The Policy Pulse | February 2026 Newsletter

FEBRUARY 2026

“Open.”

At the inaugural session of The Future We Design Seminar Series, panelist Kate Gilbert answered a simple question about the future of Boston with a single word: open.

As Founder and Executive Director of the Boston Public Art Triennial, Kate has built her work around opening minds, conversations, and civic spaces. Her response resonated deeply. It speaks to the city’s future and to the spirit of the Policy School as we mark our twentieth anniversary.

The Future We Design series, launched this February, creates space for open inquiry and shared reflection. Across conversations on design, sustainability, and the arts, we are asking: How do we build a more responsive and inclusive public sphere?

As we reflect on two decades of impact, we look ahead with intention. Join us as we imagine and design the future together.

Warmly,

Maria

Maria Ivanova

Director, The Policy School

Co-Director, Plastics Center

UPDATES FROM THE POLICY SCHOOL

left to right: Kellee Tsai, Maria Ivanova, Christopher Bosso, Barry Bluestone, Joan Fitzgerald

Cheers to 20 Years: Policy School's Spring Bash Honors A Legacy of Excellence

Policy School students, faculty, staff, alumni, Advisory Committee members, and guests gathered for a lively Spring '26 celebration that also commemorated the School's 20th anniversary. Policy School Director Maria Ivanova welcomed distinguished guests including CSSH Dean Kellee Tsai and former and current faculty, such as Barry Bluestone, Christopher Bosso, and J oan Fitzgerald, who helped launch and guide the School during its formative years. SEE PHOTOS

Resilience, Purpose, and Community: Northeastern's Law and Policy Fellows Convene for a Day of Dialogue

Thanks to the generosity of Northeastern alumnus Raymond B. Ludwiszewski ’81, the Policy School held a day-long convening of the Law and Policy Fellows, a program created jointly with the Policy School and the Northestern School of Law that brings together leaders with experience in government service to build community and contribute to academic life at Northeastern. The event, held at the Policy School’s Arlington campus, featured a roundtable discussion with students on "Resilience, Career Transitions & Continued Impact." Prof. Sharmila Murthy moderated and Policy School Director Maria Ivanova and Prof. Etai Mizrav kicked off the roundtable with opening remarks. READ MORE

top row (left to right): Marcia Mundt, Elizabeth Wilcox, Nancy Johnson, Zeinah Salahi, Trent Buatte, Samuel Roth, Christine Stoneman, Amy Romero

bottom row (left to right): Maria Van Buren, Etai Mizrav, Maria Ivanova, Sharmila Murthy, Brian Trackman

From the Inside Out: Rethinking Pedagogy and Policy

Social Impact Lab Director Rebecca Riccio delivered a presentation on "Dismantling the Systems Within: How Pedagogy Innovation Can Fuel Policy Innovation" as part of the new Policy Innovation Hub seminar series. In her talk, she explored principles of anti-oppressive community engagement and outlined ways to move forward.

Building a Better Boston: Mayor Wu Honors Prof. Ted Landsmark's Enduring Legacy

"He was, and still is," says Mayor Michelle Wu, in the introduction to a video paying tribute to Prof. Ted Landsmark, "the man who has spent every day building a better Boston, one where justice and opportunity belong to everyone." WATCH THE VIDEO

Skill Drills: Faculty Talk the Practical Side of Policy Careers

The Northeastern Association for Public Policy Students (NAPPS) hosted a Professor After Hours session featuring Profs. Mark Henderson and Daniel Aldrich. They offered candid and practical advice for students trying to connect policy values with real tools and careers. They also emphasized the importance of building technical fluency and networking consistently.

Insider's Perspective: Former Federal Servant Advises the Next Generation of Policy Leaders

The Northeastern Association for Public Policy Students (NAPPS) hosted a Coffee & Conversation gathering featuring guest speaker and Northeastern Law & Policy Fellow Elizabeth Wilcox. She shared her perspective as former civil servant with more than 20 years of experience at the U.S. Departments of State, Homeland Security, and Treasury.

Thinking Globally, Acting Boldly: Students Take Center Stage in Plastics Center Policy Hub Innovation Talk

Policy School Director and Plastics Center Co-Director Maria Ivanova provided an overview of the Center's mission as part of the new Policy Innovation Hub seminar series. She invited several students, including Nicole Vandale, Diane Grant, Claren Copp-Larocque, Rong Bao, and Olga Skaredina, to share the transformative impact of their experiential engagement at a global level.

FACULTY & STAFF IMPACT

Left, aquanaut Fabien Cousteau with former provost Stephen Director and professor Brian Helmuth in Aquarius habitat during an outreach event to the Boston Museum of Science. Photo by Chris Marks. Right, The Aquarius underwater habitat in the Florida KeysPhoto by Kip Evans and courtesy of Fabien Cousteau/Mission 31

Under the Sea: What Aquanauts Experience Underwater Could Hold the Key to Saving Our Oceans

"Unless we reframe the way we interact with the ocean,” says Prof. Brian Helmuth, “we're in a lot of trouble."

