Jackie Stennett, MBA
Host
Jackie Stennett is the Vice President and Board Member of AcademyWomen, a nonprofit leadership and professional development organization that bridges the gap of support by providing programs and resources that connect military women to networks of substance, impact and influence. As Vice President, Jackie assists in the design strategy and growth of all mission critical programs including a 5x award-winning online mentoring program, networking events and career development opportunities that cultivate and leverage the leadership of military women to impact positive change locally, nationally and globally. Jackie served as a logistics officer in the United States Army and has a wide array of leadership and management experience within the corporate, government and nonprofit sectors. Currently, in addition to her role with AcademyWomen, Jackie advises organizations with socially responsible missions in designing effective strategies to improve individual and organizational performance. Jackie holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BS in Chinese Studies from the United States Military Academy at West Point.
https://www.academywomen.org
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Host
Bonnie Stabile, PhD
Host and Moderator
Bonnie Stabile is an Associate Professor in the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University, where she is currently the Director of the Master of Public Policy (MPP) program. She teaches courses in policy analysis, policy and program evaluation, and ethics in the Schar School's master's programs in public policy, public administration, and biodefense. She was the 2019 recipient of the Schar School's Teaching Award.
Professor Stabile is the Founder and Director of the Gender and Policy (GAP) Center at the Schar School, whose mission is to marshal forces to questions of current public interest regarding the role of gender in public policy, particularly where disparities in outcomes or representation are evident, by applying and expanding upon the existing expertise of the Schar School of Policy and Government.
Professor Stabile is the Editor of World Medical & Health Policy, a peer-reviewed academic journal published by Wiley. Her recent research projects and publications include an interdisciplinary investigation of sexual assault policy; and an examination of the role of gender in public affairs education.
https://genderandpolicy.gmu.edu/
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Host and Moderator
Susan Feland
Welcoming Remarks
Susan Feland is the Founder and President of AcademyWomen. Susan was the oldest of three sisters to graduate from the United States Air Force Academy. She has worked in space systems acquisitions, taught at the Air Force Academy, and has a wide range of experience in non-profit, government, and corporate roles. Currently, in addition to leading AcademyWomen, Susan manages content and curriculum innovation at Stanford University. Susan has a LEAD Certificate in Corporate Innovation from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, an MA from Middlebury College, a Diplôme from the Université de Paris – Sorbonne and is a graduate of the United States Air Force Academy with a BS degree.
https://www.academywomen.org
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Welcoming Remarks
Mark Rozell
Welcoming Remarks
Mark J. Rozell is the Founding Dean of the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University. He holds the Ruth D. and John T. Hazel chair in public policy. He is the author of nine books and editor of twenty additional books on various topics in US government and politics, including the Presidency, religion and politics, media and politics, and interest groups in elections. His latest book is Federalism: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press, 2019.
He has testified before Congress on executive privilege issues and has lectured extensively in the US and abroad. In recent years, he has lectured in Austria, China, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, India, Italy, Poland, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, and Vietnam.
Dean Rozell writes frequent opinion columns for major media outlets such as The Hill, New York Daily News, and Politico. He is often asked to comment about his areas of expertise for television and in publications such as The Washington Post and Time Magazine.
He currently serves as a Judge for the Gerald R. Ford Award Committee for Outstanding Reporting on the Presidency for the Gerald R. Ford Foundation.
https://schar.gmu.edu/
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Welcoming Remarks
Roy E. Alston, PhD
Focus Area:
Policing and Police Reform
Roy Alston is a US Army Combat Veteran, author and a former police officer - retired as a Major and Night Watch Commander with the Dallas Police Department. Roy currently serves as a law enforcement and leadership development consultant, an Adjunct Faculty Member with the Institute for Law Enforcement Administration at the Center for American & International Law, and as the Vice President of Security for Christus Health - a Catholic, nonprofit health system. At Christus Health, Roy oversees the security matters of over 600 long-term care facilities, hospitals, walk-in clinics, health ministries, over 45,000 clients, healthcare providers and 15,000 physicians.
Formerly, Roy served as a senior research associate at the Institute for Intergovernmental Research responsible for the training and delivery of services of a national officer safety project developed at the direction of the US Attorney General. Roy also served on the Department of Justice’s Community Oriented Policing Service (COPS) research team that conducted an assessment, and wrote the 188-page report, of the police response to the mass protests in Ferguson, MO following the shooting of an unarmed teen, Michael Brown, in 2014.
