Speakers

Keynote Speaker

Jennifer Chang

Senior Biden-Harris Administration Appointee, Former Chief of Staff at National Endowment for the Arts

Jenn Chang joined the Biden Administration in January 2021, serving as the White House Liaison and Senior Advisor to the Chair and subsequently the Chief of Staff at the National Endowment for the Arts. In these roles, she helped advance equity and inclusion, health and well-being, social cohesion, and civic engagement through the arts. As the NEA’s primary partner to the White House, she worked with the Domestic Policy Council on an all-of-government arts and culture integration strategy and with the Office of Presidential Personnel on political appointments. She recruited and onboarded 11 new members of the National Council on the Arts, the NEA’s Senate-confirmed governing board. She was a lead designer of the NEA’s American Rescue Plan grant program, which distributed $135 million to organizations nationwide during the COVID-19 pandemic. She was instrumental in creating the NEA’s flagship Summit on arts integration policy, co-hosted with the White House, called “Healing, Bridging, Thriving: the Arts and Culture in Our Communities.” She also was a lead designer of ArtsHERE, the NEA’s first equity-focused grant program, in partnership with the six Regional Arts Organizations.

Inclusive Education

Rahajeng Amaragati

Founder and Executive Director of Semesta Asa Indonesia

Rahajeng Amaragati Aryono (Rara) is a social innovation enthusiast with over five years of experience in youth engagement and community development. As the Founder & Executive Director of Semesta Asa Indonesia, a Jakarta-based non-profit, Rahajeng works to empower marginalized youth through fun and meaningful learning initiatives that equip them to become community leaders and global citizens. Her work at Semesta Asa Indonesia has been recognized by Kolaboraya as one of Indonesia’s 100 social innovation creators. Currently, she also works with Pijar Foundation to foster inclusive dialogues between youth and policymakers and to support grassroots initiatives through the Townhall Muda program. Additionally, Rahajeng contributed to the UN Association Indonesia’s efforts to bring the SDGs to youth across Indonesia.

Richard Ingram

Inclusive Education Specialist, Consultant for UNESCO, UNICEF, World Bank

Richard Ingram is an international inclusive education specialist and has worked as a consultant for UNESCO, IIEP-UNESCO, UNICEF, and the World Bank. He has worked closely with Ministries of Education in several countries in Southern Africa and the Middle East to build capacity on the use of systems thinking to tackle complex issues surrounding inclusion in education. Richard is based at the University of Exeter where he is part of the SENDIN research centre. Prior to this, he was a teacher in the UK and in Kenya. Richard is the creator and host of Goal 4: Education for All, a podcast about education and inclusion.

Sumbul Siddiqui

Cambridge City Councilor and Former Mayor

Councilor Sumbul Siddiqui (she/her) is serving her fourth term on the Cambridge City Council and previously served two terms as Mayor (2020–2024), making history as the first Muslim mayor in Massachusetts and the first woman to serve two consecutive terms in Cambridge. Born in Karachi, Pakistan, she immigrated to the U.S. as a child and grew up in Cambridge affordable housing. A graduate of Cambridge Rindge and Latin, Brown University, and Northwestern’s Pritzker School of Law, she returned to Cambridge as a legal aid attorney before entering public service.

Throughout her tenure, Councillor Siddiqui has championed community-centered policies, leading efforts to expand affordable housing, increase funding for legal services, and advance key zoning reforms like the Affordable Housing Overlay and the Multifamily Housing Ordinance. As mayor, she launched Cambridge RISE, a $22 million guaranteed income program, and created the Mayor’s Disaster Relief Fund, raising over $5 million during the pandemic. She also championed free preschool for all four-year-olds and established an Early College Program to help high school students earn free college credits.

Tabinda Mazhar

Head of Education for the MENA region at Cambridge University Press & Assessment

Tabinda Mazhar serves as the Head of Education for the MENA region at Cambridge University Press & Assessment. With over 23 years of experience in education and 9 years in Cambridge, she has developed and implemented strategies for teacher professional development across a vast network of schools in Pakistan and MENA countries. Her work spans diverse educational contexts, focusing on school improvement and leadership.

