before the department. \u201cBut it isn\u2019t just me,\u201d he\u2019s quick to add. \u201cIt\u2019s these 15 other people [the council] with maybe hundreds of years in combined experience, and we get together every week for three hours to discuss these issues. We\u2019re all volunteers. No one is paid. It\u2019s really a labor of love.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Name: John Seley Title: Professor Department: Urban Studies; Psychology and Earth and Environmental Sciences, Graduate Center Degree(s): A.B., University of Pennsylvania; M.C.P., University of Pennsylvania Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania Contact Information: Phone: 917-575-2000 Office: Powdermaker 250I Email: johnseley@gmail.comStudent Profiles Alumni Profiles Faculty Profiles Staff ProfilesGrowing up, John Seley (Urban Studies) had often visited firehouses with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"page_category":[],"wf_page_folders":[137],"class_list":["post-1328","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1328"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1328\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1920,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1328\/revisions\/1920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"page_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/page_category?post=1328"},{"taxonomy":"wf_page_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_page_folders?post=1328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}