Lauren is a pediatric nurse practitioner currently with Bayside Pediatric Specialists in Bayside, Queens, and a clinical instructor at NYU Rory Myers College of Nursing. Lauren has over 30 years experience working with children and families in the New York metropolitan area, including many years with The Children’s Hospital at Montefiore, Butler Child Advocacy Center, a world-renowned program for the detection, treatment, and prevention of child abuse. Lauren has been a longtime volunteer with The Children’s Village in Dobbs Ferry, NY, where she serves on the Community Advisory Committee and was awarded their Legacy of Service Award in 2016. She also serves on the Advisory Council of Hands up for Haiti, joining their volunteer teams of healthcare professionals on medical missions in Northern Haiti. Lauren holds a B.Sc. in Nursing from Emory University, Atlanta and a M.Sc. in Nursing from Columbia University, New York. Lauren lives with her husband in Westchester, NY, where they raised their three children.

Christine J. Chao is currently General Counsel of the Foremost Group, an international shipping company. Christine has extensive corporate and commercial law experience having worked in senior legal positions for three Fortune 100 companies: GE, Federal Express and Ultramar Corporation. Christine began her legal career upon graduation from Columbia Law School with the Wall Street law firm of Dewey & LeBoeuf focusing on M&A, US securities, leasing and project finance. Christine holds a Bachelor of Arts from Colgate University and currently serves as a Trustee for her alma mater as well as the Foremost Foundation, which strives to help young people access higher education and greater opportunities generally, and The One Love Foundation, which promotes healthy relationships, especially among our young people. After living abroad in Hong Kong, China and London, England, Christine now resides in Greenwich, CT. with her husband Jos Shaver and their two sons, Ben and Tyler.

Katie is a Senior Strategist at Adobe Inc.’s Digital Strategy Group. She advises top Fortune 500 retail corporations helping them to optimize their online presence and assisting them successfully effect their digital transformation. Katie holds a BA degree from University of Michigan where she was a James B. Angell Scholar and admitted to Phi Kappa Phi. While at Michigan, Katie was on the board and the Executive Director of PALMA (Proyecto Avance: Latino Mentoring Association), which provided tutoring to Hispanic students and parents in the Ann Arbor area. Katie received her MBA from Columbia Business School where she received the Student Service Award. Katie is passionate about early education and reading and has interned at Fundación Educacional Oportunidad in Chile and at the Brazelton Touchpoints Center at Boston Children’s Hospital/Harvard University. Katie lives in Manhattan.

Nicholas Drayson is an Associate in the Restructuring group at Greenhill & Co., a leading independent investment bank. He advises distressed corporations and institutions on a wide range of capital structure, restructuring and financing situations both inside and outside formal bankruptcy. Nicholas received an MBA with Dean’s Honors from Columbia Business School, where he was co-founder of the CBS Book Club, and VP of Impact Measurement at Microlumbia, a student-run impact investment fund. Nicholas graduated from Northwestern University with a bachelor’s degree in Economics. Nicholas lives in New York City.

Alice Goh is Vice President and General Manager, International Programs and Operations at Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit educational organization behind Sesame Street. Alice joined Sesame from the Ford Foundation, where she was Director of the Office of the Executive Vice President from 2014-2020. Working across the foundation’s offices in the United States, Asia, Africa, and Latin America, Alice led strategic initiatives like the Ford Global Fellowship and provided strategic support to the foundation’s executive leadership. Previously, she was Vice President, Strategy and Administration at Teach for All, overseeing finance, technology and administration for a global network expanding educational opportunities around the world. Alice began her career at Goldman Sachs as an analyst in New York and Hong Kong. Alice serves on the board of LitWorld and is a member of the President’s Council of Cornell Women. She earned her bachelor’s degree in policy analysis from Cornell University and a master’s in business administration and master’s in education from Stanford University.

Dr. Ernest Morrell is the Macy professor of English Education at Teachers College, Columbia University, a class of 2014 Fellow of the American Educational Research Association, and the Past-President of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE). He is also the Director of Teachers College’s Institute for Urban and Minority Education (IUME). Prior to this, Dr. Morrell was an award winning high school English teacher in Northern California, and he continues to work with teachers, schools and adolescents across the country to infuse multicultural literature, youth popular culture and media production into standards-based literacy curricula and after school programs. Dr. Morrell received his Ph.D. in Language, Literacy and Culture from the University of California at Berkeley where he received the Outstanding Dissertation Award. He is an award-winning published author, and his books include Critical Media Pedagogy: Teaching for Achievement in City Schools and New Directions in Teaching English. In his spare time, he coaches youth sports and writes poems and plays.

