MOVING KNOWLEDGE INTO ACTION requires informed leaders. The Institute on Assets and Social Policy's educational programs are designed to share cutting edge theory, research, and models, as well as to build leadership for asset policy development and implementation. At the Heller School for Social Policy and Management, PhD candidates in the Assets and Inequalities policy concentration develop a theoretical and empirical understanding of the causes, manifestations and consequences of social and economic inequalities.
Students in the Assets and Inequalities concentration grapple with questions like:
What are the causes and consequences of social and economic inequalities associated with race/ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, immigration status, social class, and age?
How are aging and disability, health, mental health and substance abuse, and children, youth, and family policies and programs shaped by current social and economic inequalities, and how may these programs and policies best contribute to reducing and eliminating such inequalities?
PhD candidates in this concentration learn through participation in research that applies current theory, methods, and findings from multiple social science disciplines in multiple contexts 
to understanding and addressing the causes and consequences of inequalities in health and human services. They explore in depth the organization of work as an outcome of social-structural inequalities linked to the root causes of oppression, as well as initiatives to develop humane and inclusive institutions.
Finally, candidates in Assets and Inequalities thoroughly explore an Asset Framework for its promise and potential in understanding inequalities and providing new policy directions:
An Asset Framework provides powerful tools to understand causes and consequences of inequalities associated with race/ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, immigration status, social class, and age.
An Asset Framework explores policies of financial assets, and human, social, and cultural capital to best reduce and eliminate inequalities, build capacities for communities, families, and individuals, and promote human development.
The concentration emphasizes four core areas:
Our PhD candidates take a sequence of courses designed to move them in a natural and logical way from the root causes of inequalities, to the measurement of inequalities, to the manifestations of inequalities, to the evolution of programs, policies, and legal structures intended to reduce inequalities in the short run and to eventually eliminate them.
Visit the Heller School PhD Concentration in Assets and Inequalities website
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