Roy retired from the Dallas Police Department (DPD) in 2018 after a 15-year career. During his tenure, he served as a departmental expert in leadership development for law enforcement with the DPD In-Service Academy; as a Watch Commander in the Communications Unit - overseeing the 911 Dispatch Call Center; as the Commander of the Bexar Street Satellite Police Station’s community engagement unit; as a Lieutenant of Police and Commander of the narcotics and vice unit; and as a Patrol Supervisor in the Central Patrol Division. In 2017, Roy was promoted to Major of Police, where he served as the Night Commander of the Dallas North Central and Northeast Patrol stations.
Roy is the author of two leadership books, including The Leader’s Compass for Law Enforcement Professionals. He served in the Army as a Field Artillery officer with the 82nd Airborne Division and in combat with the 1st Battalion of the 319th Field Artillery Regiment during the first Gulf War. He is a graduate of the Army’s Ranger, Airborne and Jungle schools.
Roy earned his PhD in management, with a specialization in leadership and organizational change, from Walden University, an MBA from Indiana Wesleyan University, and a BS in Leadership from the United States Military Academy at West Point.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/royalston/
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Focus Area:
Policing and Police Reform
Carrie K. Baker, PhD
Focus Area:
Diversity and Inclusion
Carrie Baker is the Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer for the United States Space Force. In this role she serves as an advisor to the Commander and Senior Leaders.
She provides program oversight, guidance and support to over 10,000 space professionals and their families regarding diversity education and training, talent acquisition, professional development, community engagement, and the integration of policies and leading practices that move beyond traditional boundaries in talent management, in order to optimize diverse talent and promote an inclusive organizational culture across all Space Force installations and headquarters staff.
Carrie also serves as an adjunct faculty instructor at the Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute at Patrick Air Force Base. In 2019, Carrie was part of the leadership team that launched and delivered the US Air Force Academy’s inaugural unconscious bias training curriculum. The goal of the training is to share best practices concerning diversity and inclusion, and to enhance cadet leadership competencies through skill building and increased awareness, in preparation for their transition to active duty military officers.
Carrie received her Diversity Professional Practitioner certification from Cornell University, is a nationally Certified Diversity Professional (CDP), holds a PhD in Health Administration from the University of Phoenix, an MSW from Southern Connecticut State University, and a BS from Central Connecticut State University.
https://www.spaceforce.mil/
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Focus Area:
Diversity and Inclusion
Maura Belliveau, PhD
Focus Area:
Diversity Research and Innovation
Maura Belliveau is the inaugural director of the Center for Diversity Innovation (CDI) at the University at Buffalo (UB). CDI integrates the capabilities of the faculty, staff and students across UB to conduct and translate empirical, social scientific research on diversity, equity and inclusion, and develop and diffuse evidence-based best practices through trainings, educational programs and consulting services in order to change behavior, close opportunity gaps, and transform the settings in which people learn, work and innovate.
Trained as an interdisciplinary social scientist, her research, teaching, consulting and public speaking focus on structures, practices and policies that promote diversity and inclusion in organizations and which reduce bias, as well as individual strategies that underrepresented minority group members and women can use to foster their career success. Her work has been published in leading scholarly journals in organization studies and management and has been featured in The New York Times, Business Week, Fortune, The Economist, Fast Company, The Boston Globe, Washington Post, on NPR, as well as in policy briefings on the glass ceiling and affirmative action.
Maura has been a tenure-track faculty member at Emory, Texas A&M, and Duke University, where she was named one of the outstanding business school faculty members in the U.S. by Business Week.
In addition to teaching courses on management, human resources, organization change, leadership and negotiations, Maura has developed and led traditional and large-scale, experiential curricular programs on diversity and inclusion. She has delivered numerous trainings and workshops on building inclusive workplaces, understanding implicit bias, building and leveraging social networks, creating cultures of effective mentoring and mentoring across difference, and negotiating salary offers and career opportunities. Prior to earning her doctorate, she was a strategy consultant and senior manager for Cambridge Technology Group, a successful start-up serving Fortune 500 and major not-for-profit clients that later went public (as Cambridge Technology Partners) and continues to spawn many other entrepreneurial ventures in technology and consulting.
