Professor awarded American Political Science Association Congressional Fellowship

Mary Layton “Mel” Atkinson, associate professor of political science and public administration, has been selected for the 2022-23 American Political Science Association Congressional Fellowship Program.

A graduate of Guilford College, Atkinson completed a Ph.D. in political science from UNC Chapel Hill after earning a master’s degree from The American University. At Charlotte, she focuses her research on two areas: how the news media inform public policy opinion and how public opinion feeds back on the policy-making process and the impact of gender diversity in the U.S. House of Representatives on the Congressional agenda and substantive policy debate.

She is the author of “Combative Politics: The Media and Public Perceptions of Lawmaking” (University of Chicago Press, 2017) and co-author of “The Dynamics of Public Opinion” (Cambridge, 2021 with Elizabeth Coggins, James Stimson and Frank Baumgartner).

Since 1953, the prestigious American Political Science Association Congressional Fellowship Program has brought political scientists, journalists and other professionals to the U.S. Capitol, where they take part in educational seminars and work as staff in Congressional offices. The fellows gain first-hand knowledge of how Congressional lawmaking takes place, which informs their scholarship and teaching. Past fellows include former Vice President Dick Cheney and notable scholars such as David Mayhew (Yale), Thomas Mann (Brookings), Charles Bullock (UGA) and David Rohde (Duke).