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Bethany Hall-Long (PhD Nursing ’93), who has been serving as lieutenant governor of Delaware since 2017, announced her gubernatorial campaign in September. Hall-Long was the 2017 Mason Alumna of the Year, she was one of two alumnae featured speakers at Mason’s 2017 Winter Graduation. Earlier, she was the recipient of the CPH Distinguished Alumni Award in 2005.
The first Mason alumna to hold the second highest office in state government, Lt. Gov. Hall-Long has spent her two terms focused on healthcare issues, including helping to create the state’s Behavioral Health Consortium, which is devoted to devising short-term and long-term plans to address mental health issues.
Previously, she spent 14 years in the Delaware General Assembly, where she served as a Delaware state representative and senator, during which she sponsored nearly 1,000 pieces of legislation, many of them pertaining to healthcare, including telehealth, substance abuse, and cancer and chronic disease.
Concurrent with her career in public service, she has served as a professor of nursing at the University of Delaware.
Here’s some additional background about her Mason experience from a 2017 article the University published when she was named Alumna of the Year:
“I landed at the right place,” she said. “I have really fond memories of my time at Mason.”
Hall-Long said Mason gave her the opportunity to really engage in her field as a faculty member and a researcher. Her work at Mason’s Center for Health Policy Research and Ethics immersed her in public policy work as she learned her way around state politics and Capitol Hill.
“My degree and my health policy training have been vital to me. While at Mason, I was exposed to a lot of great leaders at state and national levels—and on the faculty.” Hall-Long was also mentored by the late Brig. Gen. Hazel Johnson-Brown; Rita Carty, who was the college’s dean at the time and now is an emeritus faculty member; and former faculty member Cass Connelly.