Maura earned her bachelor’s degree in Psychology and History from Mount Holyoke College and her master’s and doctoral degrees in Organizational Behavior from the University of California at Berkeley.
https://www.buffalo.edu/diversity-innovation.html
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Focus Area:
Diversity Research and Innovation
Tammy Boyd, JD MPH
Focus Area:
Health Equity for Black Women and Girls
Tammy Boyd is the Chief Policy Officer and Counsel for Black Women’s Health Imperative. In this role she seeks to advance the physical, mental and spiritual health and well-being for the nation's 19.5 million African American women and girls through her work to create policy solutions that address racial and gender-based health disparities. Tammy has extensive expertise in creating and executing federal legislative policy strategy and facilitating outreach to members of Congress. Previously she served as Managing Partner for TKB Global Strategies, LLC /Watts Partners, where she successfully executed government affairs strategies.
Along with her past roles in the corporate sector with DaVita and Johnson & Johnson, Tammy also served as Legislative Director for the late Congressman John Lewis (D-GA) where she exercised oversight over legislative activities within the office, including tax, trade, health care (Medicare, Medicaid, and Graduate Medical Education), financial services, judiciary and energy. In this capacity, Tammy was the senior staffer who drafted the legislation elevating the Office of Minority Health and Health Disparities to a Center at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), which is now an Institute. Tammy is a member of the American Bar Association, National Bar Association, Mississippi Bar Association, American Public Health Association, and the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority.
Tammy has been featured in USA Today, Clarion Ledger, Huffington Post, and Essence Magazine as one of the chief strategists that drafted the legislation that created the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. She received an MPH from Emory University School of Public Health and a JD from American University, Washington College of Law.
https://bwhi.org
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Focus Area:
Health Equity for Black Women and Girls
Don Christensen, JD
Focus Area:
Military Justice and Military Sexual Violence
Colonel Don Christensen is the President of Protect Our Defenders (POD), a nonprofit human rights organization that is dedicated to ending rape and sexual assault in the military and to combating a culture of misogyny, sexual harassment, and retribution against victims. POD honors, supports, and gives voice to survivors of military sexual assault and sexual harassment – including service members, veterans, and civilians assaulted by members of the military. POD seeks to ensure all survivors and service members are provided a safe, respectful work environment and have access to a fair, impartially administered system of justice.
Prior to his work with Protect Our Defenders, Colonel Christensen served as a trial counsel, defense counsel and military judge during his 23-year military career. Between 2010-2014, Colonel Christensen served as Chief Prosecutor for the United States Air Force.
Colonel Christensen has served as an Assistant Staff Judge Advocate, Area Defense Counsel, Circuit Defense Counsel, Deputy Chief Circuit Defense Counsel, and Deputy Staff Judge Advocate, as a deployed Staff Judge Advocate, Chief Circuit Trial Counsel, and Staff Judge Advocate and as a Military Judge. He has tried over 150 courts-martial as a trial and defense counsel and has presided over 100 trials as a military judge.
A third generation Air Force officer, he received his commission as a second lieutenant through ROTC and entered active service in 1991. Colonel Christensen has received numerous awards and decorations including the Legion of Merit, the Meritorious Service Medal, the Air Force Commendation Medal, and the Air Force Achievement Medal.
He received his law degree from Marquette University Law School and is licensed to practice law before the Supreme Court of Wisconsin.
https://www.protectourdefenders.com/
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Focus Area:
Military Justice and Military Sexual Violence
Ally Coll, JD
Focus Area:
Gender Equality in the Workplace
Ally Coll is a lawyer and nationally recognized expert, thought leader, writer, and public speaker on the #MeToo movement and gender equality in the workplace. Her writing on legal and workplace issues has been published in the Washington Post, PBS NewsHour, Law360, the Harvard Journal on Legislation, The Hill, and Jezebel.
Ally worked for several years in electoral politics and in Congress on the presidential campaigns for Barack Obama in 2002-2008, Hillary Clinton in 2016, and served in various capacities on the election campaigns and staff of Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA), and served as Press Secretary on the U.S. Senate Budget Committee before leaving Capitol Hill.
