Megan McClelland is an Associate Professor in Human Development and Family Sciences at Oregon State University where she serves as Director of the Healthy Development in Early Childhood Research Core at the Hallie Ford Center for Healthy Children and Families. Her research focuses on school readiness including links between self-regulation and academic achievement from early childhood to adulthood, recent advances in measuring self-regulation, and intervention efforts to improve these skills in young children. She is currently conducting a 4-year federally-funded project to develop a measure of self-regulation, and a large intervention trial to improve school readiness and promote healthy development in young children.

In his current position as president and CEO of the Smarter Learning Group, a national education consulting firm, Ron Fairchild helps cities and communities identify proven solutions and strategies to improve public education. Prior to starting the firm, Ron served as the founding CEO of the National Summer Learning Association. He was also executive director of its predecessor organization, the National Center for Summer Learning at Johns Hopkins University from 2002 through 2009.

Under Ron’s leadership, the organization grew from a local program to a national intermediary organization working with a 50-state network of more than 5,000 summer learning providers that collectively serve more than 2 million children and young people annually. His earlier positions as the director of education programs for the Boys & Girls Clubs of America and as education associate with the Public Education Network helped him see the breadth of organizations that could provide wonderful learning opportunities for children.

Laura Porter currently serves as the Director of ACE Partnerships for Washington State’s largest agency: the Department of Social and Health Services. She works with state managers and community leaders to embed ACE study findings and related neuroscience and resilience findings into policy, practice and community norms.

For seventeen years, Laura was Staff Director for the Washington State Family Policy Council. She worked with an extensive set of partners from seven state agencies, fifty three community collaboratives and thousands of residents to develop a unique model for improving the capacity of communities to improve child, family and community life. Using this model, communities align and leverage resources and generate more impactful strategies. Communities using the model have documented reductions in the rates of seven major social problems and adverse childhood experience prevalence among young adults. Cost savings from caseload reductions attributable to the Family Policy Council in child welfare, juvenile justice and public medical costs associated with births to teen mothers alone exceed $55m/biennium.

For managing a complex system that delivers stunning results for a small investment, Laura won the Governor’s Award for Leadership in Management in 2011.

Jim Gill is a musician and author with unique credentials among children's artists. Jim is a child development specialist, completing his graduate studies in child development at the Erikson Institute of Chicago with a special emphasis on the study of play. For this reason, each of Jim's recordings and books is created as an opportunity for playful interactions between a child and a caring adult.

Jim has released six award-winning CDs of music play for young children that are favorites in family rooms, classrooms and playrooms. Jim is also the author of two children's books. His latest, A Soup Opera, is a sing-along opera inspired by concerts that Jim performs with symphony orchestras. The book received an American Library Association award in 2010.

Over the years Jim has shared his expertise and ideas on music, play and literacy with organizations such as Head Start, The National Association for the Education of Young Children, The National Association for Family Child Care and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.