Past Forward

Ricardo D. García serves as the Los Angeles County Public Defender, the first and largest public defender agency in the United States. He received his Juris Doctorate in 1995 from the University of California, Berkeley, Boalt Hall School of Law, and his Bachelor of Art in Politics in 1991 from the University of California, Santa Cruz. García started his legal career in 1995 with the San Diego Publ...

Kate Buckson serves as the library director of St. Charles Public Library in Illinois. She has worked in public libraries for over twenty years. Without Libraries was created to provide librarians a platform to share stories about education, discuss current programs, and consider life without libraries. Libraries provide access to information and educational resources, promoting literacy, critical...

Resa Mai is a hands-on public library Director in Illinois. She facilitates partnerships within her community and across the state to create engaging exciting programs.  Currently while negotiating a large library addition she is a Lions Club International Vice President and Management Mentor. She has been an active Library advocate since early elementary school when she fell in love with the Velv...

Enyce Smith , born in Los Angeles, CA, is a multi-talented creator whose work includes music, dance, choreography, filmography, and ballroom MC known in the scene as “King of the West Coast.” Enyce has been voguing in ballroom since the age of 18 and writing and publishing music tracks for more than 10 years. Currently, Enyce is a vogue instructor, ballroom MC, and Beyond the Runway documentary di...

Dale Minami is a partner with Minami Tamaki in San Francisco specializing in the area of Personal Injury for which he has been named a SuperLawyer in Northern California for each year from 2004 through 2017 and a Top Ten SuperLawyer for the last 5 years. He received a law degree at Berkeley Law during a formative time of anti-war, counterculture, civil rights, and ethnic studies movements in the S...

Dr. Ronald J. Rivera is an Assistant Clinical Professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of California, Irvine and the Associate Clerkship Director for emergency medicine rotations. He completed medical school at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine, and residency at SUNY Downstate / Kings County in Brooklyn, New York. After being elected to Chief of Education, he discov...

Dr. Mark Skousen , Ph. D., editor of Forecasts & Strategies, is a nationally known investment expert, economist, university professor and author of more than 25 books. In July 2018 Dr Skousen was awarded the inaugural Triple Crown in Economics for his work in economic theory, history and education, is known as “America’s Economist” and has been identified as one of the 20 most influential living e...

Mitchell Kaplan is best known for the creation of the Miami Book Fair International, the largest community book festival in the United States and a model for book fairs across the country. Kaplan began his working career as a high school English teacher. Two years after opening an independent bookstore, Books & Books, Kaplan, along with the Dade County Library and other independent bookstore owner...

Arianna Barrios has spent her life living, working, and volunteering in her hometown of Orang where she serves on the Orange City Council, representing the Old Towne Orange area of the City in District One. Today, Arianna lives and runs a small business in the City’s historic district as the owner of Communications LAB, a boutique Public Relations and Community Outreach firm that employs 11 commun...

Peggy Nagae received her A.B., cum laude, from Vassar College in East Asian Studies, a J.D. degree with honors from Northwestern School of Law at Lewis and Clark College, a M.A in Spiritual Psychology from the University of Santa Monica, and a Bachelor of Illumination Sciences from the Jwalan Muktikã School for Illumination. She has practiced law as a criminal and civil trial attorney, worked as d...

Nick Mott  is a journalist and podcast producer. His podcast work has received a Peabody and two National Edward R. Murrow Awards. His print and audio reporting has been published in the  Atlantic , NPR,  High Country News , and the  Washington Post , among many other outlets.  Justin Angle  is a professor and the Poe Family Distinguished Faculty Fellow at the University of Montana College of Busi...

Donald K. Tamaki received his BA, Phi Beta Kappa, from the University of California at Berkeley in 1973, and also received his JD from Berkeley in 1976. He is a Senior Counsel at Minami Tamaki LLP. Prior to January 1, 2021, he was the firm’s Managing Partner. From 1980 to 1983, he was Executive Director of the Asian Law Caucus in San Francisco, and served on the legal team which reopened the 1944...

John Vaillant ’s acclaimed, award-winning nonfiction books,  The Golden Spruce  and  The Tiger , were national bestsellers. His debut novel,  The Jaguar’s Children , was a finalist for the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and the International Dublin Literary Award. Vaillant has received the Governor General’s Literary Award, British Columbia’s National Award for Canadian Non-Fiction, the Windh...

Kirn Kim was a former honor student and son of a prominent physician in the Fullerton Korean community. However, at age 16, he was sentenced as an adult to life in prison as part of a high-profile case that became known as the “Honor Roll Murder.” He earned parole after serving 20 years. Kirn became active in justice reform advocacy, leading to his hiring as the first formerly-incarcerated employe...

Tarell Alvin McCraney is Artistic Director of Geffen Playhouse. In this role, he is responsible for identifying, developing, and programming new works and re-envisioned classics. He sets the strategic artistic course for the Geffen's Gil Cates and Audrey Skirball Kenis Theaters. McCraney is an award-winning writer, producer, and educator, best known for his acclaimed trilogy,  The Brother/Sister P...

Teresa Watanabe covers education for the Los Angeles Times. Since joining the Times in 1989, she has covered immigration, ethnic communities, religion, Pacific Rim business and served as Tokyo correspondent and bureau chief. She also covered Asia, national affairs and state government for the San Jose Mercury News and wrote editorials for the Los Angeles Herald Examiner. A Seattle native, she grad...

Judy Tzu-Chun Wu is a professor of Asian American Studies, the director of the Humanities Center, and the director of Center for Liberation, Anti-Racism, and Belonging (C-LAB) at the University of California, Irvine. She received her Ph. D. in U.S. History from Stanford University and previously taught at Ohio State University. She authored Dr. Mom Chung of the Fair-Haired Bastards: the Life of a...

Judy Tzu-Chun Wu is a professor of Asian American Studies, the director of the Humanities Center, and the director of Center for Liberation, Anti-Racism, and Belonging (C-LAB) at the University of California, Irvine. She received her Ph. D. in U.S. History from Stanford University and previously taught at Ohio State University. She authored Dr. Mom Chung of the Fair-Haired Bastards: the Life of a...

Li Wei Yang is curator of Pacific Rim Collections at the Huntington Library. His first Huntington exhibition, “Y.C. Hong: Advocate for Chinese American Inclusion,” was on view in 2015. In 2020, Yang was part of The Huntington, Los Angeles Public Library, and the Library Foundation of Los Angeles team that curated “Stories and Voices from L.A. Chinatown,” an exhibition located in L.A. Chinatown’s C...

Glenn Kurtz is the author of Three Minutes in Poland: Discovering a Lost World in a 1938 Family Film (Farrar, Straus & Giroux 2014), which was named a "Best Book of 2014" by The New Yorker, The Boston Globe, and National Public Radio. The Los Angeles Times called the book " breathtaking, " and it has received high critical praise in The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The San Francisco C...

Dr. Regan F. Patterson is the Co-Founder of Black in Environment. She is an Assistant Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of California, Los Angeles and the Principal Investigator of the Engineering Environmental Justice Lab. Previously, Dr. Patterson was the Transportation Equity Research Fellow at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation (CBCF) and a postdoctoral...

Addison Rose Vincent (they/them) is a 30-year-old transgender and nonbinary advocate, educator, and influencer based in Los Angeles, CA. They garnered national attention in 2013 as the  first openly transgender participant  in the Chapman University sorority rush process, and again in 2014 as the  first openly transgender candidate  in the Delta Queen pageant, leaving with the title of Miss Congen...

Christine Fugate is an award-winning producer and director whose work has been screened in theaters and broadcast on channels around the world. She has produced pilots and programming for networks including Discovery, VH1, Disney, A&E, Sundance, Travel Channel, PBS, and HBO. She has also spent time interviewing celebrities such as Johnny Depp, Tom Hanks, Julie Andrews, and Anne Hathaway. For her u...

Cedric Tai is an undisciplinary artist born in Detroit, Michigan, residing in Los Angeles. They have an Art Education BFA from Michigan State University, and an MFA from the Glasgow School of Art. Their artwork and teachings focus on neurodivergent experience, labor, and politics. The artist also shares their perspectives through printed brochures such as 'How to Advocate for Yourself at the Docto...

Leslie A. Schwalm is Professor Emeritus of history and gender, women's, and sexuality studies at the University of Iowa, where she taught courses on women's history, slavery, emancipation, and the Civil War. She is the author of prizewinning articles, books, and chapters on women's experiences of slavery, emancipation, and the Civil War; the struggle for civil rights in the postwar nation; and pop...