Before joining Cambridge, Tabinda spent 14 years at one of the largest school systems in Pakistan, where she began her career as an English teacher and later held various leadership roles in academics incl. curriculum, Edtech and Teacher Professional development. Tabinda is passionate about advancing education through teacher training, and she leads a vibrant network of over 300 program leaders for Cambridge PDQs in Pakistan, which she now intends to expand to MENA.

Tabinda is particularly interested in exploring leadership at all levels—teaching, school leadership, and educational policy—to drive meaningful change in schools globally. In 2018, Tabinda became a Chevening scholar and completed her M. Phil in Educational Leadership and School Improvement from the University of Cambridge.

Wellness Education

Dr. Cory Owen

Dean Of Students at Yale-NUS College

Dr. Cory Owen is an internationally recognized educator with extensive experience in international education, mental health, and student support. She currently serves as the Dean of Students at Yale-NUS College in Singapore.

Dr. Owen's academic background includes a Doctor of Education in Higher Education Administration and Supervision from the University of Houston, a Master of Arts in Literature from the University of Houston-Clear Lake, and a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature from Texas A&M University. She has contributed significantly to the field through her publications, including chapters on supporting international students with mental health concerns.

Her professional experience also includes being a Fulbright Scholar, participating in the International Education Administrators Program in both Germany and Korea. Dr. Owen is known for her engaging and passionate approach to education, frequently conducting workshops and training sessions on topics like cross-cultural communication, mental health support, and diversity and inclusion.

Doreen Li

Instructional Designer at NAADAC, the Association for Addiction Professionals

Doreen (Yiheng) Li is an instructional designer and a recent graduate of the Learning Design, Innovation, and Technology (LDIT) master's program at HGSE (Class of 23’). She is originally from Guangzhou, China and is now based in Nashville, TN. In her current role, she designs and develops self-paced and instructor-led continuing education programs for addiction professionals across the U.S. and internationally.

Doreen holds an undergraduate degree from Vanderbilt University in child development and public health, and she brings a diverse background in early childhood education and nonprofit work. She was previously on a pre-nursing track and has hands-on volunteer experience in healthcare, including roles in a pediatric ER, ICU, and with Vanderbilt’s LifeFlight EMS, where she served as a certified Emergency Medical Responder (EMR) in Tennessee.

As the only foreign employee at her current organization, Doreen is a strong advocate for integrating cultural humility and responsiveness into educational experiences. Though no longer in a clinical setting, she remains deeply committed to supporting frontline healthcare providers through high-quality, inclusive training that reflects the diverse communities they serve.

Glen K Koh

Associate at SingHealth Duke-NUS Global Health Institute

Glen K Koh (he/him) works with Global Mental Health Programme of the SingHealth Duke-NUS Global Health Institute, which also hosts the Asia Hub of the Mental Health Innovation Network. He holds an MPH from Johns Hopkins University with a concentration in Social and Behavioural Sciences. In 2024, Glen was selected as an ASEAN-Australia Youth Mental Health Fellow by Orygen Global, in partnership with the Australian Government. He is passionate about improving youth mental health and suicide prevention through health education, health policy, and implementation science.

Jessica Baynes

Dancer, Choreographer, Educator & Founder of Healing in Motion Dance

Jessica Baynes is a dance artist and educator based in Cambridge, MA, USA. A TEDx speaker and graduate student at Harvard University, Jessica is a passionate advocate for dance and its role in community. Baynes trained at San Diego School of Creative and Performing Arts and went on to earn her BFA in Modern Dance at the University of Utah. Jessica has performed traditional modern dance works such as "Rainbow 'Round My Shoulder" by Donald McKayle and "Psalm" by José Limón, and has performed contemporary repertoire such as "SURGE" by Anouk van Dijk and “r3gla tr3s” by Omar Carrum for International Contemporary Dance Festival of Mexico City (FICDMX).

Baynes founded Healing in Motion Dance, an organization that provides rehabilitative ballet classes to patients with neurological conditions such as Multiple Sclerosis, stroke, and Parkinson's disease. Jessica's work in dance adaptability and diplomacy have been featured and funded by organizations such as TED.com, National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), United Nations Civil Society, International Association for Dance Medicine and Science (IADMS), and National Dance Education Organization (NDEO).

