Characters Unite

Eliza Byard is the Executive Director of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), a national education organization working to ensure safe schools for all students, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity/expression. Byard has become an increasingly visible figure in the national conversation on LGBT issues, speaking to a wide variety of audiences around the country and appearing on shows such as “World News with Charlie Gibson,” “The O’Reilly Factor,” “Buchanan & Press” and “60 Minutes.” In addition, she has produced award-winning projects for film and television including “Out of the Past,” “School Colors,” and “Genesis: A Living Conversation with Bill Moyers.” She received her PhD in United States History from Columbia University.

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An award-winning writer and academic, Melissa Harris-Perry is one of the leading lights of African American political and religious thought in the United States. Currently the Associate Professor of Politics and African American Studies at Princeton University, Professor Harris-Perry is a regular commentator on MSNBC, making appearances on such programs as “The Rachel Maddow Show” and “Countdown with Keith Olbermann.” In addition, she authored the book “Barbershops, Bibles, and BET: Everyday Talk and Black Political Thought,” and has contributed numerous pieces to publications such as The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times and Newsday. Her latest book, “Sister Citizen: A Text For Colored Girls Who’ve Considered Politics When Being Strong Wasn’t Enough,” will be published in 2011. She received her PhD in Political Science from Duke University.

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Attorney Wade Henderson is the president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights (LCCHR) and the counselor to the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights and Education Fund. Since taking the helm in 1996, Henderson has helped turn the LCCHR into the nation’s premier civil and human rights coalition. Prior to that, Henderson was the Washington Bureau director of the NAACP, and before that the associate director of the Washington national office of the ACLU. Well known for his expertise on a wide range of civil rights, civil liberties and human rights issues, and the author of numerous articles on civil rights and public policy issues, Henderson is considered one of the leading authorities on civil rights issues in America today. He is a graduate of Howard University and the Rutgers University School of Law.

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As the Director of Immigration and National Campaigns for the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), Clarissa Martinez De Castro has used her expertise in immigration legislative advocacy and strategy and the Latino electorate to help spotlight the issues facing the nation regarding illegal immigration and Latino politics. She has published numerous papers and is a regular contributor to the Huffington Post, and has also appeared on networks such as C-Span, MSNBC and FOX News. Martinez De Castro received her master’s degree in public administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

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Well-known and widely published, John McWhorter is a linguist, author and political commentator who has become a singular voice on cultural issues of race, language and ethnicity in America. McWhorter has garnered wide-spread acclaim for his writing, including the New York Times best seller “Losing the Race,” and his work in linguistics has appeared in such publications as The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post and The National Review. A lecturer at Columbia University and a Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute, McWhorter previously held the position of Associate Professor of Linguistics at UC Berkley after teaching at Cornell University. McWhorter received a PhD in linguistics from Stanford University.

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Named one of America’s Best Leaders of 2009 by US News & World Report, Eboo Patel is the founder and Executive Director of Interfaith Youth Core (IFYC), a Chicago-based nonprofit that promotes interfaith cooperation around the world. An accomplished author and scholar, Patel is known for his Washington Post blog The Faith Divide, and is a regular contributor to National Public Radio, USA Today and CNN. He has also authored several books, including “Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim, the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation,” and he served on President Obama’s Advisory Council of the White House Office of Faith Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. Patel holds a doctorate in the sociology of religion from Oxford University, where he studied on a Rhodes scholarship.

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Mark Potok is the director of publications and information for the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), one of the most highly regarded non-governmental operations monitoring hate groups and extremism in the world today, and is the editor of their investigative journal Intelligence Report. Potok has become an important spokesperson for the SPLC, speaking on issues of civil rights and extremism, and testifying before the U.S. Senate and the United Nations High Commission on Human Rights. In addition, Potok has appeared as a commentator on networks such as CNN, MSNBC and Fox News, and is frequently quoted by journalists and scholars in both the United States and abroad. Before joining the SPLC, Potok was an award-winning journalist, working for almost 20 years at such publications as USA Today, Dallas Times Herald and The Miami Herald. He is a graduate of the University of Chicago.

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