Daniel Ash is Associate Vice President of Community Impact at the Chicago Community Trust. He is responsible for the Building Collective Power strategy, which aims to advance equitable, livable, and resilient neighborhoods within under-invested Black and Latinx communities. Grantmaking from this portfolio supports community organizing, community-center journalism and storytelling, and resident-designed and driven campaigns.

Ash previously served as the Trust’s chief marketing officer from 2013 to 2019. In the role, he directed brand strategy and communications, spearheading the development of On the Table, an ongoing civic engagement and dialogue platform design to center and amplify the resident voice and create greater civic connectedness across the Chicago region.

Prior to joining the Trust, Ash spent 10 years as vice president at Chicago Public Media, production home of WBEZ/91.5FM (Chicago’s primary NPR station). Ash was responsible for the organization’s two largest revenue categories—corporate sponsorship and individual giving—and led double-digit growth during his tenure. Additionally, he oversaw marketing and strategic partnership. He was a key voice in shaping Chicago Public Media’s overall strategic focus.

Ash’s professional career has been focused on developing and using marketing, communication, and development programs that advance social change. He has worked exclusively in the nonprofit sector on issues including poverty, adolescent health, and HIV/AIDS care and prevention. The early stage of his professional career included leadership roles at Shriver Center on Poverty Law, Chicago Department of Public Health, Center for Family Policy and Practice, and the Illinois Caucus for Adolescent Health. Ash earned an M.P.P. from the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago, and a B.A. in Economics from Oberlin College. He also completed a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship at Princeton University.

Bart Bailey is a highly trained and certified executive, business and leadership coach, who leverages his impressive corporate experience of creating success with his ability to connect to the heart of the matter to ignite change with individuals, teams, and communities. His commitment to empowering people to fully step into their passion and purpose is at the heart of his success. He combines his 25-years of corporate experience leading diverse functions including Cross-functional Service teams (Engineering, Operations, Customer Service, Customer accounting, and Planning) and all aspects of manufacturing from managing raw goods to delivery of the finished product, utilizing lean thinking and proven practices to support his teams to achieve high-value results. His work has consistently improved engagement, employee satisfaction, improved safety, and customer satisfaction. Courage to Care is committed to leveraging Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion to foster Belonging and minimize Othering.

Bart serves on two family Advisory councils at two children’s hospitals. He serves on Lehigh Valley’s Health Network’s Cultural Awareness Leadership Council, is a member of the Greater Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce’s African American Business Leader’s Council, is Chair of the Scholarship Committee for the Alpha Mu Nu Chapter of Omega Psi Phi, and is a member of the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH). Bart facilitated workshops for the Allentown Police Department in the area of Unconscious Bias and worked with the police and community to improve relationships between the two. He facilitated workshops with middle school students in the area of understanding self, compassion, and empathy.

Bailey recently served as a consultant with CookRoss, the premier organization in the fields of Diversity and Inclusion.  There, he participated in all aspects of client engagement relating to Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Access (IDEA) to foster Belonging while minimizing Othering.

Currently, Bailey is the Owner and principal consultant of Courage to Care, LLC. This work leverages Justice, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (JEDI) to foster Belonging and minimize othering. Bart also brings over 25 years of leadership and working with people into the content and delivery.

Earlier, he served in a number of leadership roles in a variety of industries, including Jersey Central Power, GCS Service, Harley Davidson Motor Company, Alcoa, and PPL Electric Utilities. Bailey has focused his career on developing and improving employee motivation and safety behavior, Lean Thinking, constructive culture, change management, and community relations.

Corporate Culture and Wellness Expert, M. Ac., L.Ac. – teaches soft skills with a massive ROI to business and community teams. She is a high-school dropout who helped the NSA communicate more effectively with the CIA and saved Pepsi’s culture merge when purchasing Gatorade, Jade Duggan, is the creator of the Duggan Method™ and a proud keeper of America’s legacy of transformative leadership, social change, and alternative medicine.