Baynes currently advises multiple dance education organizations including Movement Exchange, a nonprofit that offers weekly dance programming for children and adolescents in orphanages and foster youth programs in North and Central America.

EdTech/Social Entrepreneurship

Ian Zhu

Founder of SchoolJoy

Ian founded SchoolJoy to empower every student to feel seen for who they are and who they aspire to be. As an immigrant, he experienced firsthand the challenge of feeling invisible in the classroom. He wanted the adults to know that he was capable of so much more despite his language barriers. What made Ian realize that skills mattered as much as grades was his decade-long journey in enterprise software and consulting. The constant factor across every project was the need for durable skills like communication, critical thinking, problem-solving, and collaboration. His personal and professional experiences evolved into a deeply rooted conviction that our traditional classrooms have a unique opportunity through AI to adapt to real-world environments and better prepare students for an increasingly dynamic future. Every child deserves to feel seen and pursue an education that is relevant to their own future. SchoolJoy has grown to serve more than 100,000 learners and thousands of teachers. Recently, SchoolJoy pioneered an application of voice AI technology that enables competency-based assessment at scale across every classroom. Through partnerships with leading higher education research institutions, SchoolJoy delivers an evidence-based framework for developing durable skills, which is currently piloting with premier competency-based institutions in both K-12 and higher education.

Peter Niu

Senior Product Manager, Upbeat (Education)

Peter Niu is a seasoned product leader with over 15 years of experience in designing, launching, and scaling innovative learning solutions globally. His expertise spans educational media, in-person enrichment programs, and digital applications for PreK-12 education. Most recently, Peter led product management at Teach Upbeat, an EdTech company focused on improving school staff retention through research-driven insights and leadership coaching.

With a deep commitment to creating engaging, effective, and accessible learning experiences, Peter has developed solutions that support diverse student populations in Europe, China, and the United States. His global perspective is informed by his international background, having lived and worked in multiple countries since a young age. Peter holds a Bachelor of Science in Economics from the London School of Economics and Political Science and a Master of Education from Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Dr. Yuh-sien Wu

Co-founder of Veritas Education and BranchOut!

Dr. Yuhsien Wu is an entrepreneur and the co-founder of two organizations, Veritas Education and BranchOut!, with offices in Boston, MA, Washington, DC, and Princeton, NJ. Dr. Wu has held significant leadership positions, including serving on the board of directors for the Harvard Asian American Alumni Alliance (H4A) and acting as the chair of the H4A-DC Chapter. Additionally, she co-chairs the Harvard Graduate School of Education alumni ambassador program in the Washington, D.C. area. As a dedicated educator, Dr. Wu has been invited to speak at numerous conferences associated with Harvard, MIT, and other nonprofit and industry organizations. Her presentations cover topics such as international education, race relations in America, and mental wellness. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she presented at Deutsche Bank and Fannie Mae, addressing the issue of racial aggression targeting minority groups. Furthermore, she shared strategies for Asian American professionals to overcome the "bamboo ceiling" at a seminar hosted by the American International Group (AIG). Dr. Wu's commitment to public service is evident in her media appearances, including a segment on Virginia Delegate Kenneth R. Plum’s television program, Virginia Report, where she emphasized the importance of civic engagement.

International Education in South East Asia

Dr. Teresita Cruz-del Rosario

Research Associate, Asia Research Institute, International Policy Expert, Asian Development Bank

Dr. Teresita Cruz-del Rosario was formerly a Visiting Associate Professor at the New York University in Abu Dhabi and also at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. She is currently affiliated with the Asia Research Institute at the National University of Singapore where she is a research associate. She has a background in Sociology, Social Anthropology and Public Administration from Boston College, New York University, Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard University Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Currently, she is pursuing a Masters in Liberal Arts with a concentration on Literary Studies and Creative Writing at the University of Chicago.

