Academics often make a big mistake when they begin to work in policy: they think that data changes minds.

Don’t get me wrong; data plays a critical role in change-making. If the data doesn’t support your case, not only will you be limited in how many minds you can change, but you’re putting your reputation on the line, and the fallout might not be pretty.

But data just doesn’t compare to storytelling in how it packs a punch. Good stories turn numbers into people and statistics into reality. They engage not just our intellectual side, but our emotional one. They bring people together, connecting them, in ways that data alone just… can’t. 

And when it comes to policy, few things matter more than connecting to each other. You need people to care enough about your issue to do something about it, and caring about something is a feeling, an emotional response. After all, policy is about people – those complicated, messy, emotionally beings who lie to themselves about how logical they are. 

The fact is that if you want to change policy, you need both data and storytelling. Let’s break them down.

First, let’s talk about data. You can think of data as the bedrock of policymaking. Like underlying rock, data shapes how things appear on the surface, even if we don’t see the hidden detail beneath. Furthermore, how solid and reliable that bedrock is will affect the ability of what comes after. You want to make policy that’s backed by solid data as much as you want to make sure that you aren’t building a parking garage over a sinkhole. 

When you meet with policymakers, there are some specific advantages to having a position backed by data.

1. Credibility. Policymakers are bombarded with information constantly. Their decision-making isn’t hampered by access to information; the difficulty lies in knowing what data they can trust. If you’re coming to the table with data behind you, that’s automatically bringing points in your favor.
2. Specificity. It’s one thing to say that graduate students are experiencing a mental health crisis. It’s another to say that the rate of depression in grad school is six times that of the general population. Or that 1 in 10 are suicidal. Being specific gives your argument an edge that’s hard to ignore.
3. Comparison. When you are trying to convince someone to support a specific position, numbers not only gives weight to the problem, but also to the choices: “Option A is estimated to reduce rates of depression in students by 10%, whereas Option B reduces is by 20%”. Believe it or not, (most) policymakers (usually) feel the weight of their decisions and care (to some degree) about the outcome. And if you can help them see the different outcomes of their choice, that greatly reduces the burden that decision carries.
4. Accountability. Policies are regularly evaluated for effectiveness (now, whether the government or the people care about that evaluation is another story, but I digress). But this means that when you have a policy proposal, bringing data on both (1) current policy effectiveness and (2) potential policy effectiveness helps to narrow the degree of uncertainty – the risk – that comes from supporting a policy. Policymakers can feel more confident that they’ll have made fewer bad decisions overall if you can help them figure out the right decision first. 
5. Clarity. Numbers bring clarity; if you are having guests over, knowing how many people will be there, what their dietary preferences are, and how long they plan to stay, will make it a lot easier for you to decide to make hand-crafted pasta or a big pot of chili. Help your policymakers see the issue for what it is, and the more you can break a complicated issue down into simpler, quantifiable elements, the more effective you will be.

So yes, data is crucial to policymaking. But it has limitations. Not only do a lot of people get overwhelmed when confronted with a bunch of numbers, but numbers lack the emotional, human component that allows them to connect easily in the first place. Data can isolate just as easily. 

Thankfully, that’s where storytelling shines.

Ahem. Allow me to indulge just a bit. My area of expertise is human evolution, and that means I could talk for way longer than I should ever be allowed to on the power of storytelling. So I’ll be brief and just say that being able to tell stories has been a key driver of human cognition. Specifically, it has given us the ability to have incredibly complex social dynamics, to take the perspective of other beings, and to share information in ways that no other species (that we’ve seen) has managed. Whether you like it or not, storytelling is an intimate component of the human identity, and that means that we connect to stories in a way that we just cannot do to data. And that means that you need to use stories on your advocacy efforts i you want to make a difference.

There are some specific advantages of storytelling, and most of them have to do with how successful they are at helping a policymaker care. After all, if you want a policymaker to take your position, you have to make them care about it first.