Prof. Helmuth is among the Northeastern researchers, including lead author and Cognitive Psychology PhD student Kristen Kilgallen, who have documented a cognitive shift among aquanauts, people who live and work under the sea, which they have dubbed the “underview effect.” They explore this phenomenon in a new article An Underview Effect? Psycho-Social Impacts of Saturation Diving Among Aquanauts.

Similar to how astronauts have reported an "overview effect,” a profound sense of connection to Earth from space, aquanauts experience a connection that is visceral, immediate, and deeply tied to the marine environment itself. Unlike scuba divers who are limited to 45-minute dives, aquanauts can observe marine ecosystems for 8+ hours daily. This enables them to witness the ebb and flow of ocean life, including predator-prey dynamics at night and the daily routines of fish, that brief visits never capture. The aquanauts the researchers interviewed all described their extended observations leading to a transformative sense of connection to ocean life.

Prof. Helmuth and his colleagues hope that sharing that sense of wonder and kinship with nature with the public could be key to helping understand and conserve the ocean environment. “We’re at this juncture,” he says, “where we’re realizing that a business-as-usual approach to how we interact with nature and especially the ocean is just not going to cut it.” READ MORE

All Abuzz: One Man's Mission to Bring an Endangered Bee Back from the Brink

Prof. Damon Hall is undertaking a two-year project, funded by a grant from the Sarah K. deCoizart Perpetual Trust, investigating municipal insect pollinator conservation policy innovations across New England, focusing on habitat recovery for the endangered Rusty patched bumble bee (Bombus affinis). This interdisciplinary research combines ecology, policy analysis, and urban governance while training three graduate students in environmental policy research methods.

Connecting the Dots: Prof. Zellner Makes the Case for Mindfulness in Policy and Planning

In a presentation at the Interdisciplinary Committee on Organizational Studies (ICOS) Seminar at the University of Michigan, Prof. Moira Zellner shared her work on participatory modeling with leading scholars in the fields of policy, planning, social science, complexity, mathematics, and economics. In her remarks, she emphasized that cultivating mindfulness is essential to helping stakeholders connect the dots when tackling complex problems. WATCH THE PRESENTATION

The City at Eye Level: How Street View Imagery Is Changing the Way We Understand Urban Environments

Prof. Fang Fang delivered a seminar in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department in which she presented her latest research on how Google Street View images can be used to evaluate urban greenspace configuration. Her work demonstrates

that street-level imagery provides robust environmental signals that can help model future urban environmental change.

Measuring What Matters: Boston's First Environmental Sensor Network Comes to Life

After four years of collaborative planning and deployment, Boston’s first environmental sensor network is now complete through the Common SENSES action-research project in which the Boston Area Research Initiative (led by Dan O'Brien) played a major role. In addition to BARI, co-investigators include Profs. Moira Zellner, Amy Mueller, and Michelle Laboy. The network includes 24 air quality sensors and 51 heat and noise sensors spread across Roxbury and Dorchester along Blue Hill Avenue, measuring extreme heat, noise, and air quality to support environmental justice action. READ MORE

Prescription for PVC: Plastics Center Sets Out to Transform How Boston's Hospitals Handle Plastic Waste

Thanks to a $100,000 grant from the Vinyl Institute, Prof. Aron Stubbins and Policy School Director Maria Ivanova, Co-Directors of The Plastics Center at Northeastern University will lead a year-long project to assess the feasibility of creating clean, recyclable PVC waste streams across Boston's major healthcare systems. The initiative will pave the way for a scalable pilot, with the potential to become a national model for healthcare vinyl recycling.

Rethinking the Classroom: Prof. Prakash's Research Takes on Science Education Reform

Prof. Nishith Prakash has an article "Building Teacher Capacity or Outsourcing Pedagogy? Experimental Evidence from Science Education Reform" forthcoming in the Journal of Development Economics. One of his co-authors is former Future Faculty Fellow Ariel Gomez, who is now faculty at SUNY Old Westbury.

Ideas That Move the World: Prof. Ivanova Recognized as a Top Global Thought Leader in Sustainability

Policy School Director and The Plastics Center at Northeastern University Co-Director Maria Ivanova has been named one of the Top 20 Most-Read Thought Leaders in Sustainable Business worldwide by illuminem, the world's leading sustainability information and data platform. Prof. Ivanova's work at the intersection of environmental policy and plastics sustainability continues to shape how we think about our planet's future.

