Margaret Koller is the Executive Director at Rutgers Center for State Health Policy where she oversees all day-to-day functions for the Center, including strategic and financial planning, communications and administrative management. Ms. Koller has extensive expertise in the areas of insurance policy and operations. Currently, she directs the Center’s Affordable Care Act (ACA) research portfolio, including health reform projects supported by the State of New Jersey, as well as other funders including the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF). Ms. Koller is also responsible for the oversight and management of the Center’s budget, including directing the Center’s infrastructure grant from the RWJF as well as all discretionary accounts funded through the University. In November 2004, Ms. Koller received an appointment to the New Jersey Small Employer Health Benefits Program Board of Directors. Before joining the Center in February 2001, Ms. Koller worked for Prudential HealthCare which was later acquired by Aetna. During her five years at Prudential and Aetna, she helped launch SeniorCare, Prudential Health Care's Medicare HMO, and was later the Senior Product Manager. Prior to her experience in managed care, she spent five years as a Congressional Aide in the district office of Congressman Bernard Dwyer. Ms. Koller was a fellow at the Eagleton Institute of Politics at Rutgers University where she earned an MS in Public Policy.

Dorothy Gaboda (M.S.W., Ph.D., Rutgers University) is the Associate Director for Data Analysis at the Center for State Health Policy. She has analyzed use of antidepressants in elderly nursing home residents, services for individuals with chronic conditions such as developmental disabilities and traumatic brain injury, retention of children and utilization of services in NJ FamilyCare, the NJ FamilyCare Express Enrollment School Pilot Program, and performance of commercial HMOs. She has also studied the needs of children and adults with autism, state and federal pharmacy programs, and barriers to electronic health data exchange. Previously, she was an Assistant Professor at the Department of Social Work at Kean University, and Field Director at the Developmental Disabilities Planning Institute. Her previous experience includes extensive project management with public and private clients for a private consulting firm in Princeton, NJ.

Michael J. Yedidia (Ph.D., Brandeis University; M.P.H., Yale University) is a Research Professor at the Center for State Health Policy. His research focuses on health professions education, access to care, patient perspectives on health and illness, and quality improvement. He is currently program director for Evaluating Innovations in Nursing Education, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s national initiative to support evaluation of interventions addressing the nurse faculty shortage (Evaluating Innovations in Nursing Education). He also leads a study of determinants of childhood obesity designed to inform the development and evaluation of obesity prevention programs in five New Jersey cities. His research funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality investigated new ways of structuring doctor-patient relationships to promote patient-centered care. Other recent projects include an evaluation of population health training programs for physicians and nurses, evaluation of an initiative to improve cardiac care for minority patients, a study of future roles for psychiatrists in the changing health care environment, and an assessment of the needs of family care givers for professional support. Previous research on patient perspectives on care includes studies of the experiences of dying patients during their final months of life and barriers to follow-up of abnormal mammograms among black women. Prior work on access to care includes research on the treatment of ischemic heart disease at a public hospital as compared to a private hospital and studies of the impact of social and organizational factors on the delivery of primary care. Prior to joining the faculty at Rutgers, Dr. Yedidia was a senior health services researcher at NYU’s Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and taught medical sociology, health policy, and research methods at the Department of Sociology and the Medical Education Program at Brown University. He received his M.P.H. from Yale and his Ph.D. in sociology from Brandeis University.

Joanne Fuccello ( MSW, LCSW, Rutgers University), has joined our Evaluating Innovations in Nursing Education National Program Office as Deputy Director. Fuccello has spent the two decades of her professional life working in both the public and nonprofit sectors analyzing and writing about health care policy and public policy. Since 2001, one of Fuccello’s primary areas of study has focused on state and federal policies related to nursing, most specifically on the complex issues related to the nursing workforce shortage. She has developed issue papers on the topic for policy and research-oriented organizations, including the National Health Policy Forum at George Washington University, the Health Policy Institute of Ohio and the New Jersey State Health Policy Forums. From 1992-2004, she was a program director for two initiatives funded through the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation – the New Jersey Policy Forums Program and the State Forums Partnership Program. Both programs worked to provide public policymakers and health care stakeholders with balanced, nonpartisan information to inform the health policy decision-making process. Her public sector work included research analyst positions in New Jersey state government with the Office of Administrative Law and the Office of Management and Budget.

Fuccello became an independent consultant in 2005 and continued to work with state health policy institutes around the country on various projects. In 2007, she researched and published an Issue Brief on strategies to integrate primary care services and mental health services within the state of Ohio, including a discussion on the role of nurses in primary care settings. Recently, Fuccello completed a two-year research project with the National Center for Cultural Competence at Georgetown University, which examined state-level legislative actions designed to mandate cultural competency training for licensed health and mental health care providers, including doctors, nurses and social workers. Her publications include over 60 policy briefs on a broad range of health and mental health policy topics, as well as case studies on program replication and challenges related to cross-sector collaboration on foundation-supported projects. She is an alumna of Douglass College and Rutgers University, where her graduate research focused on health care issues and advanced policy studies. She continues to maintain a limited private practice as a licensed clinical social worker, specializing in working with individuals and families affected by chronic illness.

David M. Frankford (J.D., University of Chicago) is a Professor of Law at the Rutgers University School of Law in Camden and a Professor at Rutgers' Institute for Health, Health Care Policy, and Aging Research in New Brunswick; Faculty Director at Camden of Rutgers' Center for State Health Policy; and a Member of Rutgers' Graduate Department of Public Policy and Administration in Camden. He is also an Associate Editor of the Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law. His primary current research interest concerns the reconstitution of professionalism as the normative integration of professions and community. In prior work, he has focused on the interactions between health services research, health care politics and policy, and the institutions of professions and professionalism.

Frank J. Thompson (Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley) is a Professor of Public Affairs and Administration at Rutgers-Newark and at the Rutgers Center for State Health Policy in New Brunswick. Professor Thompson has served as fellow with the U.S. Public Health Service and published extensively on issues of health policy and implementation. He has focused particular attention on issues of federalism and health care policy, participating in an array of funded projects related to this subject at the Rockefeller Institute of Government in Albany, New York. Publications from these projects include Medicaid and Devolution: A View from the States (Brookings Institution, co-editor with John DiIulio Jr.). Thompson is in the early stages of researching and writing a book on Medicaid under the administrations of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. In this regard, he has recently written papers that analyze the political and substantive implications of the growing use of Medicaid waivers to foster significant changes in this program. Thompson’s research on Medicaid highlights issues of political durability, democratic process, and health policy reform. Thompson received his undergraduate degree in political science from the University of Chicago. He is a Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration.