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Professor Sheying Chen, PhD, has brought a global perspective and decades of research to the Master of Public Administration (MPA) program at Pace, recently recognized by the US News & World Report’s rankings as a Best Graduate Public Affairs School.

At the heart of Chen’s work is a deep commitment to the belief that public policy should ultimately serve people, and especially those most vulnerable in society. This passion fuels his interest in addressing complex issues on aging populations, healthcare access, diversity and leadership, and the relationship between economic development and social wellbeing.

His interdisciplinary work bridges theory and practice, helping Pace students understand complex societal challenges while preparing them to lead meaningful change.

“Today, the world is at a profound crossroads. My research is therefore urgently focused on providing the clarity and vision needed to navigate this moment,” he said.

Advancing Public Policy for a Changing World

A cornerstone of Chen’s research is his pioneering work in General Public Policy (GPP) analysis, a framework that examines how nations evolve in their policy priorities. Particularly, his concept of the “Economic State in Transition” offers a powerful lens for understanding China’s modern history by showing how the state has zigzagged along a phase‑shifting GPP trajectory, moving through cycles of upheaval and renewal—from the Cultural Revolution to the Open‑Door and Reform era and into today’s unsettled “Post‑Economic State” period.

Chen’s research challenges traditional paradigms that have long dominated international policy discussions, mainly a narrow focus on the “welfare state,” introducing a broader, more nuanced analytical approach (e.g., the “Problem-GPP-ism” Triple Prism) that allows scholars and policymakers alike to better understand diverse development paths across countries against non/anti-development GPP patterns (e.g., the “warfare state”).

For Pace students, this means that they are equipped with the tools to understand the "why" behind policy. They are thus prepared to be strategic thinkers who can assess a government's core priorities and anticipate the societal impacts of major policy shifts from vital balances against all forms of extremist trends.

Addressing Global Challenges in Aging and Community Care

Another focus of Chen’s research is aging, community care, and social support systems.

As populations around the world continue to age, governments face urgent questions about healthcare, social services, and community-based support. In response, Chen’s work has explored how societies—from the United States, to Europe, to Asia—can create sustainable systems that allow older adults to maintain independence and dignity.

His research has highlighted the importance of integrating social services, mental health support, and community engagement into public policy, thus influencing global discussions and helping governments design systems that respond effectively to demographic change.

A Global Scholar Sharing Knowledge Worldwide

Chen’s influence is also in the realm of extensive publications and conference presentations.

As an editor and/or contributor of a major international publication series, he has played a central role in shaping global scholarship on social policy, social work, and aging studies. His leadership in these publications has thus created platforms for scholars around the world to share research and collaborate on pressing social issues.

In addition, Chen regularly presents his work at academic conferences and international forums, including keynote speeches and scholarly presentations on topics such as governance, social development, and cross-national policy analysis.

The result of this work is a strengthening of Pace’s global presence while connecting both Pace students and faculty to broader academic networks.

Mentoring the Next Generation of Public Leaders

A prolific scholar, Chen is equally very dedicated in the classroom, offering a unique lens for the understanding of how policy decisions shape societies over time.

In his courses, students are exposed to innovative analytical frameworks and are guided in applying these tools to evaluate complex social and administrative challenges. By sharing his own methodological resources (e.g., Chen Approaches to Unidimensionalized Scaling, or CAUS) and research materials, Chen has thus empowered students to strengthen their analytical and policy evaluation skills.

In addition, as a faculty mentor, Chen supports students in their academic and professional development, helping them refine research ideas, and encouraging them to explore emerging issues and global perspectives in social policy and governance.

His goal is simple: to cultivate thoughtful, socially conscious public administrators equipped with both technical expertise and a strong commitment to public service and social equity.

Strengthening the Pace MPA Program

Chen believes the Pace MPA program is uniquely positioned to prepare future leaders who understand both administrative practice and the human dimensions of public policy.

Building on his pioneer experience in international social work and the program’s unique tradition of integrating social welfare policy and public administration, he continues to work to strengthen its focus on community services, healthcare policy, and global comparative analysis.

“It is about ensuring that Pace is not just a place where these global challenges are studied, but one where the frameworks for solving them are being forged,” he said.

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Associate Professor of Economics Veronika Dolar, PhD, is an economist whose research spans labor, health, and sports economics, exploring how deeply structural inequalities shape opportunity—whether in the realm of Olympic performance or everyday life.

As a dedicated faculty member in Pace’s award-winning Economics department, she integrates real-world data and research into both her teaching and the mentoring of undergraduate students, empowering them to produce their own publishable work.

Economics and the Olympic Dream: A Quest to Make Data Human

Dolar’s recent work explored how income inequality affects national performance at the Winter Olympic Games. Her findings are both striking and sobering: nations with greater income inequality consistently send smaller delegations and win fewer medals, even after accounting for GDP, population, and institutional factors.

“While anyone can, in principle, qualify for the Olympics, the cost of elite training, coaching, equipment, and facilities make participation inaccessible to many,” she explained.

Using data from every Winter Games between 1992 and 2022, Dolar’s research treats Olympic success as an indicator of how effectively societies convert human capital into achievement. She has isolated the causal impact of inequality on performance, offering a fresh bridge between macroeconomic theory and sports analytics.

Through her research, presented at conferences from the Eastern Economic Association to the Center for Sociocultural Sport and Olympic Research, Dolar has created interactive data visualization tools, accessible to policymakers and journalists, but also students at Pace.

Teaching Economics Through Real-world Stories

Dolar’s classroom reflects the same passion for connection between theory and practice and illuminates how economic structures shape opportunity in all areas of life.

Her economic inequality course, for example, integrates her own research, allowing students to work directly with the same datasets she uses in her publications. Students then become researchers in the process, replicating analyses using real data—from the World Bank to the Standardized World Income Inequality Database—and extend the work to areas such as education and healthcare.

“Economics isn’t just about money or markets,” she emphasized. “It’s about human potential and fairness—who gets to compete and succeed.”

Mentoring Through Research and Collaboration

Dolar also models the power of collaboration through student research in other ways.

An example is her partnership with undergraduate students, such as Fatima Abba ’26, to co-develop a manuscript inspired by Robert Reich’s Wealth & Poverty lecture series. What began as lecture summaries evolved into a project blending theory, data, and narrative to explore global inequality. Supported by the Dyson Student-Faculty Summer Research Award and Omicron Delta Epsilon, it will serve as a foundation for Dolar’s future textbook, Understanding Economic Inequality: An Introductory Guide Through Real-World Economics.

“It was transformative,” she reflected. “The students gained hands-on experience with data, writing, and policy analysis. It showed them that research can become real scholarship.”

In addition, in her fall 2025 introduction to macroeconomics class, an assignment was included, as part of the Archipelago Macroeconomics Project, that is a reflection of students shifting from being passive recipients of traditional economic knowledge to active producers whose analyses become accessible to more broader, public audiences.

Working in teams, and under Dolar’s guidance, they created websites and digital artifacts that analyzed core macroeconomic indicators for Caribbean island economies, comparing them to the US, New York State, and New York City. The result: Pace students with more academic agency, ownership, and collaboration in an otherwise large lecture course.

Reimagining How Economics Is Taught

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In recent years, Dolar has also taken on the challenge of modernizing and reshaping how economics is taught in classrooms at Pace and beyond, and with that, a chance to make economics engaging and relevant to a new generation of students.

To this end, she has co-authored the 7th editions of ECON MACRO and ECON MICRO (Cengage Learning, 2024), texts that connect theory to everyday examples—from the competition between Ben & Jerry’s and Häagen-Dazs to the recent spike in egg prices.

“Economics, especially macroeconomics, has changed dramatically,” she said. “And our textbooks need to reflect that reality.”

In addition, Dolar has illuminated the continuing exclusion and underrepresentation of women within the economics profession (a trend, by the way, that Pace is bucking) through co-authoring another work, Missing Voices in Economics: Addressing the Gender Gap (Palgrave MacMillan, 2026). The book has been utilized in her Pace course on Economics of Gender, Race, and Class, integrating its findings into classroom discussion and analysis.

The Heart of Her Work: Making a Difference

Whether in her research, authorship of textbooks, or mentorship of students, Dolar’s passion is clear: helping others understand the world so they can make it better.

“What motivates me is seeing that ‘aha’ moment when students realize economics can explain the forces shaping their lives. That curiosity and empowerment are what make this work so rewarding,” she said.