Grace Wang, COL ’26, Plano, TX
This summer, I had the honor of working in the United States House of Representatives in Washington D.C. on Capitol Hill! Specifically, I worked as a Legislative Intern for the Health Subcommittee in the House Ways and Means Committee, the oldest committee in U.S. Congress. This job provided me with hands-on experience in health policy, and allowed me to meet and network with many policy experts and attorneys on the Hill. I am immensely grateful to Penn for graciously supporting the work I contributed to the Committee.
The most memorable aspect of my summer working for one of the three branches of the U.S. federal government was witnessing and contributing to the legislative process. As an intern, I was given the opportunity to see how bills in Congress are written through sitting in on meetings with key healthcare stakeholders and constitutional lawyers, and I even watched healthcare bills being voted on, amended, and passed by members of Congress. Watching doctors and policy officials testify in Congress during hearings provided a profound and insightful experience, offering a front-row seat to the intricate process of translating clinical and policy knowledge into actionable legislation. This work experience allowed me to apply the health policy knowledge and legal principles I learned through my courses at Penn to a real world setting, deepening my understanding of public policy.
Throughout my summer internship, I had the opportunity to work on a few key projects. First, I conducted health policy research on the medical debt crisis in the U.S., including the burden of medical debt on families and its role in exacerbating already existing issues of health inequity – which will ultimately inform the drafting and significance of a bill. In addition, I analyzed over 90 healthcare models aimed at both providers and payers to prepare for the Committee’s hearing on value based care, and produced written fact sheets on the impact of the climate crisis on healthcare outcomes and utilization. I even had the chance to work with the Deputy Staff Director of the Health Subcommittee in assessing the funding structure of over 100 safety net hospitals in Massachusetts and Missouri.
However, the most interesting part of my internship was preparing for the Health Subcommittee’s June markup on four different healthcare bills. My role in the markup was composing a written document to the members of Congress outlining the subcommittee’s stance on key healthcare issues, including drug pricing, access to care for patients with pre-existing health conditions, reproductive rights for women, and impact of recent court cases like Braidwood Management v. Becerra.
Throughout my time as a Legislative Intern, I attended several policy briefings on the Hill, and took advantage of the many networking events in D.C. I am extremely thankful for this learning experience and opportunity to work in Congress, and I hope to take the writing, research, and communication skills I have gained to future opportunities.
This is part of a series of posts by recipients of the 2024 Career Services Summer Funding Grant. We’ve asked funding recipients to reflect on their summer experiences and talk about the industries in which they spent their summer. You can read the entire series here
