An inspiring and visionary educational leader, Alan founded the HOPE Foundation in 1989. He has created award-winning publications and video staff development programs, and he is the author of the best-selling book Failure Is Not an Option®: Six Principles That Guide Student Achievement in High-Performing Schools, which has been awarded “Book of the Year” by the National Staff Development Council (NSDC).

Pedro Noguera is the Peter L. Agnew Professor of Education at New York University. Noguera is an urban sociologist whose scholarship and research focuses on the ways in which schools are influenced by social and economic conditions in the urban environment.

Tom Guskey is an expert in evaluation design, analysis, and educational reform. He is an education consultant who has worked with educators in all 50 states, Europe, and Asia. He has served as Director of Research and Development for the Chicago Public Schools and as the first Director of the Center for the Improvement of Teaching and Learning, a national educational research center.

Jay is an accomplished author, having co-authored ten books, including the best-selling Understanding by Design series with Grant Wiggins. He has written more than thirty articles and book chapters, and has published in a number of leading journals, including Educational Leadership (ASCD) and The Developer (National Staff Development Council).

Michael Fullan is Professor Emeritus of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto. Recognized as a worldwide authority on educational reform, Michael is engaged in advising policymakers and local leaders around the world in helping to achieve the moral purpose of all children learning.

Carol Tomlinson's career as an educator includes 21 years as a public school teacher, 12 years as a program administrator of special services for struggling and advanced learners. She was Virginia's Teacher of the Year in 1974. More recently, she has been a faculty member at the University of Virginia's Curry School of Education, where she is currently William Clay Parrish Jr. Professor and Chair of Educational Leadership, Foundations, and Policy.

Ken has been an independent consultant from 1996 to the present. He has been a staff development presenter and facilitator on assessment, grading and reporting in 42 states and 9 Canadian provinces and 13 countries outside North America. His twenty-three year teaching career included experience as a geography teacher and department head in Scarborough, Ontario (1976-90) and teaching at four schools in Toronto and Melbourne, Australia (Grade 7-12) starting in 1967.

Linda Darling-Hammond is Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education at Stanford University where she has launched the Stanford Educational Leadership Institute and the School Redesign Network. She has also served as faculty sponsor for the Stanford Teacher Education Program. She is a former president of the American Educational Research Association and member of the National Academy of Education.

Allison Zmuda’s focus is to help every educator create a competent classroom—a learning environment where all participants believe it is possible for them to be successful—in which what teachers and students are expected to know and be able to do is challenging, feasible, and worthy of the attempt.

Harry and Rosemary Wong are teachers. Harry is a native of San Francisco and taught middle school and high school science. Rosemary is a native of New Orleans and taught K-8. Harry Wong has been called "Mr. Practicality" for his common sense, user-friendly, no-cost approach to managing a classroom for high-level student success. Over a million teachers worldwide have heard his message.

Willard R. Daggett, Ed.D., CEO of the International Center for Leadership in Education, is recognized worldwide for his proven ability to move education systems towards more rigorous and relevant skills and knowledge for all students. He has assisted a number of states and hundreds of school districts with their school improvement initiatives, many in response to No Child Left Behind and its demanding adequate yearly progress (AYP) provisions.

Ernest Morrell is an associate professor in the Urban Schooling division of the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at the University of California at Los Angeles. Prior to this appointment, Morrell served on the Teacher Education faculty at Michigan State University. His work examines the possible intersections between indigenous urban adolescent literacies and the "sanctioned" literacies of dominant institutions such as schools.

Billie Donegan has worked with numerous research/reform organizations in Smaller Learning Communities implementation. She has worked with SREB, the Career Academy Support Network at Berkeley, Johns Hopkins’ Talent Development High Schools and Freshman Success Academies, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, School and Main, Brown University, GMS Partners, and Performance Learning Systems.

Gayle Gregory, author and co-author of numerous publications for teachers and administrators, is an internationally known consultant who has specialized in brain compatible learning and differentiated instruction and assessment. Gayle presents practical teacher/student-friendly strategies grounded in sound research that educators find easy to use in the classroom or schoolhouse tomorrow.