For Hannah Gabelnick ’26, landing a position at the Office of Women’s Health at the New Jersey Department of Health is a dream first job out of college.
Gabelnick, who studied public and international affairs and minored in journalism, focused her two years of coursework at the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs on maternal health: She participated in a junior-year Policy Task Force on advancing birth equity in New Jersey and wrote her senior thesis on a new regulation in New Jersey that will make it easier for pregnant and postpartum women with substance-use disorder to access treatment.
Now, as a Garden State Fellow with SPIA in NJ, she is launching her career focused precisely on the issues that moved her to public service.
“During a time when many national health policies are threatening access to healthcare, New Jersey has committed to improving maternal and reproductive healthcare,” Gabelnick said. “The Garden State Fellowship provides me with the perfect opportunity to continue making an impact on this issue while gaining valuable experience in a state agency.”
Gabelnick is one of three Garden State Fellows participating in the postgraduate program offered by Princeton SPIA. Christofer Robles ’26 will focus his fellowship year on affordable housing and Lucía Armengol ’26 on tenant rights.
“These placements align beautifully with the fellows’ individual passions for research, service, advocacy, and outreach,” SPIA in NJ Founding Director Anastasia R. Mann said. Mann is a historian and lecturer at Princeton SPIA.
The Garden State Fellowship, which is entering its fourth cycle, offers recent graduates from across concentrations a chance to apply the policy research and analysis skills they learned at Princeton through public service in the University’s own backyard. The fellows are selected by a committee of faculty and staff through a competitive process. Of the inaugural cohort, two fellows, Lauren Aung ’24 and Olivia Ragan ’24, will start law school this fall and the third, Madison Linton ’24, has been promoted at the organization where she was a fellow, the New Jersey Alliance for Immigrant Justice.
The fellowship program continues to grow in scope and partnership. Gabelnick’s fellowship is the first placement with the State of New Jersey and was made possible by the Burke Foundation and Princeton SPIA’s Kahneman-Treisman Center for Behavioral Science & Public Policy.
Robles, who has previously worked in the governor’s office, will spend his fellowship year conducting research policy, analyzing data, and engaging communities on behalf of Monarch Housing Associates, a nonprofit affordable housing developer.
“I will be supporting Monarch Housing Associates' mission of expanding the supply and accessibility of affordable, permanent housing in New Jersey. A proud and lifelong resident of the Garden State, I am all too familiar with the state’s enduring wealth inequality and growing homelessness," Robles said. "I am grateful to the Garden State Fellowship and Monarch Housing Associates for setting forth my hopefully very long career in public service.”
Armengol, who advocated for immigrant rights as an undergraduate, will work on tenant rights organizing at Make the Road NJ, an advocacy group for immigrant and working-class communities.
“I am looking forward to learning how policy advocacy can begin from the bottom up, grounded in community organizing,” said Armengol. “I believe that Make the Road NJ will set me up to pursue a career in public service informed by the ethos of community organizing and dedicated to the realization of participatory democracy.”
Photo courtesy of Lucía Armengol ’26, Hannah Gabelnick ’26, and Christofer Robles ’26.