Titus Yong

Dept of Strategy and Policy, National University of Singapore; Council, Singapore Kindness Movement

Titus Yong (EdM 2003) teaches and supervises undergraduates and MBAs at the National University of Singapore (NUS Department of Strategy and Policy) and is an advisor to the NUS Entrepreneurship Society. He has served as a trainer to management teams at multinational corporations such as Microsoft and Unilever, and schools across ten countries in Asia Pacific and South Asia. He has been an entrepreneur/CEO and investor to a range of educational enterprises.

He is an expert contributor to the "Encyclopaedia of Creativity, Invention, Innovation and Entrepreneurship" (Springer) and a co-author of "88 Essential Secrets for Achieving Greater Success at Work" (Marshall Cavendish). He is grateful to be honored with the Indira India "Excellence in Innovation" award in Mumbai.

Titus serves on the Council of Singapore Kindness Movement, and previously as the Vice President of the Harvard University Association of Alumni in Singapore and Treasurer for Asia Professional Speakers-Singapore. During his tenure as Chairperson of the Harvard Prize Book (Singapore), he spearheaded a change in criteria to a set of character-based considerations that prioritize societal well-being, i.e. sustained caring behavior, kindness and service leadership. Titus has been certified in positive psychology, where he shares about human flourishing, team performance & character values at social enterprises, government and family communities.

Resettlement Education

Casey Lartigue

Co-Founder, Freedom Speakers International (FSI)

Casey Lartigue, Ed.M.'91, is the chairman and co-founder of Freedom Speakers International in Seoul, Korea. Lartigue, also the co-country director of Giving Tuesday Korea, lectures in public speaking at Seoul University of Foreign Studies, and is a columnist with the Korea Times. His writing has been featured in USA Today and the Washington Post, and he’s won several awards, including being named a Seoul Honorary Citizen in 2022. An author and editor, he co-wrote Greenlight to Freedom: A North Korean Daughter's Search for Her Mother and Herself with North Korean refugee Songmi Han and co-edited Escape from North Korea, New Beginnings in South Korea: 20 North Korean Refugees Reflect on the Hanawon Resettlement Center with FSI co-founder Eunkoo Lee.

HaYoun Noh

HCI Researcher at MIT Media Lab & Yonsei University; PhD Candidate at the University of Oxford

HaYoun Noh is a third-year Ph.D. candidate in the Human-Centered AI group at the University of Oxford's Department of Computer Science, co-advised by Professor Max Van Kleek (Oxford) and Professor Younah Kang (Yonsei University). In addition to her doctoral work, she is a Research Affiliate at the MIT Media Lab's Tangible Media Group and a full-time HCI researcher at Yonsei University, where she leads a government-funded research project.

Her research sits at the intersection of technology and mental health, with a focus on how social technologies can be redesigned to better support underrepresented individuals undergoing life transitions. She explores ways these technologies can be reconfigured to help users reclaim control over self-presentation and privacy in an increasingly hyper-mediated world. Hayoun is also passionate about designing technologies that encourage pause and reflection, helping people navigate the complexities of modern life while fostering a deeper appreciation for meaningful experiences.

Arts and Culture

Agnes Hjalmarsson

Artist / Oil Painter

Agnes Hjalmarsson (Helsingborg, 2002) is a Swedish oil painter known for her autobiographical exploration of identity, culture and relationships. Being the daughter of a Korean adoptee, her work frequently honors and questions concepts like cultural appropriation, ethnic currency, and the complexities of living between cultures. For instance, her exhibition "Made in Sweden" visualises the dissonance between her Korean heritage and Swedish upbringing by using ironic exaggerations and stereotypes. Personal identity and how it is influenced by external perceptions will continue being a central theme in her upcoming exhibitions and journey as a full time artist

Echo Liu

Founder & CEO at “Yes! And…” & Teaching Artist

Echo Liu is the founder and CEO of Yes! And… Education, an organization dedicated to cultivating youth soft skills through arts-based learning. She holds a Master’s degree in Educational Leadership, Entrepreneurship, and Organizations from Harvard University, and a Master’s in Educational Theatre from New York University. She completed her undergraduate studies in Theater with a minor in Education at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

An accomplished playwright and director, Echo’s artistic work includes the original physical theater piece All About Love, which was performed at Lincoln Center in New York. Echo is also a passionate theater educator and teaching artist, with over five years of experience working across private international schools in Beijing and public schools in New York and Boston. Her deep commitment to theater education is reflected in her dual roles as a school-based drama teacher and a community-based teaching artist. She has designed and facilitated bilingual drama programs, workshops, and camps for diverse age groups, and has directed numerous youth-centered productions that empower young people to find their voice through the performing arts.

