Director, Science Policy and Advocacy

The development of lifesaving vaccines and treatments for infectious diseases is increasingly hindered by the surging cost and difficulty of generating high-quality evidence in humans through clinical trials. 1

Day Sooner is working to change that through “Clinical Trial Abundance (CTA),” a national advocacy campaign to reduce the cost of health evidence and extract more value from the evidence we have. As Director, Science Policy and Advocacy, you will lead the CTA program and drive progress toward policy change through legislative vehicles such as the Prescription Drug User Fee Act, as well as regulatory rule making and guidance.

Reporting to and working closely with the President, you will set and advance the CTA agenda, managing all aspects of the program, including strategy, policy development, advocacy, partnerships, stakeholder engagement, budget, hiring, and team performance. You will lead a team of four and grow that team as we scale, building the processes and structure to execute the CTA strategy while supporting professional development and growth.

CTA is fueled by a recent multi-million-dollar grant and as 1

Day secures additional funding, this role will be central to building the broader movement for clinical trial policy reform, convening researchers, patient advocates, industry stakeholders, and funders together to remove unnecessary barriers slowing innovation in public health.

The AI boom presents enormous potential to improve human health and save lives, but the trend toward greater cost of human data must be reversed or it will create a bottleneck, strangling that potential. Our vision over the next ten years is to reshape the FDA of the 21st century as profoundly as the post-thalidomide era changed the FDA of the 20th.

We aim to increase the value of health evidence being generated by 10x at 1/10 the current average cost.

You will build on 1

Day Sooner’s record of advancing ambitious campaigns in science, policy, and ethics to stop the world’s most harmful infectious diseases. With a strong understanding of federal advocacy and lobbying, you will develop and advance legislative, regulatory, and appropriations strategies. You are comfortable taking and defending bold positions while effectively navigating complex policy and stakeholder environments. See here for an account of our impact through mid-2024.

Early performance expectations for this role include:

• Introducing bipartisan, bicameral legislation that includes some of our priorities.
• Building out the program’s core processes—policy development, advocacy tracking, information management, and stakeholder management—so that the team can operate quickly and efficiently as it scales.
• Deepening 1
  
  Day’s relationships across the clinical trial policy ecosystem, positioning 1
  
  Day as the field’s most useful partner.
• Developing an agenda for policy changes that can be achieved through regulatory change under existing statutory authority.

• Although 1
  
  Day operates as a fully remote organization with no physical office, the nature of this role requires regular presence in Washington, DC. Candidates must be based in the DC area.
• Depending on background and experience, we expect the salary for this position to fall within a range of $150K – $220K. The salary offered will be commensurate with experience. 1
  
  Day offers an outstanding benefits package, including 15 vacation days plus federal holidays and an office closure between Christmas and New Year’s; 15 fully paid sick days; 5 paid days of professional development leave; parental and bereavement leave; generous health and wellness benefits through an Individual Coverage Health Reimbursement Arrangement (ICHRA) for you and…