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Dan French is the executive director of the Center for Collaborative Education, a non profit organization dedicated to working with networks of schools engaged in reform. The Center is the National Turning Points Center, which works with regional centers and middle schools across the nation to adopt the Turning Points design, a comprehensive and rigorous middle school reform model that is based on ten years of research and practice in implementing the Turning Points principles. Formerly, Dan was the director of Instruction and Curriculum for the Massachusetts Department of Education.

Donna Rodrigues is a Program Director for the Early College Initiative at Jobs for the Future in Boston, Massachusetts. For 35 years prior to this position, she was an outstanding and well-recognized leader in public education. Her success as the founding principal of University Park Campus School (UPCS), a public school collaboration with Clark University, has been well documented by CNN, and featured in the *New York and LA Times*, and *the Christian Science Monito*r. Recently named the highest performing high school in Massachusetts, and ranked number 68 in the top 100 high schools in the country in Newsweek, UPCS is existence proof that the achievement gap for students of color, students living in poverty, and students who are English Language Learners can be challenged and defied. The schools population, students from the most economically challenged part of the city, enters the seventh grade with skills 3 to 4 years behind grade level. These same students have scored advanced or proficient on the states graduation required exam (MCAS), and have been accepted to, and are attending college. The accomplishment is outstanding and exemplary of what can happen. Donna speaks across the country about the challenges and outcomes of a prep school education for all.

Dr. Blumer teaches in and is the chair of the Boston College Graduate School Educational Administration and Higher Education Department. Prior to Boston College, he worked in public education for 35 years as a teacher, counselor, assistant principal, principal, assistant superintendent and superintendent of schools. He is also a past President of the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents. Dr. Blumer received his B.S. and M.A. degrees from Northeastern University and his Ed.D. degree from Boston College.

Louis Menand is Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of English at Harvard University. He received his BA (1973) from Pomona and his MA (1975) and PhD (1980) from Columbia. His primary interests are 19th and 20th century cultural history. His books include *The Marketplace of Ideas* (W. W. Norton & Co, 2010); *American Studies* (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002); *The Metaphysical Club* (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2001); *The Cambridge History of Literary Criticism, Volume 7: Modernism and the New Criticism*, co-ed. (Cambridge University Press, 2000); *The Future of Academic Freedom*, ed. (University of Chicago Press, 1997); *Pragmatism: A Reader*, ed. (Vintage, 1996); and *Discovering Modernism: T. S. Eliot and His Context* (Oxford University Press, 1987). He is also a staff writer for *The New Yorker*.

Veteran reporter Daniel Schorr, the last of Edward R. Murrow's legendary CBS team still fully active in journalism, currently interprets national and international events as senior news analyst for NPR. Schorr's career of more than six decades has earned him many awards for journalistic excellence, including three Emmys, and decorations from European heads of state. He has also been honored by civil liberties groups and professional organizations for his defense of the First Amendment. In 1996, he received the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Golden Baton for "Exceptional Contributions to Radio and Television Reporting and Commentary." The Golden Baton is the most prestigious award in the field of broadcasting and is considered the equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize. Other awards include a George Foster Peabody personal award for "a lifetime of uncompromising reporting of the highest integrity," the George Polk radio commentary award for "interpretations of national and international events," and the Distinguished Service Award of the American Society of Schools of Journalism and Mass Communications. Schorr has also been inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Society of Professional Journalists.

U.S. poet, scholar, and critic, Adrienne Rich was a student at Radcliffe College when her poems were chosen for publication in the Yale Younger Poets series; the resulting volume, *A Change of World* (1951), reflected her formal mastery. Her subsequent work traces a transformation from well-crafted but imitative poetry to a highly personal and powerful style. Her increasing commitment to the women's movement and a lesbian/feminist aesthetic influenced much of her work. Among her collections are *Diving into the Wreck* (1973, National Book Award) and *The Dream of a Common Language* (1978). She also wrote compelling books of nonfiction, including *Of Woman Born *(1976; National Book Award), *On Lies, Secrets, and Silence* (1979), and *What Is Found There* (1993).