Richard D. Brecht, Harvard University Ph.D., has five decades of leadership in language research and policy across academe, government, heritage and Native American communities, private business and NGOs. As a social entrepreneur, he has been a founder and leader of more than a dozen national language organizations and projects, including American Councils for International Education, National Foreign Language Center, National Councils of Less Commonly Taught Language, Center for Advanced Language Study (now part of UM Applied Research Laboratory for Intelligence and Security), and American Councils Research Center. Brecht has lectured nationally and internationally and authored and edited dozens of scholarly books, textbooks, manuals, and articles on language policy and second language acquisition, as well as Slavic and Russian linguistics. He has been a principal in convening major public discussions on language in the United States and abroad, which have galvanized collaboration across education, industry, government, heritage and Native American communities, NGOs, national academies worldwide, and organizations and institutions abroad. Dr. Brecht has testified multiple times in Congress before committees in the House and Senate. Currently, he is co-founder and chief language officer of Jeenie®, a company that provides on-demand supportive interpretation globally. Having authored one of the briefing papers for the AAAS Commission on language education, “America’s Languages”, he served as Project Director for the Mellon Foundation-funded America’s Languages Initiative. Finally, Dr. Brecht has received numerous awards from national and international organizations in the language field.

Anthony Jackson led Asia Society’s Center for Global Education, where he oversaw the Center’s multi-faceted approach to enable all students to graduate high school prepared for college, for work in the global economy, and for 21st century global citizenship. During his tenure, he directed the International Studies Schools Network, a network of over 35 globally focused schools around the United States, the China Learning Initiative which provided national leadership to support learning of Chinese language and culture, and the Global Cities Education Network, a learning community of high performing Asian and North American urban school districts dedicated to solving common high priority problems of practice and policy.

Trained in both developmental psychology and education, Jackson was one of the nation’s leading experts on secondary school reform and adolescent development. He directed the Carnegie Corporation’s Task Force on the Education of Young Adolescents which produced the ground breaking report Turning Points: Educating Adolescents in the 21st Century, and co-authored the seminal follow-up blueprint Turning Points 2000 on secondary school reform. His most recent work is the 2nd edition of Educating for Global Competence: Preparing Our Youth to Engage the World. Jackson holds a Ph.D in Education and Psychology from the University of Michigan.

Verónica Boix-Mansilla is a Senior Principal Investigator at Project Zero, Harvard Graduate School of Education. An international expert on global and intercultural education, her research examines conditions that enable individuals to understand and take action on the most pressing issues of our times, from human migration to environmental stewardship.  Frameworks and practical tools developed through her research have set the foundations for quality interdisciplinary, global, and intercultural education high impact institutions including AFS International, Asia Society, Harvard Project Zero, International Baccalaureate, National Academy of Sciences, National Gallery of Art, OECD, Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, and the Smithsonian Institution among others. Her work has advanced district-level global competence innovations in contexts such as Portland, DC, and Buenos Aires public schools.

Dr. Boix Mansilla co-authored Educating for Global Competence Preparing our students to engage the world, with Tony Jackson (First and Second Edition); Big Picture Thinking: How to educate the whole person for an interconnected world, with Andreas Schleicher; and Educating for Global Competence in Chinese Schools, with Devon Wilson (forthcoming).  She serves on various boards and has received multiple awards including a Doctorate Honoris Causa from the International University of Catalunya.

Akash Patel is the Founder of Happy World Foundation Inc., an international nonprofit organization that promotes global citizenship education in schools and communities worldwide. In 2018, Patel, a Spanish and Mathematics teacher with Dallas ISD, was selected as a Top 50 finalist from over 30,000 teachers for the Global Teacher Prize, a $1 million award that is granted annually to one teacher who has made an outstanding contribution to the profession. In 2020, Patel was elected to the National Council of the United Nations Association of the United States of America (UNA-USA) to serve the 2020-2024 term. He was also appointed as the chair of the Global Engagement Summit, the largest gathering of American grassroots changemakers and global activists in the General Assembly Hall at the United Nations and the chair of the UNA-USA Educators Affinity group that helps educators from across the United States champion the Sustainable Development Goals in their classrooms. In 2021, Patel was inducted in the International Literacy Association’s 30 Literacy Leaders Under 30 list, elected as the first polyglot immigrant President of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL). In 2022, Patel was featured as TIME’s Innovative Educator of the Year and elected Vice-Chairman of the National Council at UNA-USA. Patel is a recipient ofseveral national and international honors for his work with anti-bias global education. He speaks six languages and has traveled to over 50 countries.