Dr. Julie Padilla has been a passionate educator for over a decade. As a first-generation college graduate, Dr. Padilla earned her Bachelor of Arts dual degree in History and Social Studies Education 7-12 from Syracuse University. She proceeded to earn her Master of Science from Syracuse as well, in Literacy Education 5-12. In 2017, she completed a second Master’s degree in School Building and School District Leadership from Touro College. More recently in 2020, Dr. Padilla completed her Doctorate in Education from Northeastern University with a concentration in Curriculum, Teaching, Learning, and Leadership. Working as a Social Studies and Literacy teacher for at-risk youth ages 14-21 at the beginning of her career, Dr. Padilla gained an invaluable amount of experience. For her work, she was awarded SmileDirectClub’s Community Hero Spotlight in 2019. She currently works as an Assistant Principal of a Pre-K through 7th grade school located in New York City. She resides on Long Island with her husband, Eldred.

Steve Records is the Executive Director of GEAPS, a global agriculture focused nonprofit, focused on advancing grain industry knowledge through its network of agricultural professionals. In this role, Steve is responsible for working with the GEAPS International Board of Directors leading the strategic development and ongoing management of the organization. Prior to this, Steve was the VP of Operations at SCORE, a nonprofit organization that helps small business owners and entrepreneurs to business success. Steve’s career has also included sales, marketing and consulting roles with The Gallup Organization and Nalco Company. Steve graduated with a bachelors degree in Chemical Engineering from Purdue and has earned an MBA from the University of Nevada Las Vegas. Steve has also completed Stanford’s Nonprofit Executive Leadership Program. In his free time, Steve enjoys travel, cooking, and wine in addition to spoiling his dogs Otis and Murphy. He lives in Minneapolis.

Samantha Siegal is a Senior Director of Marketing at PepsiCo. In this role, Sam leads all strategy, innovation & marketing for the company’s portfolio of ambient juice brands. Since joining PepsiCo in 2012, Sam has held roles across brand finance, global strategy and marketing. She graduated cum laude from Amherst College with a dual bachelor’s degree in Economics and Law, Jurisprudence & Social Thought before beginning her career in Sales at Barclays Capital and earning an MBA from the Yale School of Management. In her free time, Sam enjoys exercising, reading, reliving her years as a modern dancer, brewing beer, traveling and, of course, working on behalf of LitWorld. She resides in Manhattan with her husband, Mike.

Nadeige is a Small Business Entrepreneur, and Co-founder of La Paix Bakery, Inc., a family-owned and operated retail bakery business in south Florida that launched in 2005. Nadeige is also a full-time graduate student at New York University Robert F. Wagner’s Executive Master of Public Administration (EMPA) – Public Service Leaders program to assist her career pivot from the corporate sector into government. Her corporate journey of thirteen years included, various PepsiCo leadership experiences across: sales, change management, marketing and commercial strategy, while also passionately supporting diversity and inclusion efforts through employee resource groups (ERGs). Nadeige earned her Bachelor of Science dual degree in Finance and Marketing from Florida State University, with a minor in Communications in 2006. She is a member of the NYU Wagner Diversity Council (WDC), and was recently appointed to the Historic Miramar Advisory Board within the Broward county, Florida community. Nadeige resides in south Florida and as an avid traveler, enjoys learning about different cultures through local art, literature, music and food.

Caleb is currently the Commercial Business Development Lead at Zest Dental Solutions, a portfolio company of BC Partners. In this role, he leads a team on all growth initiatives in the direct-to-consumer dental space. He graduated from Wagner College with a bachelor's degree in Business Administration while also playing on the basketball team. In his free time, Caleb enjoys playing sports, being outside, reading, traveling and spending time with friends and family. Caleb resides in Encinitas, California with his wife, Kylee, and daughter, Leila.

Cora Walker is currently an Assistant Vice President at GSO Capital Partners LP. Prior to joining GSO, Cora was an associate at Kirkland & Ellis LLP, specializing in mergers and acquisitions. Cora received her J.D., magna cum laude from Fordham University School of Law where she was a member of the Fordham Law Review and Chairperson of the Dispute Resolution Society. Prior to law school, Cora graduated cum laude from The George Washington University with a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration. Cora resides in New York City with her husband Joshua.