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Os Guinness speaks widely on social issues, particularly in the western world. He is the founder of the Trinity Forum and a Senior Fellow of the EastWest Institute in New York. As one who has experienced culture from different parts of the world, Guinness is a respected voice on issues of culture, character, calling, faith, worldview, and matters of globalization, religion, postmodernity, and public life. The son of medical missionaries (and the great-great grandson of Arthur Guinness, the Dublin brewer), Guinness was born in China during World War II. In 1951, Guinness was expelled from China shortly after going through the Chinese revolution of 1949. He received his undergraduate degree from the University of London and his D.Phil in social science from Oriel College, Oxford. Os has written or edited more than twenty five books, including *The American Hour*, *Time for Truth*, *The Call*, *Invitation to the Classics*,* Long Journey Home*, and *Unspeakable: Facing up to the challenge of evil*. His latest book, from Harper One, is *The Case for Civility – and Why our Future Depends on It*, published in January 2008. In 2010, Guinness contributed to *A Place for Truth: Leading Thinkers Explore Life's Hardest Questions*, published by The Veritas Forum and InterVarsity Press. Os was previously a freelance reporter with the BBC. Since coming to the United States in 1984, he has been a Guest Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Studies and a Guest Scholar and Visiting Fellow at the Brookings Institution. From 1986 to 1989, Os served as Executive Director of the Williamsburg Charter Foundation, a bicentennial celebration of the First Amendment. From 1991 to 2004 he was a senior fellow at the Trinity Forum, and a frequent speaker and seminar leader at political and business conferences in both the United States and Europe.

Nearly 25 years ago, critic Martin Williams called Gary Giddins "probably the most impressive journalist ever to have written about music." Born in Brooklyn, New York, Giddins graduated from Grinnell College in Iowa, and the following year began working as a freelance writer. In 1973, he joined *the Village Voice*, and a year later introduced his column "Weather Bird," which he ended in December 2003, closing a 30-year run during which he received international recognition and won many prizes, including an unparalleled six ASCAP Deems Taylor Awards for Excellence in Music Criticism. Giddins' writings on music, books, and movies have appeared in *The New York Times*, *The New Yorker*, *Esquire*, *The Atlantic*, *Grand Street*, *The Nation*, and many other publications. He presently writes columns about music for *Jazz Times* and about film for *the New York Sun*. His first book, *Riding on a Blue Note*, appeared in 1981, and was followed by *Rhythm-a-Ning*, *Faces in the Crowd*, and critical biographies of Charlie Parker and Louis Armstrong that he adapted into documentary films for PBS; he won a Peabody award for writing the PBS documentary, *John Hammond: From Bessie Smith to Bruce Springsteen*. He has been nominated three times for Grammy Awards, and won in 1987 for his liner notes to *Sinatra: The Voice*.

Helen F. Ladd is the Edgar Thompson Professor of Public Policy Studies and professor of economics at Duke University. Prior to 1986, she taught at Dartmouth College, Wellesley College, and at Harvard University, first in the City and Regional Planning Program and then in the Kennedy School of Government. She graduated with a BA degree from Wellesley College in 1967, received a master's degree from the London School of Economics in 1968, and earned her PhD in economics from Harvard University in 1974. Most of her current research focuses on education policy. Most recently, she has co-edited *The Handbook of Research in Education Finance and Policy (2008)*, and co-authored (with Edward Fiske) *Elusive Equity: Education Reform in Post-Apartheid South Africa (Brookings Institution, 2004 and HSRC Press in paperback, 2005*). She is also the editor of *Holding Schools Accountable: Performance-Based Reform in Education (Brookings Institution, 1996)* and the coauthor (with Edward Fiske) of *When Schools Compete: A Cautionary Tale (Brookings Institution, 2000)* which draws lessons for the US from New Zealand.

Bob Blumenthal began his career as a jazz critic in 1969 for *Boston After Dark*, later known as *The Boston Phoeni*x, while in college, and continued to contribute to that paper through 1989. After serving as guest critic for *The Boston Globe* during its jazz festival for a decade, he became a regular Globe contributor in 1990 and a weekly columnist in 1993, and continued in both roles until 2002. Throughout these years, during which he worked as an attorney, primarily for the Massachusetts Department of Education, Blumenthal was also contributing to such publications as *The Atlantic Monthly*, *Rolling Stone*, *The Village Voice*, *Down Beat* and *JazzTimes*, and writing numerous album notes. He also provided radio and television commentary and served as a panelist for the National Jazz Service Organization, the New England Foundation for the Arts, and the Jazz Composers Alliance. He also received Grammy awards for best album notes in 1999 for *Coltrane: The Classic Quartet/Complete Impulse!*.