Thomas Countryman is Chairman of the Board of the Arms Control Association, a nonpartisan NGO analyzing key security issues and advising the executive branch, Congress, and the public on choices to promote global security and reduce the risk that weapons of mass destruction will be used.

He retired from the Senior Foreign Service in January 2017 after 35 years of service. At that time, he served simultaneously as acting Undersecretary for Arms Control and as Assistant Secretary for International Security and Nonproliferation, a position he held since September 2011. The ISN Bureau leads the US effort to prevent the spread of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons

After serving in Belgrade, Washington and Cairo, he advised Ambassador Albright on Middle East affairs at the US Mission to the United Nations and was Director for Near East affairs at the National Security Council.

Tom directed the State Department’s Office of South Central European Affairs, was Minister for Political Affairs in Rome, Deputy Chief of Mission at the Embassy in Athens (including five months as Charge d’Affaires), and Foreign Policy Advisor to the US Marine Commandant.

Earlier, he was Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Political-Military Affairs, and then Deputy Assistant Secretary for European Affairs, with responsibility for the Balkans.

Mr. Countryman graduated from Washington University in St. Louis (summa cum laude) in economics. He speaks Serbo-Croatian, Arabic, German, Italian, and Greek.

Steve Cox brings 40 years of experience in international development, community philanthropy, human rights, environmental management, and higher education to his current roles as a volunteer with public interest organizations in his community and an active participant in selected political campaigns.

Prior to his retirement in March 2018, he served for seven years as Vice President for Programs and Managing Director for Networks and Strategic Initiatives at the Inter-American Foundation.  Steve has also held senior executive positions with the Ford Foundation, the World Wildlife Fund, the Nature Conservancy, the World Resources Institute, INCAE, and Fundación Acceso, a non-profit organization that he founded in Costa Rica.  He began his career working with Agua del Pueblo, a Guatemalan NGO building potable water systems for indigenous communities.

He has been a consultant to the World Bank, the United Nations, the Global Environment Facility, CARE, the Oscar Arias Foundation, the Inter-American Institute of Human Rights, and the Pew Charitable Trusts; has been a guest lecturer at the World Bank, Columbia University, Duke University, the University of California at San Diego, the University of Maryland, the University of Minnesota, Notre Dame University, the Universidad de Cuenca (Ecuador), and FLACSO/Ecuador; has been a Kettering Foundation Fellow and a member of the Advisory Council of the Kellogg Institute for International Studies at Notre Dame.  He has served on several non-profit boards and is currently on the board of AsylumWorks in Washington, DC, and the advisory board of the Kaleidos Center for Interdisciplinary Ethnography in Ecuador.

Since retiring in 2018, he has been an active volunteer with immigrant rights organizations in Washington, and in elections in North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Virginia.  He has spent half of his career in residence in Latin America (Mexico, Costa Rica, Brazil, Peru, and Guatemala), and is fluent in Spanish and Portuguese.  He has a BA in Latin American Economic Development from Berkeley and a master’s degree in public policy from Harvard.  He is the proud father of two adult daughters who are deeply involved in public service.

Marlysa D. Gamblin is the founder of GamblinConsults, a consulting firm that provides public speaking and consulting services around racial equity.

Marlysa is an expert on race and policy in the United States and is passionate about helping people understand the importance of race/racial equity, with the hopes of changing hearts, minds, and actions toward sustainable change. Marlysa has extensive experience in this field, including staffing on the Faith-Based Presidential Subcommittee on Race, Justice, and Poverty under the Obama Administration and being elected to lead Economic Empowerment for the NAACP in DC.

At different points in her career, she has consistently heard one question regardless of age, sector, region, or political affiliation– “Why do we need to focus on race?” In response, Marlysa decided to help people understand why by designing the Racial Wealth Gap Learning Simulation–an interactive tool that helps people understand how structural racism was created in the United States. This simulation has had a tremendous impact on helping thousands of people and organizations across the country start this important conversation and move toward thinking about what their role in this work is. Upon designing this tool, she realized that many people struggled with the next step. To this, she responded by designing another tool–the Racial Equity Methodology. This tool walks people through a step-by-step process of how to apply a racial equity lens into their day-to-day work and decisions.