Ally received her law degree magna cum laude from Harvard Law School in 2016, where she served on the Board of the Harvard Women’s Law Association and as the Executive Policy Editor of the Harvard Law and Policy Review. She was a 2018 alumni recipient of the Harvard Women’s Law Association’s “Shatter the Ceiling” award. She recently served as a consultant for the 2018 major motion picture On the Basis of Sex, a biopic film about Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s early legal career and her efforts to found the Women’s Rights Project at the ACLU.
After graduation and the 2016 election, Ally worked as Elections Counsel on the U.S. House Administration Committee before joining the law firm Boies Schiller Flexner LLP as a litigation associate in April 2017 when it was revealed that the firm had retained Israeli intelligence operatives to spy on the women coming forward with their stories about Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein. Ally—who had just shared her own #MeToo story in the Washington Post a week earlier—assumed a role internally to advocate for specific steps the firm should take in response. Months later, she left Boies Schiller to launch the Purple Campaign, whose mission is to address workplace harassment by implementing stronger corporate policies, establishing better laws and empowering people to create lasting change in their workplaces and communities.
https://www.purplecampaign.org/
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Focus Area:
Gender Equality in the Workplace
Deborah Lee James, MIA
Focus Area:
Policy and Government
Deborah Lee James is an author, speaker, strategic advisor, and served as the 23rd Secretary of the United States Air Force from 2013-2017. She was the second woman to ever lead a military service in the United States and had responsibility for 660,000 military and civilian personnel and a budget of nearly $140 billion. Prior to this role, she served as President of SAIC's Technical and Engineering sector, a $2 billion, 8,700-person enterprise. Earlier in her career, Deborah held other P&L positions, and worked in the legislative branch of government and the Department of Defense.
Deborah has deep expertise in strategic planning, risk management, public policy, cyber security, space, logistics and innovation. Deborah is an accomplished speaker on business and government topics including issues in national security and world affairs, politics in Washington, business transformation leadership, mergers and acquisitions, cost reduction strategies, and diversity and inclusion. Deborah is the author of the new book Aim High: Chart Your Course and Find Success. And she periodically appears on MSNBC, CBS, and other national news programs.
Deborah holds an MIA in International Affairs from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, and an AB in Comparative Area Studies from Duke University.
https://www.deborahleejames.com/
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Focus Area:
Policy and Government
Paula Kranz, MPA
Focus Area:
Tech and Algorithmic Biases
Paula Kranz is a US Army Veteran, best-selling author, and the CEO & Founder of Medi-XR, a healthcare consulting firm specializing in Augmented and Virtual Reality (AVR) and Digital Health solutions that offer technologically augmented human connections. Paula also leads an FDA Collaborative Community focused on XR Healthcare Initiatives and remains focused on addressing health disparities rooted in unconscious bias and the social determinants of health.
Paula was formerly a director/producer at Wheelhouse Media and the Executive Director of Wheelhouse Foundation where she focused production on AVR applications.
Paula’s professional experience spans the consulting, media, defense, academic and nonprofit sectors. Prior to joining Wheelhouse, Paula was a partner in Think Broader, a boutique public relations, branding, and marketing firm that provided education, training and content development to advocate for individuals or groups who face systemic social and media discrimination. Previously she was a New York Times best-selling author and research associate at Harvard University’s Center for Public Leadership. She was also the Deputy Director of The Fletcher School’s Counter-Terrorism Center. Paula served for 22 years as an Army Intelligence officer, with leadership experience in over 70 countries around the globe, including the Middle East, Africa, SE Asia, and Europe. Post 9-11, she also served on a domestic interagency FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force and with US Special Operations Command.
Paula serves as an Executive Vice President for Women Executives, as Co-Chair of the Carolinas 2020 Women on Boards initiative, and as Co-Chair of the Charlotte American Heart Association’s GO RED FOR WOMEN campaign. She has served on the boards of the Institute for Defense and Business, Women in International Security, Carolina Freedom Foundation, Association of the US Army European Division, and as an advisor at large for a Charlotte-based anti-human trafficking workforce development nonprofit.
Paula was a National Security Education Program Boren Fellow, studying Arabic in Jordan and Israel. She holds a Diploma (Masters Level) in Global Business from Oxford University, an MPA from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, an MA from the University of Denver, and a BS from the US Military Academy at West Point.
