Adelphi Health Care Policy Aspects & Public Health Political Representative Letter

Letter to Political Representative Assignment

 

In order to effectively lobby for or against an issue of concern, the public health professional nurse must be perceived as informed, competent, and politically aware. This assignment has been developed to help the student sharpen those skills and perhaps even make an actual change in his/her community.

At any one time, there are myriad bills of proposed legislation in the U.S. Senate, the U.S. House of Representatives, the New York State Senate, and the New York State Assembly surrounding Health Policy issues.

As public health professionals, you have the ability to positively contributeto the legislative process as it attempts to address the major issues of your age. It is both a civic responsibility and a professional obligation to represent the best interests of our discipline and make your voice heard.

The assignment is to draft a letter to one of your state or federal representatives regarding a piece of health- related legislation. In order to successfully complete this assignment, you must:

1. Determine who your representative is -

 

For New York, the relevant websites are:

 

Assembly: https://nyassembly.gov/mem/search/ Senate: https://www.nysenate.gov/find-my-senator

For the U.S. Congress, the relevant websites are:

 

House of Representatives: https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative Senate: https://www.senate.gov/senators/index.htm

1. Determine what bill you want to write about – For New York, the relevant websites are:

Assembly: https://nyassembly.gov/leg/ Senate: https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation

For the U.S. Congress, good websites include: https://www.congress.gov/ https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/

1. Find information about the bill. You may do various searches on the Internet, but you MUST consult the actual bill. As some legislation is quite lengthy, you may not need to read the entire bill, however you must familiarize yourself with it sufficiently enough to be able to speak intelligently about it.
2. Find at least one relevant article in the peer-reviewed literature to help inform your position on the legislation.

 

1. Decide the position you will take on the bill. You may choose to be in support of or againsttheentirety of the legislation or a partial component of it.You may also advocate for adding something to or removing something from the bill. Please note that the position you advocate for will NOT influence your grade on this assignment.
2. Write your letter, considering the following:

 

Your letter should be formatted so that you could sign the letter and mail it as-is. Include the date, addresses, proper salutations, etc. Your language should be formal, polite, and concise. Begin by stating simply who you are and why you are writing in one sentence ("My name is John Smith, a citizen of New York City, NY, and I am writing to encourage you to support Senate bill S.1234). Provide support for your position, including information you gleaned from the academic literature. Be as specific as possible (if you feel that a particular article gives very strong evidence, you may reference it directly and could even include a copy with your letter). Your position will be further supported by describing personal experiences and/or how such legislation would affect you personally. End your letter by stating exactly the action you wish your elected official to take (e.g., "As the Committee considers the issues surrounding X this summer, I would ask you to strongly consider supporting/opposing Y"). In somecases, it may be appropriate for you to ask your representative to directly respond to you.

Your letter should be at least four paragraphs long, but should not be longer than 2 pages (ideally, it will fit entirely on one page). Use a reasonably normal font (e.g., Times New Roman, 12 point), single or 1.5 spacing (no double spacing!), and borders no larger than 1".

Policymaking is an extremely complex endeavor that should consider all the information available, but it also involves a lot of real people with different needs, desires, and viewpoints. Policymakers consider public health professionals just one of many constituents, and any group that makes a nuisance of itself will be subsequently marginalized. Politics, in other words, requires diplomacy. It is important to remember that you are a public health professional AND a citizen, and these are two separate roles. As a public health professional, you may possess discipline-specific knowledge, but in addition as a citizen you undoubtedly have an opinionabout how the government should act. Bear in mind that while you may be better informed than the average person, you should never be egotistical or demand certain actions. In fact, you are able to voice your opinion because you are a citizen, not because you work in public health. This is a powerful right that we are afforded in the United States, and you should exercise that right often -- but when you do, always be sure to stay informed and polite!

On the due date you must submit:

 

1. 1. A hard copy of your letter, formatted and signed in its final form

 

1. 1. A copy of the first page of the bill you are writing about

 

1. 1. A copy of the first page of the scholarly article you read to inform your position

 

You must also submit a .doc file of your final letter, the complete text of the bill, and the complete text of the scholarly article into the appropriate dropboxes in Moodle.

 

This assignment will constitute 20% of your course grade and will be graded according to the ‘Letter to Political Representative Grading Rubric.’