Last week, was a busy week for the WSU Office of Federal Relations. WSU Spokane Chancellor Lisa Brown and Acting Dean of the Medical Sciences, Ken Roberts traveled to DC to share updates with the Congressional delegation on the WSU Spokane Medical Science Campus. In addition, Dr. Jim Moyer, the Director of the WSU Agriculture Research Center, and Deborah Moore, WSU’s CARET Representative were in DC to advocate for agriculture research at land grant institutions.
While on a panel at the Inventing America Conference at the Newseum, WSU Spokane Chancellor Lisa Brown spoke to the importance of the University’s commercialization efforts and pending federal patent legislation. Chancellor Brown was joined on the panel by Former Congressman Jim Greenwood, CEO of BIO; Jeff Pott, General Counsel of AstraZeneca and Eb Bright, Executive Vice
President & General Counsel of Exploramed. More than 100 policy makers and thought leaders were there for the event where Chancellor Brown discussed the patent industry, jobs, the global economy and the important role of universities in this process.
WSU’s Ferdinand’s Creamery was highlighted at the annual APLU Council
on Government Affairs reception, where Members of Congress including WSU Alumni Congressman Dan Newhouse (R, WA-04), Congressman Rick Larsen, and Congressman Derek Kilmer sampled the much coveted Cougar Gold and award winning Apple Cup Crisp Ice Cream.This was a first for Ferdinand’s as the ice cream traveled across the country and to Capitol Hill for the event. We are grateful to our colleagues at the University of Delaware for making this happen and are already looking forward to doing this again next year!
To add to the excitement of the week, The Science Coalition on behalf of Washington State University hosted a Headliner Breakfast, where Congresswoman Suzan Delbene (D,WA-01) spoke to the importance of funding higher education federal research efforts.
In attendance where representatives of universities from across the United States, including Notre Dame University, The Ohio State University, Princeton University, Texas A&M University, the University of California, the University of Michigan, Harvard, the University of Washington as well as many others.