Hannah van Kolfschooten as visiting fellow at Harvard Law School
21 November 2023
What did your visiting fellowship at Harvard Law School entail?
I was part of the Visiting Researcher Program of Harvard Law School in Cambridge, Massachusetts from January 2023 until July 2023. The program hosted about 15 legal researchers from all over the world, in all career stages. We met every week for a colloquium and presented our research to each other. In addition, I was a guest at the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School, where I participated in academic activities and lunches. Harvard Law School has a vibrant academic community, so I visited many (lunch) seminars and talked to a lot of inspiring academics. At the same time, I had a lot of time to do research and write in one of the many libraries on the beautiful Harvard campus.
What impact has the Fellowship had on you, both professionally and personally?
My research focuses on the regulation of artificial intelligence in the medical context. Also in the US, this is a rather “hot” topic. Because regulation works very differently in the US, I got a lot of inspiration for my research, both from internal seminars and events at other universities. I was happy to encounter other legal researchers working on similar topics and exchanging thoughts with them. I also got the chance to collaborate with US researchers: the Petrie-Flom Center invited me to write for Bill of Health and I published a piece with the Health and Human Rights Journal with a fellow visiting researcher on climate change and health law. Personally, I enjoyed the experience of living in Boston for half a year and making many friends, that will hopefully visit Amsterdam very soon.
What are the top highlights of your Fellowship experience?
Foremost, I feel very lucky to have met so many wonderful and inspiring fellow academics. Other highlights were the many seminars and conferences I was able to attend in the US, such as a privacy conference at Yale University, an AI conference at MIT, and the annual Health Law Conference in Baltimore.