Delia Kimbrel
Kansas, USA
Before coming to Heller, Ms. Kimbrel worked in the nonprofit field as an advocate for families in crisis and escaping domestic abuse. While at Heller, she has worked for IASP on several projects researching and evaluating asset attainment by low-income families in Massachusetts. In 2009, she was named a Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government Rappaport Public Policy Fellow and conducted research on the Family Self-Sufficiency (FSS) program at the MA Department of Housing and Community Development. She is currently working with IASP and Compass Working Capital to continue research on the FSS program. Ms. Kimbrel hold a BA in sociology from the University of Kansas and a MA in Social Policy from the Heller School.
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Rebecca Loya
California, USA
Before coming to Heller, Ms. Loya worked in the nonprofit and education fields on gender-related issues including job training, violence prevention, and reproductive healthcare. While at Heller, she interned at the Crittenton Women's Union where she co-authored a brief on the shortfall of work support programs for low-income women. In 2009, she was selected to participate in the Howard University Summer Institute on Race and Wealth and was recently awarded a Ford Foundation Pre-Doctoral Diversity Fellowship. Ms. Loya has worked for IASP as a researcher for the Massachusetts Asset Development Commission and currently supports the Charles Steward Mott-funded State Asset Building Coalition Initiative. Ms. Loya holds a MA in Social Psychology from Stanford University.
Laura Sullivan
California, USA
At IASP, Ms. Sullivan has conducted quantitative data analysis using national surveys, contributed to research reports, and helped to draft several grant proposals. In 2007, through the National Academy of Social Insurance Internship Program, she conducted research at the Social Security Advisory Board on the impacts of asset limits and marriage penalties for disabled and older adults who receive Supplemental Security Income. Before coming to Heller, she worked in policy advocacy for low-income communities, interned in the Texas State Senate, and worked on a cost-benefit analysis of referral networks for social services. Ms. Sullivan holds a Master of Public Affairs and an MA in Latin American Studies.
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Hannah Thomas
United Kingdom
Earlier in her career, Ms. Thomas worked as a research associate for a community development organization in Maine, where she researched and evaluated the impacts of asset-related policies and programs. While at Heller, she received a HUD pre-dissertation doctoral grant, and a 2007 Rappaport fellowship. Through these awards she worked with the City of Boston and the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston to interview families in foreclosure around the city. She has published on community development finance and foreclosures and has presented at several national meetings of asset practitioners and researchers. Her current work at IASP examines the impact of foreclosures on wealth in communities of color and the intersection of individual and community assets. She holds BA and MA in Geography.
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Professor Thomas Shapiro directs the Institute on Assets and Social Policy and is the Pokross Professor of Law and Social Policy at The Heller School for Social Policy and Management, Brandeis University.
Professor Shapiro's primary interest is in racial inequality and public policy. He is a leader in the asset development field with a particular focus on closing the racial wealth gap. The Hidden Cost of Being African American: How Wealth Perpetuates Inequality, published by Oxford University Press, 2004 (soft cover, 2005) was widely reviewed, including by the Washington Post, Boston Globe, and others. The book was named one of the Notable Books of 2004 by The St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
With Dr. Melvin Oliver, he wrote the award-winning Black Wealth/ White Wealth, which received the 1997 Distinguished Scholarly Publication Award from the American Sociological Association. This book also won the 1995 C. Wright Mills Award from the Society for the Study of Social Problems, and the Gustavus Myers Center for the Study of Human Rights in North America named it an Outstanding Book of 1996.
A Tenth Anniversary Edition of Black Wealth/White Wealth, with two new chapters that examine the most important changes in racial inequality and developments in asset policy in the past decade, was published in 2006.
Great Divides: Readings in Social Inequality in the United States, 3rd edition, was published in the summer of 2004.
His media appearances include Tony Brown's Journal, The Tavis Smiley Show, Talk of the Nation, CNN, and On Point. His work has been reviewed or discussed in The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The American Prospect, The Chicago Sun-Times, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, CommonWealth Magazine, Newsweek, The Village Voice, and others.
Dr. Shapiro presents lectures and seminars throughout the United States to general, professional, policy, community, foundation, and university audiences. He teaches seminars in Assets and Social Policy; The Sociological Inquiry of Inequality; and Qualitative Research Methods.
Dr. Janet Boguslaw is Associate Director and Research Scientist at the Institute on Assets and Social Policy. She is a lecturer and Associate Director of the Masters Degree Program in Public Policy (MPP) at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management at Brandeis University.
Through direct practice, evaluation, and research her work focuses on creating multi-sector innovations and partnerships to advance economic opportunity and stability through both voluntary and policy-driven initiatives. Dr. Boguslaw has worked with corporate managers to research, direct and advance their community development initiatives, with state agencies in the areas of workforce training and employment stabilization, and on funded research exploring policy strategies for regional development and stabilization. She teaches the graduate seminar in Assets and Social Policy, co-leads the dissertation seminar for the Concentration in Assets and Inequality, and directs the MPP Poverty Alleviation Concentration.
She is the author of Social Partnerships and Social Relations: New Strategies in Workforce and Economic Development, and has co-authored numerous articles and book chapters. She received her M.Ed. from Washington University in St. Louis and her Ph.D. from Boston College.
Professor Stephen Fournier teaches Statistics/Regression Analysis to first-year Ph.D. students and also Management Information Systems for students in the Master's programs. Currently Professor Fournier works as a computer consultant and data analyst for a number of research projects in both the Schneider Institutes for Health Policy and the Institute on Assets and Social Policy.
