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Menschel Senior Leadership Fellowship

The Menschel Senior Leadership Fellowship brings individuals who have recently served in high-level jobs in government, multilateral institutions, nonprofits, or business to the Harvard Chan School campus to teach and mentor students for an eight-week semester and partake in academic life at Harvard.

Phone 617-432-3609

For Students

As resources to the Harvard community, Menschel Senior Leadership Fellows spend time teaching and mentoring students. They offer guidance and personal stories exploring leadership challenges in public health, such as:

  • Making difficult decisions
  • Overcoming obstacles
  • Taking risks
  • Building teams
  • Listening to advice
  • Fostering resiliency
  • Communicating effectively
  • Engaging stakeholders
  • Building trust
  • Enabling change

Courses

Each Menschel Senior Leadership Fellow generally teaches an eight-week course at the Harvard Chan School. Each course is unique and reflects the individual career and leadership of the Fellow in residence for that term. Courses address a wide variety of leadership challenges in areas such as politics and public health, health equity, policy implementation, climate change, poverty, access to healthcare, community health, health systems, and more.

Eligibility to enroll: Harvard Chan students are given first priority for seats, but the courses are open to all Harvard University students who cross-register through the Harvard University Course Catalog. Undergraduates must first get approval from their degree program.

Current courses and workshops

Fall 2, 2024: MPH 552 – Innovation, Improvisation and Leadership on the Front Lines of America’s Pubilc Health Crises

InstructorMiro Weinberger, Mayor of Burlington, VT (2012 – 2024)

During his 12 years as mayor, which ended on April 1, 2024, Mayor Weinberger prioritized housing, racial equity, the opioid crisis, and climate action.

In his first term, Burlington achieved 100% renewable energy generation. Weinberger then launched a plan to achieve Net Zero by 2030 by steadily eliminating city’s use of fossil fuels for heating and ground transportation and “electrifying everything.” The city succeeded in reducing total community emissions by 18% between 2019 and 2023.

Course Description

Over the last decade America has faced multiple new or evolving, high stakes public health crises, with over 1 million Americans dying of COVID, and more than 500,000 dying of drug overdoses.  State and municipal leaders have often been on the front lines of these and other public health challenges, even when lacking the training, resources, or authority for addressing them.  This course will explore the principles, attitudes and strategies for leading and saving lives under these conditions.

Learning Objectives – Students taking this course will understand:

  • The role that leaders play creating urgency and inspiring the persistence necessary to address public health crises.
  • How to drive public health collective action in a landscape with diffuse and ambiguous authority and responsibiliy
  • How to deploy an equity lens to public health challenges
  • How social determinants of health impact individuals and communities
  • The important role that cities play in addressing public health challenges
  • The value the CommStat Model and Kennedy School Memo as public health tools

Office hours

Menschel Senior Leadership Fellows host office hours, open to all Harvard students.

Office Hours with Mayor Miro Weinberger

Book office hours with Miro Weinberger, former mayor of Burlington, VT, who is here for Fall 2 2024. During his 12-year tenure, he addressed major issues like housing, racial equity, the opioid crisis, and climate action, achieving milestones like 100% renewable energy generation in Burlington. This is a unique chance to connect directly with him and learn from his extensive experience in public health, urban planning, and leadership.

If you have any questions related to the Menschel Senior Leadership Fellowship, please contact Salif Mangane (smangane@hsph.harvard.edu).

Student liasons

Harvard Chan students may apply to serve as student liaisons for Menschel Senior Leadership Fellows. Liaisons work on a volunteer basis to help integrate Fellows into the fabric of the Harvard community by introducing them to the community’s people, culture, and events.

About

Menschel Senior Leadership Fellows are in residence on campus for approximately 9 weeks; and in cases of short-term fellows, only 1-2 weeks. Given the abundance of resources at Harvard, they can hardly expect to see and do it all. However, student liaisons can greatly enrich a Menschel Fellow’s experience by sharing with them their own network and knowledge., including theiir connections to student groups, events, faculty, and other campus going-ons.

Seeing Harvard through a student’s perspective provides each Menschel Senior Leadership Fellow with a fuller sample of the Harvard community. In return, Student Liaisons build unique relationships with esteemed global leaders of public heath decision-making.

Application Process

  • The application and selection process for Student Liaisons generally takes place weeks prior to the arrival of a Senior Leadership Fellow. Note: The process may be delayed for positions pertaining to Fellows in the Fall 1 term, since a Fellow for that term will arrive prior to most students returning to campus.
  • A separate application process for Student Liaisons will be held for each incoming Senior Leadership Fellow.
  • Open positions and links to online applications will be posted on this page.
  • Program staff will review all applications, meet with select candidates, and notify those chosen for positions.

Role

  • Contribute ideas of activities, meetings, and events that may be of interest to the Senior Leadership Fellow.
  • Meet regularly with the rest of the Student Liaison team and the Senior Leadership Fellow.
  • Meet as needed with the Senior Leadership Fellows Program (SLFP) staff for support and collaboration.

Student testimonials

Being a part of the student liaison program really complimented my first semester at Harvard Chan. Through the program, I was able to connect with Mayor Kim Janey and learn more about the amazing work she’s done for the city and as a leader in health equity. It felt like a truly integrated experience, doing my public health coursework as well as being her student liaison, and I am grateful to have had this opportunity here at Harvard.

Yvette Cho, MPH ’22, student liaison for Kim Janey, Menschel Fellow ’23 

Serving as a student liaison to Mayor de Blasio was a phenomenal experience. I deeply enjoyed co-facilitating small group dialogues on topics like poetry and public opinion, allowing Harvard Chan students, myself included, to learn creatively in conversation with the mayor. The student liaison program is a rare opportunity to engage with people who have served in high-level positions and gain unusual insights into what leadership may require.

Amal Cheema, MPH ’23, student liaison for Bill de Blasio, Menschel Fellow ’23