Christine Southworth, through her work with robots and automated music systems as co-founder and Director of Ensemble Robot, is making groundbreaking music based on the interaction between science, technology and creativity. Employing sounds from man and nature, from Van de Graaff Generator to honeybees, Balinese gamelan to seizmic data from volcanos, Southworth is introducing a brand new genre of music to Boston, born out of the areas complex community of scientists and artists. Southworth received a B.S. from MIT in 2002 in mathematics and music and M.A. in Computer Music & Multimedia Composition from Brown University in 2006. She composes for Western ensembles, Balinese gamelan, and mixed ensembles of gamelan, western instruments, electronics, and robots. Her compositions draw from her interests in modern American and European music, jazz, Balinese music, and rock and roll, and have received awards and recognition from the LEF Foundation, American Composers Forum, Meet the Composer, New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA), the MIT Eloranta Fellowship, and Bang on a Can. Her music has been played throughout the U.S., Europe, and Indonesia by ensembles including Gamelan Galak Tika, the Calder Quartet, and Ensemble Robot.

Mary Kelley helps organizations, cities and towns with strategic planning and project design/implementation. She brings years of professional experience in leadership positions in the performing arts in New York City and New England including eleven years as Executive Director of the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency supporting cultural organizations, artists and schools in the Commonwealth. Mary previously served as the founding Executive Director of The Music Hall in Portsmouth NH; Director of Marketing and General Manager of The Big Apple Circus; and Production Associate at Warner Theatre Productions which produced or co produced 22 Broadway and off-Broadway productions. For Tom Field Associates, Mary created the Westbeth Theatre Center in New York from the old Bell Sound Laboratories on Bank Street in New York. From incorporation of the Center to hiring the theatre architect and designer, she oversaw the operations of this Off-Off Broadway theatre complex during its formative years. She was General Manager at the Williamstown Theatre Festival and ETC Theatre Company. She also served as New York State Director of Hands Across America, a project of USA for Africa and managed the South American tour of EVITA.

David Grant assumed executive leadership of the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation in 1998. He is responsible for development and evaluation of programs in the Foundation's major areas of giving: education, the environment, and the arts in New Jersey, as well as the Foundation's major initiatives: Poetry, technical assistance to non-profit organizations, and Sustainable Morristown. David spent his professional career before Dodge as an educator. In 1983 he and his wife, Nancy Boyd Grant, co-founded The Mountain School of Milton Academy, a semester-long, interdisciplinary environmental studies program in Vermont for high school juniors. From 1994 to 1998 David was a national consultant to schools and leader of workshops on topics of curriculum and program design, professional development, assessment practices and school climate. His public service includes having been town moderator of Vershire, Vermont and a board member of the Vermont Council for the Humanities. He served as chair of the Board of the Council of New Jersey Grantmakers from 2006 to 2008 and is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the Surdna Foundation in New York City. Davids avocation since 1976 has been performing as Mark Twain in a one-man theatrical show, including, in 1982, a performing/lecture tour around the world.

Marla Miller's primary research interest is U.S. women's work before industrialization. Her book, The Needle's Eye: Women and Work in the Age of Revolution, appeared from the University of Massachusetts Press in August 2006, and won the Costume Society of America's Millia Davenport Publication Award for the best book in the field for that year. Related articles have appeared in the New England Quarterly (1998), the proceedings of the Dublin Seminar on New England Folklife (2000), and the William and Mary Quarterly (2003). She is presently completing work on a microhistory of women and work in Federal Massachusetts, and diving into a new project that she is especially excited about: a scholarly biography of that most-misunderstood early American craftswoman, Betsy Ross. As Director of the History Department's Public History program, Marla also teaches courses in Public History, American Material Culture, and Museum and Historic Site Interpretation, and continues to consult with a wide variety of museums and historic sites.