Professor Fournier retains close connections to the Department of Infrastructure and Planning at the Royal Institute of Technology (Kungl Tekniska Hogskolan, KTH) in Stockholm where he worked for over six years. He received his Ph.D. in Regional Economics from the Department of Urban Studies and Planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Professor David Gil has been involved in social welfare practice, research, and administration in the United States and Palestine/Israel, and worked on farms and in industry in Sweden and Palestine. His teaching, research, and writings are concerned with theories of social policy, humanization of work, prevention of violence, and with transforming social institutions into development-conducive alternatives. Professor Gil's books include Unraveling Social Policy, The Challenge of Social Equality, and Confronting Injustice and Oppression.
Professor Gil has served as president of the Association of Humanist Sociology, on the Delegate Assembly of the National Association of Social Workers, on the Board of Directors of the American Orthopsychiatric Association and on the editorial boards of professional journals. In 2000, he was named Social Worker of the Year by the Massachusetts NASW.
Professor Andrew Hahn is Senior Advisor to IASP. He conducts policy analysis, evaluation, and demonstration projects for government agencies and major foundations focusing on employment, education, youth, and community development both here in the United States and in development settings.
Dr. Hahn's books, notably, What Works in Youth Employment and Dropouts in America: Enough Is Known for Action, numerous published articles, and reports are syntheses of practical lessons for donors, policy makers and program managers about effective strategies for assisting society's most vulnerable youth. His work is aimed at identifying opportunities to strengthen youth policies and assisting local leaders to contribute to policy development and change. An emerging interest is focused on how institutions of higher education contribute to progressive social change.
Dr. Hahn is a Professor at The Heller School for Social Policy and Management and teaches courses on program evaluation, youth policies and programs, and community building.
Professor Anita Hill began her law career as an Associate with the Washington, D.C., firm of Wald, Harkrader & Ross. She has worked as special counsel to the assistant secretary of the Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights and served as advisor to the chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Professor Hill is the author of numerous articles on international commercial law, bankruptcy, and civil rights, all areas in which she has taught. She presents on commercial law as well as race and gender equality, and her commentary is regularly published in Newsweek, The New York Times, and The Boston Globe. She has served on numerous boards of directors for nonprofit organizations and is the author of Speaking Truth to Power, which chronicles her experience as a witness in the confirmation hearing for Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas.
Dr. Hill is Professor of Social Policy, Law, and Women's Studies at The Heller School for Social Policy and Management.
Dr. Tatjana Meschede, Research Director, manages the MacArthur Foundation funded project "Family Financial Well-Being in the 21st Century: Strategic Positioning of Data Tools for Policy Impact." Dr. Meschede has extensive experience in research on homelessness collaborating with Massachusetts' state departments (DTA, DPH, DHCD) and local communities, and is the author of numerous reports and publications, such as Bridges and Barriers to Housing for Chronically Homeless Street Dwellers, and a report on Quincy's Housing First projects.
She has broad experience as project manager and principal investigator for research on homelessness and housing, food insecurity and nutrition, the technology divide, and access to the labor market for persons with barriers.
Dr. Meschede worked in Israel and Europe, and is on the faculty of the Masters in Public Affairs Program at the University of Massachusetts Boston where she teaches quantitative and qualitative research methods and statistics. She received her Ph.D. in Public Policy from the McCormack Graduate School in Policy Studies at the University of Massachusetts Boston.
Laurie Nsiah-Jefferson, PhD., M.P.H., M.A. is a Senior Scientist and Senior Lecturer at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management and a Visiting Scholar at the Women's Studies Research Center, Brandeis University. She is also a Lecturer in Women and Gender Studies at Harvard University, Faculty of Arts and Sciences. She teaches courses on the intersection of race, gender and other identities, and its impact on public and institutional policy. She currently serves as a Senior Fellow at the National Center for Health Behavioral Change, Urban Medical Institute, Morgan State University, collaborating to develop, evaluate, and study innovative interventions and policy initiatives to support community and evidenced based methods to improve the health status of minorities in disenfranchised communities. Dr. Nsiah-Jefferson's research interests include racial/ethnic and gender inequities; intersectionality theory and research methods, and the impacts of stress and racism on health and social outcomes for women, mothers and children.
Mr. Jonas Parker works at IASP on developing Financial Literacy Education as an asset-building strategy. His current projects include collaboration with Community Action Agencies in Massachusetts to evaluate and improve asset formation programming tailored to serving low-income families. His previous work has been in the non-profit sector and as a high school math teacher.
Mr. Parker holds a Bachelor's degree from Brown University and a Master's degree in Social Policy from the Heller School where he is currently a Ph.D. candidate.
Professor Jeffrey Prottas is a member of the senior staff of the Schneider Institutes for Health Policy. He has specialized in research on organizational behavior and change, especially service delivery programs. His work has often focused on how organizations adapt to changes in their political and technical environments. This research has been concentrated in the health care field and has been concerned with program and policy evaluation and the impact of organizational factors in the implementation of public policy.
Professor Prottas co-leads the Working Group on Immigration at The Heller School. Professor Prottas is the Director of Evaluations for the Robert Wood Johnson ACCESS Project. This project works with, and learns from, community organizations attempting to develop broad based coalitions to improve the accessibility of health care. His role involves both evaluating the project's activities in communities and drawing lessons about community mobilization and empowerment from the experience of community leaders.
Professor Prottas received his Ph.D. in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Ms. Sandra Venner, IASP's Policy Director and Fellow, has extensive program development and policy advocacy experience in the areas of family and child welfare, youth development and financial assistance for low-income households. Her work with the Institute primarily includes policy research analysis and consultation with state and local advocacy and community organizing groups.
Ms. Venner's research focuses on identifying and advancing asset building strategies for those typically left out of the opportunity structure. She has written numerous policy analysis reports and co-authored a chapter in the book, Welfare Reform, 1996-2000: Is There a Safety Net?
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