1. Emotional Connection. Helping policymakers connect emotionally is a very powerful way to help them care. I mean, have you ever seen an ad for pet rescue and have to forcibly remind yourself of all the very, very good reasons you just cannot adopt another animal?? Emotions drive us; rationalization comes after.
2. Relatability. Another way to help a policymaker care about an issue is to help them see how it relates to them or someone they care about. If they can imagine their child being a grad student, facing the kind of issues that you are presenting to them, it’ll be a lot harder for them to dismiss the very real struggles that they – and we – are facing.
3. Memorable. Let’s face it: our brains didn’t evolve in an environment where remembering facts and statistics was key to our survival. Instead, we used stories to pass along learned lessons. After all, it didn’t matter to our survival exactly how many of our ancestors died from eating a particular berry, but being able to remember the tragic tale of Jimmy and the Purple Vine Berries could keep us safe.
4. Accessibility. I’m going to lay it out straight: academics have earned their reputation for elitism. Academics speak using a kind of dialect that most people don’t understand, creating a barrier between them and their audience and not connection. And even though a lot of academics are comfortable dealing with data, most people do not spend a lot of time engaging with it. This means that if you are hoping that your complex and nuanced statistical analysis of a situation is going to resonate with the policymaker sitting across the table from you, I’ve got bad news for you. And let me be clear: this is not something they need to fix. You have the information; you have the responsibility to communicate that in a way that ensures understanding. There’s a famous story of Richard Feynman getting frustrated at his efforts to break a complicated physics concept down to a level that his freshmen could understand. He said that he knew it meant that he didn’t really understand it himself.

If you want to be truly compelling and persuasive, you’ve got to bring together accurate data and evocative storytelling. But this can be easier said than done. If you’re struggling to marry the two effectively, here are a few approaches you could try:

1. Illustrate the Data. Try to turn the numbers into a narrative. Instead of describing the statistics on grad school matriculation, student work expectations, and our drop-out rates (hint: they’re bad), tell the story of Kaylynne, a mom who moved across the country with her husband and 3-year-old and how her education and work environment was so toxic that she developed multiple disabilities so severe that, by the tine she graduated 7 years later, she was disabled and unable to work. (Hi, that’s me, I’m Kaylynne – you can read more of my story here). And then you can say, “If you think this is bad, just remember: she’s not the exception. Half of all doctoral students drop out because of the stress.”
2. Humanize the Data. Put a face on the data. After telling my story above, you can follow that up with: “How many of those with me here today have a similar story? How many personally know someone who has one? Kaylynne’s story is also my story, and his, and hers. Do you know anyone who has gone to earn a PhD? Have you talked to them about their experiences? Maybe you should.”
3. Contextualize the Data. Saying that half of doctoral students drop out is, on its own, a powerful statistic. But the obvious counter is that there could be many reasons for someone dropping out of school: maybe they got a great job offer, or their parents needed them home, or maybe, as a lot of faculty will say, the students just “weren’t cut out” for the rigor of a PhD program. So when you can provide context for the data – when you can explain that, when asked, the vast majority of the students left because of high stress, low pay, and a poor work-life balance. How they were having to rely on food banks to feed their kids while working 50-hour weeks stuck at a computer with no HR to protect them from neglect, abuse, and exploitation.
4. Garner Attention. Yes, yes, I’ll admit it. Stories get people’s attention. And this is not a bad thing. Yeah, you heard me: Getting attention is not a bad thing. All it does is allow the Thinking Human Being now listening to you to give you, and your position, their due consideration. Don’t cheapen their decision by presuming that they are incapable of analyzing what they hear. Once you’ve got their attention, then you can show them that they can trust you because you have the facts that back it up. If you can’t draw them in enough to convince them to listen to you, then that’s on you, not them.

As you craft your message to your policymakers, try to think of ways to incorporate both data and storytelling. Perhaps start by thinking on the stories that you’ve heard from fellow students. Which ones have resonated with you? Which ones have inspired you to take action? To care? Once you’ve picked out a few stories, think about how they fit into the data. Where do they overlap? Where can the latter illustrate the former. Then, craft your message, helping them see how the story at the surface connects the data that lies beneath. And what they can do now that they understand.

FAARM Co-Founder
Kaylynne M. Glover, PhD

Advocacy plays a crucial role in shaping legislation affects the conditions for graduate and professional students across the nation. One effective way to influence change is by meeting with congressional offices. In this guide, we’ll walk you through the essential steps to conduct successful congressional office meetings.

Step 0: Wait, why should my organization do this in the first place? 

Legislation can impact all kinds of research trainees – graduate and professional students and postdocs – and it can improve working conditions in a wide variety of ways. It’s really important to remember the scope of what we’re talking about here: federal legislation can affect all research trainees nationwide. A single win could be incredibly positive for millions of people.