Jing Tsu is a cultural historian and literary scholar of modern China, and has written for The New York Times, The New York Times Book Review, and Financial Times. The first tenured professor appointed in East Asian Languages and Literature and Comparative Literature, her research spans literature, linguistics, science and technology, internationalization, regionalism and globalization, and US-China relations. She is a member and former Chair (2014-2021) of the Council on East Asian Studies, Senior Research Fellow at the MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies, and Faculty (by courtesy appointment) at the Jackson Institute for Global Affairs.  In spring 2023, she is delivering the William Clyde DeVane lectures for Yale, entitled "China in Six Keys."

Tsu is author of five books (two co-edited).  Her new book, Kingdom of Characters: The Language Revolution That Made China Modern (Riverhead, 2022), has been named among the "100 Notable Books of 2022" by The New York Times and among the twelve "Best Nonfiction of 2022" by The Washington Post.  It has been reviewed widely in the U.S. and U.K: The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, The New Yorker, The Economist, Wired, Science, Nature, Physics World, The Times, The Spectator, The Telegraph, The Guardian, Times Literary Supplement, London Review of Books, South China Morning Post (Hong Kong), NRC (The Netherlands), Frankfurter Allgemeine (Germany), among others. The book tells the dramatic story of how China and its language entered the information age dominated by the western alphabet.

Her first book, Failure, Nationalism, and Literature: The Making of Modern Chinese Identity, 1895-1937 (Stanford University Press 2005), was noted by critics as “bold,” “original,” “a provocative and innovative book that opens up new critical spaces,” and “a seriously good read.” Her second book, Sound and Script in Chinese Diaspora (Harvard University Press 2010), has been called “a truly groundbreaking work in Sinophone studies,” “an unusual, complex, and remarkable book,” “a captivating work of linguistic and literary scholarship,” and a “must-read.”

Tsu is widely recognized for her original approach, interdisciplinary synthesis and perspective on China. She has held numerous fellowships and honors: The Society of Fellows (Harvard), Woodrow Wilson Foundation, Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (Stanford), the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study (Harvard), New Directions Fellowship from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Institute for Advanced Study (Princeton), and John Simon Guggenheim Foundation.

At Yale, she has served on of the Executive Committee of the Whitney Humanities Center, the Executive Committee of the Humanities Program, the Executive Committee of Film & Media Studies Program, as well as the Provost's Advisory Committee on International Activities, the Humanities Planning Committee, Humanities Tenures & Appointments Committee, and the Provost's Standing Advisory Appointments Committee for the Arts Schools.

Andy Browne leads Brunswick’s China Hub, working closely with colleagues in China and globally, including the firm’s Geopolitical practice, to advise clients on China-related issues.

Prior to joining Brunswick, Andy ran the editorial program at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum, a platform set up by Michael Bloomberg, the three-term mayor of New York City, to connect CEOs and government leaders from emerging and developed economies.

Andy spent 35 years working in Asia, latterly as a China Editor and Columnist for the Wall Street Journal.

He started his career in journalism in 1982 at the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong, before moving to Reuters News Agency where he spent 20 years running news bureaus in Taipei, Shanghai, Beijing and Seoul, before becoming Asia Pacific News Editor in Singapore. Andy also spent two years as a Partner in Brunswick’s Beijing office between 2007 and 2009.

Andy won the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting in 2007 as part of a team of Wall Street Journal reporters in Beijing and shared an Overseas Press Club award for business reporting on China in 2011. Andy was also a guest commentator on NBC’s coverage of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics.
He received a BA in Chinese Language and Literature from the University of Leeds.

