The Milken Institute School of Public Health named a Department of Health and Human Services adviser and disability rights lawyer as the next Harold and Jane Hirsh Associate Professor of Health Law and Policy in a release last month.

Alison Barkoff, who is currently acting as the Administration for Community Living administrator and assistant secretary for aging, will leave her role at HHS to join Milken in October as both the Harold and Jane Hirsh Associate Professor of Health Law and Policy and as the director of the Hirsh Health Law and Policy Program. The program offers a joint-degree option in law and public health and takes an interdisciplinary approach to the study of health care, policy and law as well as public health with aims to understand how law impacts health care and public health.

“With her decades of leadership in the federal government and non-profit sector advancing health law and policy, she brings unmatched experience, knowledge and passion to our program and is the perfect person to continue the Hirsh Health Law and Policy Program’s national impact,” Milken Dean Lynn Goldman said in the release.

Barkoff held leadership roles at the ACL since the beginning of the Biden Administration in 2021 and worked to ensure the civil rights of people with disabilities and older adults, according to an HHS release. Barkoff has also previously worked as special counsel for Olmstead Enforcement in the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice and served in advocacy efforts at the Center for Public Representation and the Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law.

“The Milken Institute School of Public Health plays a unique role in serving as a thought leader on the most important health issues today, and I am excited to contribute through research and advocacy to address health disparities, increase access to health care and long-term care and shape courts’ interpretation of health laws,” Barkoff said in the release. “I am thrilled to advance this important work while also serving as a mentor to the passionate students at GW who will become the next generation of health leaders.”