About the Staff

Jane Shaw
shaw@popecenter.org
President

Jane S. Shaw joined the Pope Center for Higher Education Policy in 2006 as executive vice president and became president in 2008. Shaw spent 22 years with PERC, the Property and Environment Research Center in Bozeman, Montana, where she was a senior fellow and director of communication.

Earlier in her career, Shaw was a journalist. Before joining PERC, she was an associate economics editor of Business Week, working in New York City. Previously, she was a correspondent for McGraw-Hill Publications in Washington, D.C., and Chicago. Shaw received her bachelor's degree in English literature from Wellesley College.

With Michael Sanera she coauthored Facts, Not Fear: Teaching Children about the Environment (Regnery 1999). She coedited A Guide to Smart Growth: Shattering Myths and Providing Solutions (Heritage Foundation, 2000) with Ronald Utt. She initiated a Greenhaven Press book series for young people, Critical Thinking about Environmental Issues and was an author of two books in the series.

In recent years, her writing has been primarily about higher education. Recently she explored the question of whether education is a public good in an article in the Independent Review and discussed the college bubble in Academic Questions.

Shaw is a member of the Board of Visitors of Ralston College, a college under development in Savannah, Georgia, and a trustee of the Philadelphia Society. She is a past president of the Association of Private Enterprise Education and a senior editor of Liberty, editorial adviser to Econ Journal Watch, a member of the Editorial Advisory Panel of Regulation, and a member of the Editorial Advisory Council of the Institute of Economic Affairs (London).

George Leef
georgeleef@popecenter.org
Director of Research

George Leef holds a bachelor of arts degree from Carroll College in Waukesha, Wisconsin, and a Juris Doctor from Duke University School of Law. He was a vice president of the John Locke Foundation and director of the Pope Center until the Pope Center became an independent entity in 2003.

Previously, Leef was on the faculty of Northwood University in Midland, Michigan, where he taught courses in economics, business law, and logic. He has also worked as a policy adviser in the Michigan Senate, and since 1996 has served as book review editor of The Freeman.

Leef is the author of Free Choice for Workers: A History of the Right to Work Movement (2005) and editor of Educating Teachers: The Best Minds Speak Out (2002). Leef has published widely, with articles and reviews appearing in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Regulation, the Christian Science Monitor, the Detroit News, Raleigh News & Observer, the Cato Journal, and other publications. He has testified before committees in the U.S. House of Representatives and the legislatures of Michigan and North Carolina and has made numerous TV and radio appearances.

Jay Schalin
jschalin@popecenter.org
Director of State Policy

Jay Schalin joined the Pope Center in August 2007. He researches and writes about higher education issues, especially in North Carolina, and guides the Pope Center's policy on state higher education proposals.

A Philadelphia native, Schalin began working as a freelance journalist for the Asbury Park Press in New Jersey in 1994 and has also written for several other papers in New Jersey and Delaware. In 1998, he returned to school to complete his education, graduating from Richard Stockton College in New Jersey with a B.S. in computer science in 2001. He also worked as a software engineer for Computer Sciences Corporation. Schalin has an M.A. in economics from the University of Delaware.

His articles have appeared in Forbes, The Washington Times, Investor's Business Daily, Human Events, and American Thinker. His op-eds have been published by the McClatchy News Service and the Raleigh News & Observer. He has been interviewed on ESPN, National Public Radio, and UNC-TV, and his work has been featured on ABC News and Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor.

Jenna Ashley Robinson
jarobinson@popecenter.org
Campus Outreach Coordinator

Jenna Ashley Robinson joined the Pope Center in January 2007. She was previously the E.A. Morris Fellowship Assistant at the John Locke Foundation, where she worked since 2001.

Robinson graduated from N. C. State University in 2003 with a major in political science and French. She has studied at the University of East Anglia School of American Studies in Norwich, England. She received her master's degree in political science from UNC-Chapel Hill in December 2005 and is a Ph.D. candidate in political science, with a concentration in American politics and a minor in methods. Robinson is also a graduate of the Koch Associates Program sponsored by the Charles G. Koch Foundation.

Robinson's work has appeared in American Thinker, Human Events, Carolina Journal, the Lincoln Tribune, the Hickory Daily Record, the Gaston Gazette, the Mountain Express, and the News & Observer. She has taught introductory courses in American politics at UNC-Chapel Hill and Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.

Carolyn Zahnow
czahnow@popecenter.org
Communications Manager

Carolyn Zahnow is a Raleigh, North Carolina, native who has also lived in southern California and North Texas. She joined the Pope Center in December 2006.

Zahnow has degrees in marketing management from San Diego City College and in communications from North Carolina State University. Past working experiences include Nokia Mobile Phones in Texas, substitute teaching in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, IBM in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, and Cooper Tools in Apex, North Carolina.

She is the author of Save the Teens: Preventing Suicide, Depression and Addiction. She speaks publicly on these topics throughout North Carolina as well as writes articles and a blog. Zahnow also is the founder of several grief support groups in Wake Forest, North Carolina.

Barbara Masie
bmasie@popecenter.org
Accountant

Barbara Masie, who joined the Pope Center in April 2008, is responsible for all the accounting and financial aspects of the organization. Masie graduated from Union College with a B.S. in industrial economics. Before taking time off to spend with her children, Masie was a financial analyst with the IBM Corporation, working in Connecticut, New York, and London.

Duke Cheston
cheston@popecenter.org
Reporter and Writer

Duke Cheston is a 2010 graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he studied biology. At UNC he wrote for Carolina Review, UNC's only conservative publication. He wrote a number of provocative articles and won several awards, including "Article of the Year." While at UNC Cheston was administrative and executive vice chairman of the College Republicans and was elected to the Student Congress in 2009.

Since joining the Pope Center, Cheston has written articles on an array of topics, with a particular focus on community colleges, health care education, and religious issues.