Heidi Allen, MSW, PhD is Associate Dean for Research and an Associate Professor in the School of Social Work at Columbia University. Dr. Allen’s research focuses on eliminating health disparities through evidence-based health policy and evolved from her clinical practice in mental health and emergency department social work. She spent several years working in state health policy, focusing on delivery system redesign and coverage expansions. Professor Allen was a 2014-2015 American Political Science Association Congressional Fellow in Health & Aging Policy as well as a 2017 speaker at TEDMED.  She is currently a commissioner on the Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission (MACPAC), a non-resident fellow at the Urban Institute, and a contributing writer at Milbank Quarterly. Professor Allen serves on the Development Core of the Columbia Population Research Center and is a faculty affiliate of the Columbia Center on Poverty and Social Policy. She is an Advisory Board member of the Columbia University Center for Health Policy and the Boston University Center for Innovation in Social Work & Health. Dr. Allen is a first-generation college graduate who received her bachelor’s degree from Boise State University and her MSW and PhD from Portland State University.