Still Starry-Eyed: Michele Rosenthal Shares the Secret to Enduring Professional Joy

Associate Director of Student Experience and Graduate Co-op Success Michele Rosenthal served as the keynote speaker for Nourish Engagement, a community of practice for employee engagement at Northeastern. In her presentation entitled I am still the Starry-Eyed New Professional, she discussed her professional trajectory and techniques to find meaningul professional joy and fulfillment.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Plastics Center Launch Reception

Thursday, March 5th | 4:00-6:00 PM ET | Raytheon Amphitheater (Egan 240)

Join us to celebrate the launch of the Plastics Center! Plastics are integral to modern life, yet their widespread use and disposal pose a threat to both human health and the environment. At the Plastics Center, we aim to understand and mitigate the harm caused by plastics through transdisciplinary research, education, the arts and policy engagement. Refreshments will be provided!

RSVP here

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Leadership in Sustainability (The Future We Design Seminar Series)

Tuesday, March 10th | 5:00-7:30 PM ET | East Village 17th Floor

Cities, companies, and campuses are navigating complex transitions toward sustainable operations and governance. This session convenes municipal officials, corporate leaders, and campus administrators implementing ambitious climate and equity goals, demonstrating how policy innovation happens across sectors and scales. We are thrilled to invite alumni working in sustainability fields, government officials, and industry experts to this event. Sustainability means a lot of things, and we will discuss how we lead in a way that serves and includes future generations.

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Massachusetts Early Childhood Research Summit

Thursday, March 19th | 9:00 AM – 3:30 PM ET | Wellesley College (Diana Chapman Walsh Alumnae Hall)

Calling all researchers, data analysts, designers, and early childhood “nerds”! Join us on Thursday, March 19, 2026, at Wellesley College for a statewide gathering to share research, data, and design insights—and to connect emerging evidence with opportunities for early childhood policy change in Massachusetts.

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Arts and Policy (The Future We Design Seminar Series)

Thursday, April 2nd | 5:00-8:00 PM ET | Museum of Fine Arts (465 Bar and Restaurant)

Through the lens of the iconic “Soiling of Old Glory” photograph, this seminar will explore how cultural expression documents injustice, preserves collective memory, and catalyzes policy transformation. Bringing together photographers, historians, and museum professionals, the session will demonstrate how art creates the conditions for social change. This event will serve as the culmination of the series and will celebrate the 20th Anniversary and end of the Spring semester alongside friends of the School, faculty, and our university community.

Speakers:

Pierre Terjanian, Ann and Graham Gund Director and CEO of the Museum of Fine Arts
Stanley Foreman, Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer
Louis Masur, author and historian
Prof. Ted Landsmark, Northeastern University

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NULab Spring Conference 2026

Friday, May 1st | 10:30 AM-3:00 PM ET | Zoom

Please join us for the ninth annual NULab spring conference, featuring talks by Northeastern faculty, staff, students, and collaborators about their work in computational social science and digital humanities. This year's theme is "Collective Persistence" and the conference will include a diverse set of interdisciplinary presentations on topics including digital archiving, oral history, network analysis, Indigenous language preservation, ethical applications of AI, and more.

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BARI Conference 2026: Greater Boston’s 10th Annual Insight-to-Impact Summit

Friday, May 8th | 8:30 AM-6:00 PM ET | Northeastern (Boston campus)

The BARI Conference is a unique forum for community leaders, practitioners, researchers, and policymakers to share how they are leveraging the tools of research, scholarship, and design with and for the communities of Greater Boston—and how we can do even more through collective action. The call for proposals has been extended until February 2nd.

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Now You Know: Honoring the Life and Legacy of Kitty Dukakis

Thursday, May 14th | time TBD | Cabral Center, John D. O’Bryant African American Institute

Sponsored by the Dukakis Center for Urban and Regional Policy, this symposium will celebrate women’s leadership in public service as exemplified by the life and legacy of Kitty Dukakis. Bringing together policymakers, practitioners, community members and researchers, we will collectively explore how to make meaningful progress across four policy areas championed by the former Massachusetts First Lady: housing insecurity, mental health, environmental preservation, and support for the arts. The goal is to form new coalitions across the public, private, non-profit, and academic sectors that will actively work together to move the needle in each area and fulfill the collective vision of Kitty and Michael Dukakis to build a thriving community that serves the most vulnerable residents of the Commonwealth.

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NAPPS weekly meeting

every Friday | NAPPS Weekly Meeting | Meeting-Join | Microsoft Teams

If you’ve ever wanted to step up, speak out, and shape the world around you, then NAPPS (Northeastern Association for Public Policy Students) is the place to be. Whether you’re eager to test your skills in leadership roles, brainstorm innovative policy solutions, or engage with the larger policy community, NAPPS offers the perfect platform. It’s a space where you don’t just learn—you lead, experiment, and grow.