Christopher M. Livaccari is the Head of Presidio Knolls School in San Francisco, and an educator, author, and former U.S. diplomat who served in Tokyo and Shanghai as a Vice Consul, Deputy Press Attaché, and as Deputy Director of the Tokyo American Center. He was previously Director of Education & Senior Advisor in Asia Society’s Center for Global Education in New York, and Principal & Chinese Program Director at Silicon Valley International School in Palo Alto, California.

He is the author of New Ways of Seeing: How Multilingualism Opens Our Eyes and Trains Our Minds for a Complex World, and co-author of Structures of Mandarin Chinese for Speakers of English I & II, Chinese Language Learning in the Early Grades, and the Chinese for Tomorrow series, among many essays and articles on language, education, and culture.

Chris has been a featured speaker at the Aspen Ideas Festival, has spoken on language education at the British Museum in London, and was the recipient of the U.S. State Department’s Meritorious Honor Award, citing outstanding speeches written for two U.S. ambassadors to Japan.

As a Foreign Service Officer, Chris supported visits to Asia by two U.S. presidents, two secretaries of state, and multiple congressional delegations. As Director of Education and Chinese Language Initiatives at Asia Society, he created a partnership and exchange network of more than 200 schools across 28 U.S. states and 23 provinces in China that included almost 100,000 students.

Chris is a graduate of Columbia University, the University of Chicago, and New York University. In addition to modern and classical Chinese and Japanese, he has studied Korean, Sanskrit, Russian, Italian, Spanish, and many other languages.

Tim Shaw is an educational veteran with decades of experience in school management and instruction. He served as the principal of Meadow Brook Elementary School in Grand Rapids, MI, where he successfully led a diverse school with 500 students who spoke over 40 languages. 

Throughout his career, Shaw has worked tirelessly to create welcoming and inclusive learning environments. He helped build the innovative Mandarin Immersion Program for Kindergarten through 12th grade students, and helped build strong and welcoming learning communities where all families, students, and staff felt accepted and supported.

Dr. Zhongqi Shi is an accomplished researcher and leader in the field of Chinese language education, with a distinguished record of accomplishments. He earned his Ph.D. from Teachers College, Columbia University, and has since focused on advancing second language learning, instructional technology in education, and teaching Chinese for special purposes. With close to twenty years of experience teaching Chinese language and culture at Columbia, Dr. Shi has authored several textbooks that are widely used both in the United States and China. As associate director of Columbia’s Chinese program, Dr. Shi leads curriculum development and instructional innovation, ensuring that the program remains at the forefront of the field. Dr. Shi also serves as the Vice President of Chinese Language Teachers Association (USA), providing invaluable leadership and guidance to teachers nationwide. In addition, Dr. Shi directed Columbia’s Business Chinese and Internship program in Shanghai from 2008-2016, which provided students with a unique opportunity to immerse themselves in Chinese business culture while acquiring advanced language skills. 

Mrs. Wenjing Xie is the Founder and President of CLTA-AZ, a 501 (C)(3) non-profit organization for Chinese language teachers in Arizona.

Mrs. Xie is currently the DLI Program Coach at Chandler Unified School District of Arizona. Besides working with teachers to ensure program success through curriculum articulation and assessment, she organizes community events for the school to increase program visibility. She also works as a consultant and conducts DLI and Secondary School Professional Developments for school administrators and teachers.

Prior to her current position, she worked as an Outreach Curriculum Specialist for Chinese K-12 programs at Arizona State University from 2010-2019. She helped many public schools develop their Mandarin curricula, direct STEM summer camps, train teachers, and organize cultural events. She also served as Curriculum Manager for Arizona State University Chinese Flagship AP Linkages Program, a federally funded initiative for K-16 articulation in Chinese instruction; led the development of AP Chinese curriculum for AZ schools; and supervised outreach events to bridge the connection of ASU and K-12 schools.