Congressional office meetings are essential for bringing the issues faced by research trainees to the attention of legislators and staff. A normal rank-and-file congressional office discusses at least a dozen issues with constituents and stakeholders in a regular day and hundreds over the course of a 2-year term. Not only that, but research trainees are neither a large nor a high-profile population of voters in most congressional districts. So you should assume your representatives in Congress don’t know your issues in detail – unless, and until, you tell them yourself.

Congressional office meetings are also very useful for networking and name recognition, both for the individuals participating in the meeting and for your organization.

Step 1: Manage your expectations.

It is important to keep this in perspective: your single meeting is not going to be the thing that made it possible to pass immigration reform or a FAARM Federal Framework. Big, complicated reforms require a lot of time and work, often over many years, before the conditions are right for passage. If fact, many large reforms are accomplished in small pieces over time, not as a single package. For any given meeting, it might honestly be difficult to measure how much you moved the ball forward. That’s ok. Veteran advocates from the nation’s largest advocacy organizations struggle to articulate a clear and specific way to measure the impact of a single given meeting or event. (You should definitely ask them about this any chance you get!)

I use this model, the “Fundamental Physics of Legislative Advocacy,” to help set expectations for my congressional office meetings:

• Fast Force: Occasionally, you’ll connect with a member or staffer who is simply a true believer that likes you and your causes. They’ll do cool stuff like ask for your input on hearing questions and legislation text, mention your organization in press releases and floor speeches, or introduce bills for you. This is really awesome when it happens, but it’s very rare. Making this kind of ‘fast’ connection can require a lot of shots-on-goal.

• Slow Force: Plenty of Congressional staffers have no experience with grad school or scientific research. Even some immigration staffers will have no idea how graduate education intersects with immigration, so they may not understand why you care about Optional Practical Training  and may not be familiar with it at all (ask the international students in your organization if you don’t get the reference!). Making more Congressional staff aware of your organization and it’s causes makes it a little more likely that, over time, positive action will be taken.

Regardless, both forces reward organizations that have as many meetings as possible. Each meeting can have an impact, even if you don’t see it right away.

Step 2: Research your members.

The importance of this cannot be understated. Each member of Congress has unique interests, experiences, and priorities – often aligned with the major features of their district. You need to learn about them and shape your “pitch” around their priorities. Ask yourself –

• What is their history on the issues you want to discuss? Have they stated a position on your issues or your priority legislation? 
• Are they a co-sponsor on the bills you are discussing? Were they cosponsors of any previous iterations of that bill? Remember that it often takes many years, across many Congresses, to pass substantive new legislation. Check for past versions of bills you care about.
• Are they a member or chair of a relevant committee or caucus?
• Do they have something in common with you or your organization? It’s good to know where your member grew up and got their college degree.
• What are the major universities with graduate programs in their district or state?
• How many grad students are in those programs?
• If your ask is related to a subpopulation (e.g., international students), how many of that subpopulation are in those programs?

Step 3: Craft your pitch!

Now that you know your audience, you can create a message tailored to them. There are some important things to consider as you do so:

• How much time do you have? This is key to deciding how to prioritize your discussion points. Be prepared to trim it down to the bare bones, but also be prepared for a longer discussion and follow-up questions.
• Who’s talking about each of your issues or priority legislation? It can be very helpful for members of your team to strategically target their efforts, each focusing their prior research on a small set of issues or legislation.
• What are your talking points for each issue or bill?
  • Be familiar with the general background and recent news on the issue or bill.
  • Be prepared to share 1 or 2 hard-hitting and salient facts.
  • Where possible, tell a story! Make use of personal experience to the greatest extent possible.
• What are your asks?
  • Being practical and realistic helps ensure your team will be taken seriously. Can the Member of Congress do what you’re asking for?
  • Common example asks include:  Introduce a bill, cosponsor an existing bill, write a letter, ask a question in a hearing, attend an event, etc. 
• Do you have a one-pager or statement for each of your issues or priority legislation? It’s an extremely good idea to produce a one-pager or statement in advance on each issue or bill you want to talk about!

Step 4: Contact offices and request meetings. 

