Advocacy 101

Christina West is the associate vice chancellor for federal relations in Vanderbilt University's office of federal relations. In this role, West is responsible for coordinating the university's federal relations and advocacy activities. She interacts regularly with leaders in Congress, focusing primarily on the Tennessee congressional delegation and their staff.

Prior to joining Vanderbilt, West was a senior associate at the government relations firm of Collins and Company. She also served as the assistant director for international affairs at the National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges (now the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities). In that position, she promoted, both on Capitol Hill and within the administration, the international agendas of major public research universities, including the Department of Education's Title VI programs and immigration issues related to international students and scholars.

In addition to her experience in the private sector, West worked on Capitol Hill, primarily for former Representative Bob Clement, D-Tenn., with responsibility for his work on the Budget Committee as well as his education, foreign relations, trade, immigration, and defense portfolios. She also completed a summer internship in the legislative office of former Sen. Fred Thompson, R-Tenn.

A graduate of Haverford College, in Haverford, Pennsylvania, West has a bachelor's degree in political science.

Liz LaPolt Clark is vice president for policy and research at NACUBO and a member of the NACUBO executive leadership group. She has been widely quoted in the press and is a sought-after speaker on how Washington politics and federal policies impact higher education. Clark got her start on Capitol Hill opening Cornell University's first Washington, DC-based federal relations office. Also in her career, she has led federal affairs for the State University of New York (SUNY) System and for Oregon State University. At NACUBO, she heads the team responsible for analysis of federal regulatory and legislative actions, research, and communications.

Ashley N. Jackson, director of government affairs for NACUBO, leads advocacy efforts on Capitol Hill on issues affecting business officers such as higher education reauthorization, tax and accounting policy, and annual appropriations. Prior to joining NACUBO, from 2015 to 2022, Jackson worked with the National Asphalt Pavement Association (NAPA) to secure $3 million for the asphalt airfield pavement research program as part of the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization. She focused on surface transportation and aviation authorizations, annual appropriations bills, highway funding, and asphalt research as NAPA's point person on Capitol Hill. In addition to managing the NAPA Political Action Committee, Jackson led the planning and execution of the annual Transportation Construction Coalition Legislative Fly-In, which brought more than 500 highway contractors to Washington each spring to discuss issues affecting highway and airport infrastructure funding with lawmakers.