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This article discusses how advocacy can be taught to both law and public health students, as well as the role that public health law faculty can play in advocating for public health. Despite the central role that advocacy plans in translating public health research into law, policy advocacy skills are rarely explicitly taught in either law schools or schools of public health, leaving those engaged in public health practice unclear about whether and how to advocate for effective policies. The article explains how courses in public health law and health justice provide ideal opportunities to teach advocacy skills, and it discusses the work of the George Consortium, which seeks to engage public health law faculty in advocacy efforts.

Balancing on a tightrope twenty feet above the ground is outside the comfort zones of many health law professors. Being there forces you to consider in new ways yourself, your skills, and your surroundings. Fears arise, and yet you must still act. And you must trust that the person who offered you this opportunity cared about you and your well-being, and that they would ensure there was a way to get from where you began to the other side. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes a new type of medical-legal partnership (MLP) that targets the health and justice concerns of people enmeshed in the U.S criminal justice system: a partnership between clinicians who care for people with criminal system involvement and public defenders. This partnership offers an opportunity to not only improve patient health outcomes but also to facilitate less punitive court dispositions, such as jointly advocating for community-based rehabilitation and treatment rather than incarceration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic and growing political polarization have activated parental grievance against the government in recent years. Politicians have capitalized on this grievance by campaigning on, proposing, and passing legislation providing greater protections for parental rights in decision-making about health care and public education. This Article tracks the history of how courts have sought to balance parental rights with the public interest, and then explores contemporary controversies surrounding parental rights, including healthcare decision-making, public health mandates, public education, and the child welfare system. These controversies illuminate the incoherence in courts', policymakers', and the general public's framing of parental rights and demonstrates the need to identify shared values and promote equity in order to effectively balance individual rights with the common good. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides an overview of medical-legal partnerships (MLPs) and discusses MLPs as a public health law intervention. Opportunities for collaboration among MLPs, public health lawyers, and public health practitioners are described. The eight core components shared by MLPs are outlined. It is said that health care delivery reforms are incentivizing new clinic-to-community partnerships to connect patients to social service providers.

This article describes overlapping links among incarceration, poor health, race, and stigma, and stigma's impact on the health of former prisoners and their families and communities. The authors include policy recommendations to reduce the impact of incarceration and stigma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the importance of integrating legal education into public health curricula. It argues that understanding public health law goes beyond simply summarizing statutes or court decisions. The article suggests that the Council on Education for Public Health should revise its competencies to include law explicitly and advocates for hiring faculty with legal training to effectively teach legal concepts and skills. Lawyers can support faculty members in incorporating law into their courses and contribute to research projects examining the relationship between law and health outcomes. However, there are challenges to hiring lawyers, such as salary differences and tenure expectations. SPPHs can utilize resources and partnerships to enhance their capacity to teach legal concepts and skills. [Extracted from the article]