Julie Kim

VIP Relations at Frieze

Julie joined Frieze in 2024 as Senior VIP Relations Manager, where she leads the development and execution of strategies to cultivate relationships with top galleries, artists, private collectors, and institutional leaders across the Americas, contributing to the success of Frieze fairs in Seoul, London, New York, and LA. She is particularly committed to elevating underrepresented artists of the Asian diaspora, bridging the East and West, and fostering diversity within the art world.

With extensive experience in private sales and client development in both the auction and gallery sectors, Julie previously served as a Specialist in Modern & Contemporary Art at Phillips, where she nurtured relationships with top collectors and curated exhibitions across the U.S. She has also held roles at Sotheby’s and Gagosian Gallery, where she was instrumental in founding the Young Collectors groups. Julie holds a degree in Art History and Economics from Boston College and is the founder of the Young Patrons Board at the Misty Copeland Foundation.

Dr. Yanyun Chen

Past Lecturer and Professor at Tufts SMFA and Yale-NUS College

Dr. Yanyun Chen is an artist drawn to stories that write us, which are written onto and into our bodies; and in turn, the re-writing of these stories through drawing, animation, installation, and sculpture. She traces hurt, grief, wilt, and scars, parses time’s slow violence on botanical and human bodies, and untangles tenuous social constructs around womanhood and upbringing.

These scars that we carry in our bodies, are they marks of progress or burdens of histories?

Her practice wrestles with and casts doubt on traditions in form, method, and subject: on one hand, traditions are celebrated as markers for identity, and as ways of honouring existing value systems and intergenerational lineage; on the other hand, traditions are also limitations, boundaries, and social barriers.

Her practice hopes to honour the scars carried in our bodies.

Chen has exhibited internationally, and been the recipient of prestigious awards including the Singapore National Arts Council Young Artist Award (2020), ArtOutreach IMPART Visual Artist Award (2019), and SAM President’s Young Talents People’s Choice Award (2018), Chen’s works can be found in private and corporate collections. Chen holds a PhD from the European Graduate School, an MA in Communications, and a BFA in Animation. She was previously a Professor of the Practice at SMFA Tufts University, Boston, and Lecturer at Yale-NUS College in Singapore.

US K-12 Education Leadership

Richard Chang

Head of School at Josiah Quincy Upper School

Richard is the current headmaster of Josiah Quincy Upper School, a Boston public pilot school (grades 6-12) providing International Baccalaureate Middle Years and Diploma Programmes for all students. He has been serving the school for 19 years and is also the recipient of the US News & World Report "Best High Schools" Gold & Silver Medals (2015-2018) and the Washington Post "Most Challenging School" recognition (2015-2018).

Wilmer Chavarria

Superintendent of Winooski School District

Wilmer draws from a diverse professional background, much of which reflects our own realities and assets in the district. Immediately prior to serving as the superintendent of Winooski, he served as the Director of Equity and Education Support Systems for the Milton Town School District where he carried out in-depth assessments of systems of support for students and the creation of a robust and comprehensive framework for alignment and strengthening of systems across schools. He also championed district efforts in the creation of a system-level equity strategy, roadmap, and guiding policy to ensure long-term impact beyond isolated initiatives within the schools.

Fireside Chat

Melissa Q. Teng

Design Research Lead at Design Studio for Social Intervention (ds4si)

Melissa Q. Teng is a public artist, designer, and writer based in Boston, MA. She is the Design Research Lead at the Design Studio for Social Intervention (ds4si), where the team is exploring how public spaces can be designed to welcome a sense of public life and aliveness. Her art practice often collaboratively explores community displacement and belonging, with a particular focus on housing, homelessness, and prisons. Melissa was previously an artist-in-residence at the City of Boston's Mayor's Office of Arts & Culture looking at how government workers and artists can work together bravely.

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