Associate Vice President for Government Relations and Public Policy
Pamela (Pam) Davidson has served at AAU since March 2021as the Associate Vice President for Government Relations and Public Policy. She is responsible for higher education funding and policy issues, including accreditation, student aid, college affordability, Title IX, the Institute of Education Sciences, and other U.S. Department of Education-related issues. Pam also leads the CFR Higher Education Task Force.
Pamela brings more than 30 years of policy and advocacy experience to AAU working on Capitol Hill and with non-profit organizations. Prior to joining AAU, she served in the United States Senate as a Professional Staff Member for the late U.S. Senator Mike Enzi (R-WY), Chairman of the Subcommittee on Primary Health and Retirement Security of the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP), and as a Senior Policy Advisor to U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy (R-LA). She was responsible for all education, labor and workforce development, paid leave initiatives, adoption, and childcare issues. She also successfully negotiated several bills enacted into federal law.
Before returning to Capitol Hill, she served as a Senior Director of Government Relations for the National Alliance for Public Charters Schools (NPCS), as Director of Government Affairs for the National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies (now Child Care Aware of America), and as Vice President of Government Relations for the National Council For Adoption (NCFA). Pam began her career working for several members of the U.S. House of Representatives, with 10 years for the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce, including under former Chairman and U.S. House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH).
She is also active in several organizations, such as Women in Government Relations (WGR), serves as a mentor to college students participating in The Fund for American Studies (TFAS) program and has served as a reviewer for the mock lobbying panel for the University of Texas Archer Center.
Pamela is a native of Tulsa, Oklahoma, and is a proud graduate of Oklahoma State University (Go Cowboys!) where she earned a bachelor of science, political science. She currently resides in Arlington, Virginia.