Join MACDC’s Director of Policy, Nathanael Shea, and former Massachusetts State Senator, Sonia Chang-Díaz, to learn the ins and outs of the legislative process. This interactive virtual session is designed to equip CDC staff, board members, and leaders with the knowledge and skills to understand how laws are made and effectively engage in advocacy. 

About the instructors:

Nathanael Shea is MACDC's Director of Public Policy. He leads MACDC's policy team and advances the policy goals of CDCs in state and local government. Prior to his time at MACDC, he spent 11 years in the office of state Senator Sonia Chang-Díaz, including 8 as Chief of Staff. During his tenure in her office, he led the Senator’s staff in all areas of legislative, state budget, and community engagement work, and was a key player in major legislative victories to improve funding for public schools, reform policing practices, reduce mass incarceration, expand access to multi-lingual public education, and establish concrete equity measures in the state’s cannabis industry. Prior to his time in the Senate, Nathanael was a professional stage actor. He lives in Watertown with his family and is an avid bicycle commuter.

Sonia Chang-Díaz is the Chief External Affairs Officer at the YMCA of Greater Boston, where she oversees YGB’s communications, government relations, development, and partnership work. Prior to joining YGB’s leadership team in 2026, Sonia served for 14 years in the Massachusetts State Senate, where she was the first Latina and first Asian-American elected to that body. During that time Sonia wrote, championed, and won landmark education funding reforms to provide $1.5 billion annually in new aid to K-12 districts across the state. She led the charge for criminal justice reform and repealing racist sentencing rules, when Beacon Hill insiders were ready to look the other way. She also sponsored and won multiple protections for trans Bay Staters, negotiated a nation-leading police reform law, and won increased assistance for small businesses and equity laws to close the racial wealth divide through emerging industries. She’s strengthened environmental justice laws, won protections for immigrants, and helped pass voting rights expansions. In 2022 she became the first woman of color to ever make the ballot for Governor in state history. Sonia lives in Jamaica Plain with her husband and two children.