Paula is a USA Triathlon Olympic Distance National Championship qualifier and enjoys traveling and outdoor adrenaline adventures.
http://www.medi-xr.com/
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Focus Area:
Tech and Algorithmic Biases
Victoria Lipnic, JD
Focus Area:
Employment and Labor Law
Victoria Lipnic serves as a Commissioner of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). She was named to the EEOC by President Obama in 2010 and was confirmed by the US Senate for a five-year term. In 2015 she was confirmed for a second term and in 2017, was named Acting Chair of the Commission by President Trump.
During her tenure as Acting Chair, Commissioner Lipnic led the EEOC's successes in policy and operations. Because of the EEOC's 2015-2016 Select Task Force on the Study of Harassment in the Workplace, the Commission was well-positioned to address the #MeToo movement in 2017. Her focus on age discrimination culminated in a June 2018 report and the EEOC reduced its backlog of private sector charges to the lowest level in 13 years. She created the position of Chief Data Officer for the agency, and oversaw the re-organization of the agency's Office of Enterprise Data and Analytics, the most significant operational change to the agency in 25 years.
Commissioner Lipnic was integral in the EEOC's development of regulations under the bipartisan ADA Amendments Act of 2008 and in 2014, she helped lead the agency's celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. She remains focused on issues relating to equal pay, the good governance of the EEOC, increased transparency and public participation in policy-making, and the role of the EEOC as a regulatory enforcement agency.
Commissioner Lipnic has a breadth of experience working with federal labor and employment laws. From 2002-2009, she served as the US Assistant Secretary of Labor for Employment Standards, where she oversaw the development of the nation's first military family leave regulations under the Family and Medical Leave Act and led the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs’ efforts on equal pay. She also worked on Capitol Hill as Workforce Policy Counsel to the Committee on Education and the Workforce in the House of Representatives. Before her work for Congress, she acted as in-house counsel for labor and employment matters to the US Postal Service. She also served as a special assistant for business liaison for former US Secretary of Commerce, Malcolm Baldrige. Prior to her service at the EEOC, she was counsel to the law firm of Seyfarth Shaw LLP in Washington, DC. She earned her BA in Political Science and History from Allegheny College and her JD from George Mason University School of Law.
https://www.eeoc.gov/
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Focus Area:
Employment and Labor Law
Deborah L. Plummer, PhD
Focus Area:
Racial Equity and Inclusion
Deborah Plummer is a psychologist, university professor, author, and speaker on topics central to racial equality, inclusion, and mutual respect. Her groundbreaking and timely book, Some of My Friends Are…The Daunting Challenges and Untapped Benefits of Cross Racial Friendships (Beacon Press) examines race relations through the lens of friendships, exploring how cross-racial friendships work and fail within American society. She is also the editor of the Handbook of Diversity Management (Rowman and Littlefield) and author of Advancing Inclusion: A Guide for Effective Diversity Council and Employee Resource Group Membership (Half Dozen Publications), and award-winning Racing Across the Lines: Changing Race Relations through Friendships (Pilgrim Press).
She has written for Diversity Executive, Boston Globe Magazine, and Medium and has authored several book chapters and published numerous journal articles for the professional academic community. Her essay “The Girl from the Ghetto” is published in the anthology All of the Women in My Family Sing: Women Write the World, Essays on Equality, Justice and Freedom (NBTT Press).
As a scholar-practitioner, Debbie has designed several assessment tools: Antiracist Style Indicator (ASI), Racial Identity Status Self-Assessment (RISSA) and the Diversity Engagement Survey (DES). Her work has been featured in several media outlets and she has served for many years as an expert commentator for various news outlets.
Debbie has held past roles as an academic medical center vice chancellor, hospital system chief diversity officer, staff psychologist, tenured psychology professor, and founding director of a graduate degree program in diversity management. She has been named by Becker’s Hospital Review as one of the Top 15 Chief Diversity Officers to Know.
Debbie currently lives in Cleveland, Ohio with her husband, Michael Bussey, where she serves on the boards of Nana’s Tribe Foundation, Books@Work, and Positive Education Program (PEP). She considers her second home to be the Greater Boston area where she cherishes her work with Facing History and Ourselves, a non-profit, international educational and professional development organization, and is a proud board member of GrubStreet, a leading narrative arts center located in Boston. In her next life, she plans to come back as a master chef (think Ina Garten) or a singer, dancer and entertainer (think Beyoncé).
https://www.dlplummer.com/
About Deborah L. Plummer, PhD
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Focus Area:
Racial Equity and Inclusion
