Full Name
Jennifer Otten
Job Title
Professor
Company
University of Washington
Speaker Bio
Jennifer Otten is a Professor in the University of Washington Food Systems, Nutrition, and Health Program and in the Department of Environmental & Occupational Health Sciences and the Undergraduate Program Director for the UW Food Systems, Nutrition, and Health major. She previously served in various capacities for the Institute of Medicine (IOM) of the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, DC, including as a study director and as the organization’s first communications director.
Dr. Otten’s research uses qualitative and quantitative tools, including policy and program evaluations, to focus on understanding, changing, and evaluating food systems and food systems policies as they relate to public health and nutrition outcomes. Her research has helped to advance understandings about whether and how local and state minimum wage policies affect food security and food affordability. Most recently, she worked with Washington State agencies and tribal organizations to assess the effects of programmatic and policy changes during COVID-19 on food purchasing and food security in Washington state residents, pacific northwest tribal communities, WIC clients, and the state’s food system. Her work also focuses on understanding and improving the ways in which evidence gets to the public policy table and is incorporated into public agency work. Her current research in this area includes working with Washington state food agencies to create a set of common food system metrics to better align its programming, assess program impacts, and connect food economy with food access outcomes; and, a multi-year USDA-funded project on building trust between producers, consumers, and policymakers to support more sustainable animal agriculture. As part of her work in this arena, she also founded and co-directs UW’s Livable City Year, a program that coordinates city-academic partnerships to advance evidence-based efforts that improve city livability and sustainability.
A registered dietitian, Otten completed her dietetic internship at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, has her bachelor’s degree in nutritional sciences from Texas A&M University, completed a master’s degree in nutrition communication from Tufts University in Boston, and a received her doctorate in Animal, Nutrition and Food Sciences from the University of Vermont. She also completed a postdoctoral research fellowship at the Stanford Prevention Research Center in the Stanford University School of Medicine.
Dr. Otten’s research uses qualitative and quantitative tools, including policy and program evaluations, to focus on understanding, changing, and evaluating food systems and food systems policies as they relate to public health and nutrition outcomes. Her research has helped to advance understandings about whether and how local and state minimum wage policies affect food security and food affordability. Most recently, she worked with Washington State agencies and tribal organizations to assess the effects of programmatic and policy changes during COVID-19 on food purchasing and food security in Washington state residents, pacific northwest tribal communities, WIC clients, and the state’s food system. Her work also focuses on understanding and improving the ways in which evidence gets to the public policy table and is incorporated into public agency work. Her current research in this area includes working with Washington state food agencies to create a set of common food system metrics to better align its programming, assess program impacts, and connect food economy with food access outcomes; and, a multi-year USDA-funded project on building trust between producers, consumers, and policymakers to support more sustainable animal agriculture. As part of her work in this arena, she also founded and co-directs UW’s Livable City Year, a program that coordinates city-academic partnerships to advance evidence-based efforts that improve city livability and sustainability.
A registered dietitian, Otten completed her dietetic internship at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, has her bachelor’s degree in nutritional sciences from Texas A&M University, completed a master’s degree in nutrition communication from Tufts University in Boston, and a received her doctorate in Animal, Nutrition and Food Sciences from the University of Vermont. She also completed a postdoctoral research fellowship at the Stanford Prevention Research Center in the Stanford University School of Medicine.
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