Salk Fellowship Focuses on Equipping Health Activists with State-Level Advocacy Skills

During a fall election cycle that has Pennsylvania in the national spotlight for its tight political races with major implications on key healthcare issues, the Salk Health Activist Fellowship is focused on equipping healthcare activists with effective skills to advocate at the state level.

The annual fellowship kicked off on September 22 with Jewish Healthcare Foundation (JHF) President and CEO Karen Wolk Feinstein, PhD, outlining JHF's approach to activist philanthropy, critical insights from her many years of successful advocacy, and introducing the accomplished fellowship cohort to one another.

As is hallmark to all JHF's Feinstein Fellowships, the Salk Health Activist Fellowship features an interdisciplinary mix of 35 participants representing 12 different disciplines and seven different universities. The cohort includes 14 medical students at the University of Pittsburgh, the largest concentration of medical students in the Salk Fellowship's 18-year history.

At the second session on September 29, fellows had the opportunity to learn about HIV criminalization and the current state of advocacy on the issue here in Pennsylvania.

Jon W. Davidson, senior staff attorney on the LGBTQ & HIV Project at the American Civil Liberties Union, discussed the importance of addressing stigmatizing language; the intersection between health care, human rights, and policymaking; and considerations for beginning an advocacy campaign. Fellows were also introduced to an Advocacy Action Plan that will be used to guide the strategies they will assemble in interdisciplinary groups to advocate for a healthcare policy issue.

Throughout this fall, the fellows will build a strategy for effective advocacy at the state level by collaborating in small groups with guidance from JHF staff. Through conversations with leaders from the Pennsylvania Health Law Project, Children First, Women's Law Project, TheCaseMade, the Philadelphia Department of Public Health, and elected representatives and government officials, fellows will gain a deeper understanding of how to effectively communicate their concerns and policy priorities.

The Salk Fellowship will conclude with a presentation of their various strategies at the last session on November 17.