Chicago City Wire

Former Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has accepted a position as a Richard L. and Ronay A. Menschel Senior Leadership Fellow at Harvard University, where she will teach a course called “Health Policy and Leadership” at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

According to a report by the Chicago Sun-Times, part of the course will focus on how Lightfoot guided the city through the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Lightfoot said teaching graduate students "gives me an opportunity to share my perceptions and experiences of the times that we’ve lived through with people who are very committed to the public sector,” she told the Sun-Times. Lightfoot has taught previously, teaching courses on trial advocacy at the University of Chicago and Northwestern Schools of Law.

Harvard Senior Leadership Fellows Program and Studio Programming Director Eric Andersen said Harvard sought Lightfoot because “I think as mayor and as a leader, she faced many pressing public health issues, most notably navigating the pandemic," he said in the story.

Lightfoot will join a list of Menschel fellows that includes former New York Mayor Bill de Blasio and Boston Mayor Kim Janey, among others. The Menschel program “offers a rare opportunity for those who have recently served in top-level positions in government, multilateral institutions, nonprofit organizations and journalism to spend time at the school mentoring and teaching students who aspire to similar roles," Harvard stated in a news release. Lightfoot will have regular office hours and meet with students, faculty and staff on campus, the report added.

“I want to take advantage of the other opportunities that will surely present themselves, both to participate as part of the campus community and then contribute in other ways, too,” Lightfoot said in the report.

After being elected to a single term as mayor, Lightfoot finished third in this year's Democratic primary with roughly 16% of the vote in a field of nine candidates, becoming the first sitting mayor in Chicago to be voted out in nearly 40 years. Cook County Commissioner Brandon Johnson won a runoff election with Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas to win the mayor's race.