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The this weekend hosted 50 scholars attending the held by the American Political Science Association’s Health Politics and Policy Section. 

Panels held at the Haldeman Center addressed issues including “The Political Economy of U.S. Health and Social Policy,” “Reproductive Rights,” “The Rural Urban Divide,” and “Pandemic Preparedness and Disease Prevention in a Polarized Society.” 

The conference also featured a plenary session on “Democracy, Health Politics, and 2025” to discuss emerging issues, a graduate student poster session, and a “Meet the Editors” panel with research journal editors.

“���㽶��Ƶ is an ideal home for scholarly conferences on pressing public issues,” says government and public policy professor , associate director and senior policy fellow of the Rockefeller Center and a co-organizer of the conference. 

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Natalie Hernandez, a political science PhD student at Yale, discusses her research with conference attendees. (Photo by Zoe Olson)

“���㽶��Ƶ brings leading scholars, expert staff, a beautiful setting, and a term-based academic calendar that can enable us to carve out conference time when our semester-based academic peer institutions are on breaks,” Nachlis says.

The inaugural conference was designed to feature leading scholars in the field and also to welcome graduate students and junior scholars, with funding to enable them to attend.

The conference was co-organized by officials of the American Political Science Association’s Health Politics and Policy Section, including Nachlis, of Cornell University, of the University of Michigan, and of Cal State University East Bay. Co-sponsors included the Rockefeller Center, , the , and the . 

The conference was hosted by the Rockefeller Center’s Public Programs and Special Events team, which also arranged this year’s 2024 Election Speaker Series and 100 Days Series.

“Andrew, Charley, Holly, and I had been dreaming about holding a conference like this for years,” Nachlis says. “Given the success of this first iteration, we’re hopeful that we can grow our group of supporters and participants moving forward.” 

Planning is already underway to partner with peer institutions and research journals in the future. “We aim to make this conference a consistent contributor to national conversations on health politics and policy,” Nachlis says.