The US federal government touches all aspects of our lives through its ~$4.5 trillion annual budget (although less than 4% is for research and development), laws, regulations, rules, and policies. Dr. Anna Quider will discuss her experience as a physicist-turned-policymaker working within the federal government at the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Department of State, and external to the federal government as a higher education and science advocate. Attendees will learn about career paths into federal policymaking and how input from physicists and the public inform the federal policymaking process. Dr. Quider is presently the Assistant Vice President for Federal Relations for Northern Illinois University and the past-president of The Science Coalition, a national nonprofit dedicated to increasing US federal funding for fundamental scientific research. She was a 2011 APS Congressional Science Fellow and 2012 AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow.