Prof. Vicky N. Albert received her doctorate in Social Welfare from U.C. Berkeley in 1987, after which she completed her Ph.D. dissertation at the Department of Economics. Dr. Albert was an Assistant Professor at Ohio State University from 1987 to 1988. Presently, she is a Full Professor at the School of Social Work, University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Professor Albert’s research focuses on poverty, income maintenance policies and programs, and child welfare. Much of Dr. Albert’s research evaluates the consequences of social policies for families with children from an aggregate or macro perspective. In recent years, Dr. Albert collaborated with the Brookings Institution, Economics Studies, to investigate the response of the social safety nets to the Great Recession. With the Brookings Institution, she co-led a project entitled “The Responsiveness of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Program during the Great Recession”. Dr. Albert has over 70 publications, including books and journal articles.

Prof. Jaewon Lim is an Associate Professor in the School of Public Policy and Leadership in the Greenspun College of Urban Affairs at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV). He earned his Ph.D. in Regional Planning from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. From 2003 to 2007, he served as a research assistant at REAL (Regional Economics Applications Laboratory) of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, focusing on the development and use of analytical models for urban and regional forecasting and economic development. Before joining UNLV, he held positions as a regional economist and affiliated faculty in the Office of Economic Development and School of Geography and Development at the University of Arizona. He is currently serving as the Executive Director of the Western Regional Science Association (WRSA), a voting member for the North American Regional Science Council (NARSC) of Regional Science Association International (RSAI), and a councilor for Pacific Regional Science Conference Organization (PRSCO) of RSAI. He also serves as an associate editor for the Annals of Regional Science and on the editorial board for the International Journal of Urban Sciences and Culture and Politics. His research interests concern urban/regional demographic and economic analyses with the tools of spatial analysis on sustainable economic development through R&D activities, technology transfer, and workforce development.

Dr. Daeyoung Kwon earned his Ph.D. in Economics from Seoul National University in 2023.  From 2013 to 2022, he served as a research assistant for the SDAE (Sustainable Development and Applied Economics) Laboratory of Seoul National University, focusing on developing and using analytical models for assessing the socioeconomic impact of unexpected event outbreaks.  During his time at Seoul National University, he participated in a number of interdisciplinary research projects, which equipped him with a diverse array of econometric analytical tools and expertise in applied economics and regional science. Currently, he is pursuing a Ph.D. in Public Affairs from the School of Public Policy and Leadership at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. His research is centered on the impact of state and local government-led policies and strategies on regional growth from a community resilience perspective.