CEO Blog

This week will witness the inauguration of our 46th president, Joseph R. Biden Jr. The Biden transition team has been navigating the normally delicate transition process made even more complicated by the COVID-19 pandemic and an uncooperative outgoing administration.

The new administration finds itself preparing policy responses to multiple policy crises on day one. While acute policy responses will fill the initial weeks of the administration, there are longer-term aging issues that will need to be considered in the year ahead.

Fortunately, GSA has assembled the work of some top scholars to help illustrate many of these issues in the latest Public Policy & Aging Report (PP&AR), titled “Policy Considerations for a Post-COVID Presidency.”

Happy New Year! If one of your resolutions is to make a positive difference in people’s lives, the first new resource we’ve added to the GSA website in 2021 is an essential tool: COVID-19 vaccine information for older adults.

We recognize that our members are working with older adults and may get questions from family, friends, and colleagues about the COVID-19 vaccine. This fact sheet gives answers to common questions so that GSA members can share accurate information.

The GSA family begins 2021 mourning the loss of our friend, colleague, role model, and Board Chair Kathryn Hyer, MPP, PhD, FGSA, FAGHE.

Many of you had the opportunity to work with Kathy over her more than 30 years of active involvement in GSA. Kathy served as AGHE treasurer, SRPP Section chair, and member of the GSA Executive Committee. And she had the distinction of serving as the first GSA president under the Society’s new governance model.

GSA is offering emerging scholars the opportunity to be immersed in aging-related policy development and participate in this process at the national level! We’re now accepting applications for the 2021 cycle of the Greg O’Neill Student Policy Internship, which will be conducted remotely in the summer months. I invite you to apply or help spread the word! The application deadline is January 29.

As of January 1, GSA welcomes three new editors-in-chief to its peer-reviewed journals! I extend my congratulations to these successors who are about to embark upon four-year terms, and thank the outgoing editors for their tremendous contributions which have led to the journals’ continued growth as leading journals in the field of gerontology and associated disciplines.