First and foremost, don’t overthink this. Email is almost always the best way to get in touch with a Congressional office. It’s entirely ok to use a generic utility address (like scheduling@member.senate.gov) or a ‘Meeting Request’ form that you’ll find on their websites. You can usually get a swift reply, but if you don’t get a reply within a week, you may need to call the member’s DC office. If you’re a constituent of that member (you live in their district), make sure to say so in any emails, form responses, or phone conversations. If you’re not, consider getting a constituent to help with outreach to that office, since constituents are far more likely to get prompt responses to meeting requests. Include any one-pagers or statements your organization has produced on your issues or your priority legislation in the meeting request, if possible. Start reaching out to request meetings 3-4 weeks before your lobby day event or target meeting date.

Be aware up front that you will probably not talk directly to the Member of Congress. You will probably meet their education, immigration, or science staffer, and it’s very helpful to state clearly in your meeting requests that you’re ok with meeting with staff if the member is not available. You will usually have 15 – 30 minutes, depending on the office and on whether the member will be able to join the meeting. But know this – meeting with staffers is no less impactful than meeting with a member, so don’t feel like you won’t be able to make a difference.

If your organization has met with a given office in the past, reach out to the staff you met with previously to request your meeting. This is a great way to build a relationship with that office and maximize your likelihood of a prompt response. (Make sure your organization saves good records and notes on each Congressional office meeting! Don’t overthink this part, either – a Google Drive folder, a spreadsheet, and a Google Doc is plenty. Just make sure your successor knows where to find them!)

Step 5: Conduct your meetings!

The office may have anywhere between 1 and 3 staff to meet with you; it’s appropriate for you to bring 2-4 team members to each meeting. (You’ll see some kinds of advocacy groups that fill offices with a huge crew in matching shirts and whatnot; you do not need to do this, and you’ll probably start seeing that there are some real practical drawbacks to this approach after you run into a few groups like this during your meetings.) Don’t be surprised if you end up having meetings in some oddly arranged – or just plain odd – rooms. FAARM Core Team members have had meetings in hallways, cubicles, and a couple different kinds of utility or storage spaces.

Before you go in, decide who on your team will direct traffic and who will take notes during the substantive parts of the meeting. Don’t be surprised when lots of Congressional staff pull out a paper notepad to take their notes, and you should consider doing the same yourself. It’s fairly customary to exchange business cards at the beginning of the meeting, but if they don’t, be sure to request theirs at the end.

Once the meeting has started, follow your plan, be friendly, and don’t overthink things! Make sure you introduce each member of your team, what you study, and where. Discuss your issues and bills in the order you planned before the meeting, and make sure your level of detail is appropriate to the time available. Answer follow-up questions from the staffers as well as you can, and try to stick to the planned schedule and be finished at the planned time – they have very little flexibility to their schedule.

When you finish, be sure to thank them for the meeting. Always let them know they can contact you or your organization if they have questions about your community’s concerns and how legislation could impact them. Being a good resource helps build relationships. 

Everyone says the same thing starting out: “We’re gonna play error-free ball.” But then the unforeseen happens. It’s unavoidable. What matters then is how good an audible you call. The difference between a successful presidency and a historical footnote is how well you roll with the punches, just to complete my tour of sports metaphors.

Josh Lyman, The West Wing, S7E19

Congressional office meetings are often more of a conversation than a presentation, and that means they may go unexpected directions. If the staff you’re meeting with ask you a question that you can’t answer, be honest about it: maybe you don’t have the data needed to answer it – maybe it doesn’t even exist yet – but maybe you can look into it and get back to them later. But whatever the question is, be plain, honest, and direct in your answers: don’t make things up, and don’t feel like you have to have all of the answers. This will earn their respect and trust; Members of Congress and their staff can usually tell if you’re blowing smoke. Instead, take note of the questions asked and answer as much as you can in a follow-up email after the meeting.

Step 6: Follow up afterwards.

Make sure you send a follow-up email for every single Congressional office meeting you conduct! Thank everyone you met with for their time (again) and answer any unanswered questions from the meeting. Resend your one-pagers. as well as any other documents discussed in the meeting, so that they’ll be easy for them to find (and share) when they need to (they generally prefer electronic copies of things, anyway). And be sure to offer yourself and your organization as a resource for your community and its concerns.

If you’re planning to discuss the FAARM Federal Framework or any of our Immediate Needs or other proposals, let us know at faarmteam@gmail.com, and we’ll be happy to support your Congressional office meeting planning. All kinds of research trainees are always welcome to use any of our materials that may be helpful for your advocacy work.

Good hunting!

Daniel Curtis

FAARM Co-Founder