Sally S Cohen

Sally S. Cohen, FAAN, Ph.D., RN, is a clinical professor at NYU Rory Meyers College of Nursing. As a nationally recognized leader in advancing health policy and nursing at the national and state levels, she helps integrate health policy into nursing education, practice, and research. Her interdisciplinary scholarship encompasses public health, children’s rights, bullying prevention, and the politics of policymaking for children’s issues. As the editor-in-chief of Policy, Politics & Nursing Practice from 2014 to 2019, Cohen helped to create a vibrant forum for nurses and others globally to share ideas and analyses of policies and political activities that affect nursing practice in all venues of care.

Before joining NYU as faculty, Cohen was the 2014–2015 NAM/AAN/ANA/ANF Distinguished Nurse Scholar-in-Residence at the Institute of Medicine (now the Academy of Medicine). Before that, she directed the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Nursing and Health Policy Collaborative at the University of New Mexico. The collaborative, which wrapped up its work in 2017, prepared nursing Ph.D. students for leadership in health policy. As director of policy and research at the National League of Nursing, Cohen helped advocate for legislation that in 1985 established the National Institute of Nursing Research. She also developed and directed the Nursing Management, Policy, and Leadership specialty at the Yale. 

Among her many honors, Cohen received the 2019 Lois Capps Policy Luminary Award from the American Association of Colleges of Nursing for her exceptional contributions to the nursing workforce and healthcare policy. She was honored by Yale School of Nursing with its “90 Outstanding Yale Nurses” award in 2013. In 2008, she received the Kaplan-Landy Award for Vision, Innovation, and Leadership from the Hadassah Nurses Council. She was elected to the New York Academy of Medicine in 2006 and the American Academy of Nursing in 1988.

Cohen earned her PhD from Columbia University, MSN from Yale University, and BA from Cornell University.