Through this work, Marlysa has established a wealth of experience helping individuals and organizations understand how to apply a racial equity lens in their internal culture, practices, and processes. She also has experience walking individuals, organizations, agencies, and communities apply a racial equity lens to the programs they design, the advocacy strategies they create, the local, state, and federal policy they support, the research they lead, and the analysis they provide.

In addition to Marlysa being an expert, thought-leader, and resource designer, she is a dynamic public speaker, perhaps most known for her engaging and interactive presence. She has spoken across the country in various capacities, including as the keynote speaker, as well as on panel discussions, podcasts, conference workshops, and radio stations. In addition, she meets with individual organizations to provide capacity-building opportunities.

Marlysa has earned her B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley and her Master in Public Policy from the Harvard School of Government.

Carlos E. Jimenez-Gomez moved from Spain to the US in 2016. He is a computer scientist working as a consultant, supporting public organizations in achieving digital transformation. In this field, most of his work is currently under the strategic perspective, like analysis, design, and evaluation of strategic plans and roadmaps, assistance to CIOs, directors, and other high-level officials and public employees, or technical direction of strategic digital government projects.

Carlos is also linked to academia in these fields. He has done applied research and he currently teaches in the university within digital government and data science studies. A favorite achievement is his participation in the elaboration of a policy document signed by the heads of state of 21 countries on cross-border interoperability (data sharing), and his involvement in a four-times awarded program on justice transformation (fully virtual courts) in Spain, where he participated since its inception.

As a volunteer, he has also responsibilities at the strategic level in leading professional organizations in the field of technology, such as the IEEE or the IEEE Computer Society, participating also in the development of standards related to ethics, governance, and artificial intelligence.

Álvaro Lozano moved from Spain to London 2 years ago, where he works on the marketing team of a tech multinational company working especially in Search Engine Optimization. He also works as a Digital Marketing professor in different business schools and as a digital marketing consultant for a Spanish small business specialized in events and elearning consultancy.

He is currently enrolled in the EMBA at City, London University. He enjoys cooking and music, playing the guitar for more than a decade, and now learning piano and sax. In college, he studied psychology and marketing and market research; he has a Master’s degree in SEO. If you want to develop a website, rank it on Google or a digital marketing strategy in general, he can probably help!

Robin Nunn is a partner and co-leader of the Banking Industry Group at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP.  She has a wealth of experience gained in private practice as well as working in-house for Fortune 500 companies.

Kevin C. O’Leary is a research fellow at the Center for the Study of Democracy at the University of California, Irvine and also teaches in the Political Science Department at Chapman University. He earned his Ph.D. at Yale University.  His new book, Madison’s Sorrow: Today’s War on the Founders and America’s Liberal Ideal tracks liberalism and illiberal reaction across American history and tells the story of how racism and plutocracy generated America’s reactionary right and the Trump presidency.  His previous book, Saving Democracy: A Plan for Real Representation in America, was a finalist for the American Political Science Association’s Michael Harrington Award.  Saving Democracy advocates instituting a system of citizen assemblies in congressional districts across the nation which would debate the major issues of the day.  Citizen assemblies made of 50 to 100 people chosen by lot in each congressional district would improve citizen participation and provide a measure of public opinion far more deliberative and educated than regular opinion polls.

A contributor to The American Prospect, he was the lead West Coast reporter for TIME, as well as a reporter for the Los Angeles Times, national correspondent for Campaigns & Elections, editorial page editor of the Pasadena Star-News, and editor of OC METRO magazine. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of UCLA, he led the Washington internship program and was an intern to Speaker Tip O’Neill.  He was a Coro Fellow in Los Angeles before attending Yale Graduate School.  He lives in Irvine, California with his wife and has two grown daughters.

