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Jean Trounstine earned her B.A. at Beloit College and her M.F.A. in Theatre Arts at Brandeis University. She is currently a professor of humanities at Middlesex Community College in Lowell Massachusetts, specializing in writing, literature and theatre courses. With grants from the Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities, Trounstine developed a humanities-based theatre arts program at Framingham Women's Prison, where she directed several productions. Drawing from music history, women's history, art, literature and drama, the program was offered at the prison for ten years, most recently earning college credit in collaboration with Boston University. Her work in prison with The Merchant of Venice was nominated for a prestigious Schwartz Award, considered by the Foundation as the most successful project funded in 1988. It is the basis of her book *Shakespeare behind Bars: The Power of Drama in a Women's Prison* (2001). With Robert Waxler, she co-authored *Finding a Voice: The Practice of Changing Lives Through Literature* (U Michigan, 2005). She helped to establish this program in Massachusetts, where criminals are sentenced to a literature seminar and probation instead of jail and it is now in many other states and in England. *Changing Lives* was honored in 2004 by the New England Board of Higher Education as an exemplary program in New England and received a grant from the Massachusetts Foundation for Humanities. Trounstine has been the subject of over fifty news articles both locally and nationally, and at conferences for educators, probation officers, judges, legislators, theatre practitioners, and writers, she speaks about her work with offenders and is received enthusiastically.

Milton Chen, PhD, has been a leading figure in educational media for more than 20 years. He joined the George Lucas Educational Foundation as executive director in 1998, bringing new leadership to its mission of gathering and disseminating the most innovative models of K-12 teaching and learning in the digital age. Before that, he was the founding director of the KQED Center for Education and Lifelong Learning, in San Francisco, delivering educational services for teachers, parents, and community groups in support of public television programming. He has been a director of research at the Children's Television Workshop, in New York, and an assistant professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Most recently, Chen has served as a consultant to Children Now, the Educational Development Center, the Foundation for Advancements in Science and Education, and Scholastic. He received an AB in social studies from Harvard College and an MA and PhD in communication research from Stanford University.

Professor Taliaferro teaches courses on United States foreign policy, security studies, the rise and the fall of the great powers, as well as introduction to international relations. His research centers on international relations theories, security studies, international history and politics, the grand strategies of the great powers, political psychology, and U.S. foreign policy. Professor Taliaferro is the author of *Balancing Risks: Great Power Intervention in the Periphery *(2004), for which he received the American Political Science Association's Robert L. Jervis and Paul W. Schroeder Award for the Best Book in International History and Politics. His articles have appeared in the journals *International Security*, *Security Studies*, and *Political Psychology* and two edited volumes. He is co-editor, along with Steven E. Lobell and Norrin P. Ripsman, of an edited volume entitled, *Neoclassical Realism, the State, and Foreign Policy*, which is currently under review at a university press. Professor Taliaferro is currently writing a book entitled *The Primacy of Power: Realism and U.S. Grand Strategies, 1940-present*, which is under contract at Routledge. Professor Taliaferro has held grants and fellowships from the Smith Richardson Foundation, the Institute for the Study of World Politics, the National Science Foundation, and the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard University. He serves on the editorial board of International Studies Review.

From 1955 to 1991, Bill Cavness was the voice of WGBH Radio. He hosted many live broadcasts including numerous classical music programs and from 1958 to his retirement in 1991, he produced and hosted a daily weekday program, called *Reading Aloud*. Before there were books on tape, Bill revived what he referred to as "an old family custom" of reading stories aloud. The series began in 1958 with Doctor Zhivago. This was before Pasternak's book was readily available and the reading was Bill's way to share the book with a larger audience. During the holidays, Bill would turn his attention to literature about the season including on several occasions over the 33 years, Charles Dickens' *A Christmas Caro*.