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Gary Glassman is president and executive producer of Providence Pictures and he is the writer, director and producer of the NOVA documentary The Bible.

Anne Zeiser is an award-winning strategist whose background as a broadcast journalist, marketing executive, and social advocate uniquely positions her as the architect of successful, outcomes-driven media campaigns. Before founding Azure Media to provide strategy to media companies, Anne was Executive Director of Marketing, Publicity & Media Platforms/Director of National Strategic Marketing at PBS/WGBH where she oversaw strategy, marketing and publicity, impact campaigns and affiliate relations for PBS icons including *Masterpiece Theatre*, *Mystery!*, *NOVA*, *American Experience*, *FRONTLINE*, *Antiques Roadshow*, *This Old House*, *Arthur*, *Curious George*, *Zoom*, and *Design Squad*, as well as numerous groundbreaking multi-media special projects. Zeiser began her career in government. Her work in journalism, marketing communications, and public affairs has received top industry honors and she is a member of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences and a Board Member of the Filmmakers Collaborative.

Bryan Windmiller, holds a PhD in biology and a Master's degree in Environmental Policy, both from Tufts University. He has worked as a consulting wildlife ecologist since 1987. Bryan's research interests include: assessing the impacts of residential construction on vernal pool amphibian populations, the conservation of Blanding's turtles in Concord, Massachusetts, and the ecology of amphibian populations exposed to the emerging fungal disease, chytridiomycosis.

Gina B. Nahai is a best-selling author, and a professor of Creative Writing at USC. Her novels have been translated into 18 languages, and have been selected as One of the Best Books of the Year by the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune. They have been finalists for the Orange Award, the IMPAC Award, and the Harold J. Ribalow Award. She is the winner of the Los Angeles Arts Council Award, the Persian Heritage Foundation's Award, the Simon Rockower Award, and the Phi Kappa Phi Award. Her writings have appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Magazine, and Huffington Post. She writes a monthly column for the The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles, for which she has been twice a finalist for an L.A. Press Club award. Nahai's first novel, Cry of the Peacock (Crown, 1992) told, for the first time in any Western language, the 3,000-year story of the Jewish people of Iran. It won the Los Angeles Arts Council Award for Fiction. Her second novel, Moonlight on the Avenue of Faith (Harcourt, 1999), was a finalist for the Orange Prize in England, the IMPAC award in Dublin, and the Harold J. Ribalow Award in the United States. A #1 L.A. Times bestseller, it was named as One of the Best Books of the Year by the Los Angeles Times. Her third novel, Sunday's Silence (Harcourt, 2001), was also an L.A. Times bestseller and a Best Book of the Year. Her fourth novel, Caspian Rain was published in September 07, was also an L.A. Times bestseller, was named One of the Best Books of the Year by the Chicago Tribune, and won the Persian Heritage Foundation's Award. Nahai is a frequent lecturer on the contemporary politics of the Middle East, has been a guest on PBS, CNBC, as well as a number of local television and radio news programs, and has guest-hosted on NPR affiliate KCRW (The Politics of Culture). A judge for the Los Angeles Times Book Awards (Fiction, First Fiction), she has lectured at a number of conferences nationwide, and served on the boards of PEN Center USA West, The International Women's Media Foundation, and B'nai Zion Western Region. Nahai holds a BA and a Master's degree in International Relations from UCLA, and an MFA in Creative Writing from USC. She lives in Los Angeles, where she's at work on a new novel.

Grover J. (Russ) Whitehurst was appointed by President George W. Bush to a six-year term as the first Director of the Institute of Education Sciences. As director, Whitehurst administers the Institute, including the activities of the National Center for Education Statistics, the National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance and the National Center for Education Research. He coordinates the work of the Institute with related activities carried out by other agencies within the Department and the federal government. He advises the secretary on research, evaluation and statistics relevant to the work of the Department. During his career as a researcher, Whitehurst was the author or editor of five books and published more than 100 scholarly papers on language and pre-reading development in children. Throughout his academic career, his research focused on the development of knowledge and programs that might have a direct influence on the lives of children and families. Those goals continue in his role as Institute director. Whitehurst was born and reared in Washington, North Carolina. He was educated in the public schools of Washington, received his undergraduate degree at East Carolina University, and obtained a Ph.D. in experimental child psychology in 1970 from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He is married with two children.