Karen Ong is Creative Director and Principal of Marketing for Change, a leading behavior change agency.

Karen’s creative leadership spins breakthrough ideas into marketing, branding, products, and communication campaigns that move the needle on behavior change. Rooted in a background of design and sociology, Karen brings empathy for the target audience, a sense of humor, and a push to embrace the unlikely approach to all of her work, resulting in creative that is attention-grabbing and emotionally resonant. She took the helm of the creative team in 2010 and oversees all creative, including branding, social media, video, print, and digital product development.

Projects Karen is especially proud of include leading the launch of a new collaborative non-profit, Healthy Babies Bright Futures, which bring the top experts in science together to offer the next generation a toxic-free future; using a research-based branding approach to create “Serve Strong” the health and safety initiative for National Volunteer Fire Council’s volunteer firefighters; HungerInOurSchools.org, a video-rich, solution-oriented online report for No Kid Hungry that helps public school teachers give voice to how hunger hampers kids’ ability to learn, and “Be Floridian,” a campaign for the Tampa Bay Estuary Program which encourages local residents to “protect fun” by skipping summer fertilizing.

Karen is backed up by a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in graphic design from Rochester Institute of Technology. She has a minor in sociology and began her career at a boutique design firm in San Diego. Like any self-respecting artist, she has worked in a coffee shop with a cute name and a sheet music store, after running a camp for neighborhood kids out of her parent’s basement.

Mark Petrovic is an Architect and Member of the Technical Staff at Paypal, Inc.  Prior to Paypal, Mark was Vice President for R&D at Earthlink, the national Internet service provider, an engineer in Sprint operations, and Visiting Scientist at IBM Research. He holds a Ph.D. in physics from Oklahoma State University.

Originally from Long Island, NY, Guiliana is currently pursuing a degree in media studies and a minor in theater from the University of San Francisco. In addition to interning with ARJ, she works as a tutor through USF’s Engage SF Literacy program for kids in grades K-5.

David Rubenstein, a nonprofit leader known for recruiting and guiding powerful teams to address social issues,  coordinates the activities of Action for Racial Justice, a project to engage Americans of all backgrounds in the struggle for equal rights.

Over two decades, Dave has advised a wide variety of nonprofit organizations and their boards, working closely with executives and organizational leadership to visualize and clarify their missions and execute realistic and effective action plans.

Active in movements for international humanitarian aid and human rights, urban youth programs, environmental protection, Dave is best known as a leader and key architect of the Save Darfur advocacy movement, which brought America’s attention to the humanitarian and human rights crisis in Sudan’s western region.  As Founding Executive Director of the Save Darfur Coalition, he directed/guided work that helped secure a UN Security Council resolution authorizing civilian protection force in Darfur.  The Save Darfur Coalition found its influence by reaching across significant religious, ethnic, and political divides to build an internationally effective campaign.

Dave designed and launched four nonprofit organizations – fundraising, recruiting and training talented teams, building partnerships with wide range of private, nonprofit and governmental organizations, and developing leading-edge technology tools and marketing materials.  Among these were the EnvironMentors Project, a mentorship program for youth in under-resourced schools, and the Best Shot Foundation, an advocacy program promoting U.S. funding for global health initiatives.

His accomplishments and commitment to greater Washington have been recognized by Washingtonian Magazine, which named him a “Washingtonian of the Year,” and with stories in the Washington Post and Washington University Magazine. Dave lives in Montgomery County, Maryland with his wife and daughter. He holds a degree in economics from Washington University in St. Louis.

Amanda received her Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies from Prescott College in Arizona. She grew up in California and now lives in Colorado, where she enjoys exploring the mountains with her dogs.

Rowan Wright is a senior attending high school in Maryland. She is secretary of her school’s Red Cross Club and treasurer of her school’s HOSA club. She is passionate about public health and social justice.