Policy Director, Cornell Health Policy Center - Brooks School of Public Policy

About the Brooks School of Public Policy
The Cornell Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy harnesses the University’s broad disciplinary excellence in public policy, along with its innovative teaching, research, and engagement programs, to solve pressing global challenges. The school’s prestigious faculty apply an interdisciplinary and problem-oriented focus to wide-ranging public policy issues as they explore how government choices intersect with people’s lives. The school’s initial areas of focus are in data science and technology policy; environmental and sustainability policy; health policy; human security; inequality and social policy; the politics and economics of development; and race, racism, and public policy.

The Opportunity
The Cornell Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy is seeking a collaborative, creative, and entrepreneurial professional to serve as the Policy Director of the newly established Cornell Health Policy Center, a cross-campus collaboration with the Weill Cornell Medical College, beginning in fall 2024. The newly launched Health Policy Center will serve as a locally and nationally known source of rigorous and relevant health policy evidence, influence and advocacy as the locus of health policy impact, research, and training at Cornell. The inaugural Policy Director for the Cornell Health Policy Center will play an integral role in strategically developing, leading, and executing the Center’s purpose-driven priorities and objectives to use data-driven evidence to impact advancing effective health policies and practices at the federal, state, and local organization and community levels. 

Position Overview

The Policy Director will partner with CHPC Co-Directors and Associate Directors to develop the strategic direction for health policy program development and research translation, shepherd the scaling of the Center’s policy impact initiatives, and lead external engagement with public and private partners, advisory groups, and coalitions, including federal, state, and local policymakers, journalists, and interest groups to achieve impactful objectives. The ideal candidate will have significant experience in the policy field, deep knowledge of contemporary health policy issues, and expertise in building, communicating and mobilizing around health policy. Reporting to the Center’s founding co-directors (the Dean of the Brooks School who co-directs the Center with the Chief of the Division of Health Policy and Economics at Weill Cornell Medicine), the Policy Director will lead the Center’s policy dissemination and engagement work and coordinate the Center’s communications efforts in collaboration with colleagues on both campuses.
 

Other key responsibilities include: execute on a health policy portfolio of engagement and impact projects; identify and build strategic partnerships between the Center and other institutes and stakeholders in the health policy field; organize and execute events, such as panels and symposia, that facilitate engagement between health policy scholars at Cornell and policy audiences; create and disseminate collaborative policy research briefs and other content; design and carry out research translation activities; build and maintain a vibrant network of community-based policy partnerships with external collaborators; coordinate, with communications teams on both campuses, day-to-day communications work including website, social media, and media relations.

While position responsibilities vary, every member of our community is expected to foster a culture of belonging and a healthy work environment by communicating across differences; being cooperative, collaborative, open, and welcoming; showing respect, compassion, and empathy; engaging and supporting others regardless of background or perspective; speaking up when others are being excluded or treated inappropriately; and supporting work/life integration of oneself and others.

Position Responsibilities/Essential Functions: 

Policy Dissemination & Engagement 50%

• Collaborate with the CHPC leadership to develop strategic priorities for policy impact

• Develop content for dissemination (e.g., plain language evidence briefs)

• Develop and execute dissemination plan for content above – targeted dissemination to relevant advocacy or interest groups, state/federal legislators and staffers with relevant interests, etc. 

• Build, strengthen and expand effective relationships with CHPC faculty and federal/state legislators and agencies, other stakeholders and key policy partners (e.g., advocacy groups, think tanks), with joint efforts with Cornell government relations when it makes sense to collaborate. 

  • Content dissemination (e.g., send a brief to a