Next Gen Public Media
Research Advisory Board
The By / With / For Youth: Inspiring Next Gen Public Media Audiences Research Advisory Board is a group of researchers, practitioners, and youth advocates with expertise in youth and digital media who will advise NGPM’s research efforts.
Milton Chen
George Lucas Educational Foundation
Dr. Milton Chen’s career has focused on educational innovation, including practices such as effective use of media and technology; teacher and parent education; real-world curricula; and community partnerships between schools, universities, libraries, and museums. He is senior fellow and executive director, emeritus at The George Lucas Educational Foundation (GLEF) in the Bay Area, producers of the Edutopia.org website on innovative K-12 learning. Dr. Chen has been the founding director of the KQED Center for Education (PBS) in San Francisco; director of research at Sesame Workshop in New York; and an assistant professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Dr. Chen is a trustee at the W. K. Kellogg Foundation and Sesame Workshop. He chaired the education committee for the National Park System Advisory Board, advancing the agency’s work in STEM and humanities education, and the Panasonic Foundation, which supports youth and STEM learning in Newark.
An-Me Chung
CS for All
An-Me Chung has extensive experience building networks and spearheading public-private partnerships with CEOs, senior government leaders, philanthropists, researchers, technologists, policymakers, and community leaders and practitioners to bring education and technology opportunities particularly for under-represented youth. An-Me understands that systems change and innovation is the necessity of equity and sustainability. She has a history of leading complex initiatives focused on using data and promising practices, raising public awareness, and leveraging partnerships for movement building and policy change. At the C.S. Mott Foundation, she partnered with the U.S. Department of Education through the Clinton, Bush, and Obama administrations to build the afterschool field and increase federal funding for afterschool programs from $1M to $1B in the first four years. This public/private partnership won the Public Excellence Award and was a semi-finalist for the Kennedy School of Government “Innovations in American Government” award. She brought her skills in philanthropy, strategic planning, partnerships and alliances, public policy, and research to the MacArthur Foundation where she managed initiatives designed to improve student learning in digital media through partnerships with the Institute of Museum and Library Services and the White House Office of Science and Technology. Knowing that digital skills are core to living in a digital world led her to Mozilla where she forged partnerships and led the development of global digital literacy and 21st century skills standards and credentials, and core curriculum. As a fellow at CSforALL, An-Me lends her expertise and experience to a movement with a mission to ensure that all K-12 students will have access to computer science education. In addition to her skills in partnership and coalition building and passion for bringing quality education opportunities for all youth, she is well versed in strategic planning, and organizational and board development. Board service includes Framework Institute, Digital Harbor Foundation, Mid-West Chinese Family Camp, Nomi Network, IMS Global Digital Credentials Executive Board, Hive Digital Media Learning Fund, Grantmakers for Education, Community Foundation of Greater Flint, and the Out-of-School Funders Network. An-Me is a Presidential Leadership Scholar and alumni advisor, a program convened by Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush to bring together leaders who share a commitment to help solve society’s greatest challenges. She completed a post-doctoral fellowship at Columbia University and received her PhD from Yale University and a BS from Washington University in St. Louis.
Sandra Cortesi
Berkman Center
Sandra Cortesi is a Fellow at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University and the Director of Youth and Media. She is responsible for coordinating the Youth and Media’s policy, research, and educational initiatives, and is leading the collaboration between the Berkman Klein Center and UNICEF. At Youth and Media Sandra works closely with talented young people and lead researchers in the field as they look into innovative ways to approach social challenges in the digital world. Together with Berkman Klein Center’s Executive Director Urs Gasser and the Youth and Media team, she focuses on topics such as inequitable access, information quality, risks to safety and privacy, skills and digital literacy, and spaces for participation, civic engagement, and innovation.
Antero Garcia
Stanford Graduate School of Education
Antero Garcia is an Assistant Professor in the Graduate School of Education at Stanford University where he studies how technology and gaming shape both youth and adult learning, literacy practices, and civic identities. Prior to completing his Ph.D., Antero was an English teacher at a public high school in South Central Los Angeles. His most recent research studies explore learning and literacies in tabletop roleplaying games like Dungeons & Dragons and how participatory culture shifts classroom relationships and instruction. Based on his research focused on equitable teaching and learning opportunities for urban youth through the use of participatory media and gameplay, Antero co-designed the Critical Design and Gaming School–a public high school in South Central Los Angeles. Antero’s research has appeared in numerous journals including American Educational Research Journal, Harvard Educational Review, and Reading Research Quarterly. His recent books include Good Reception: Teens, Teachers, and Mobile Media in a Los Angeles High School, Doing Youth Participatory Action Research: Transforming Inquiry with Researchers, Educators, and Students (with Nicole Mirra and Ernest Morrell), and Pose, Wobble, Flow: A Culturally Proactive Approach to Literacy Instruction (with Cindy O’Donnell-Allen). Antero received his Ph.D. in the Urban Schooling division of the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Andrés Henríquez
Education Development Center
Andrés Henríquez, EDC director of STEM education strategy, is a national expert in science, educational technology, and policy. He brings extensive experience in philanthropy, having served as a program officer at the National Science Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation of New York.Henríquez is deeply committed to making a difference in the lives of underserved children. For decades, he has worked to achieve this goal as an educator, researcher, advocate, and funder.
Mimi Ito
University of California, Irvine/ Connected Learning Lab
Mimi Ito is a cultural anthropologist, learning scientist, entrepreneur, and an advocate for connected learning—learning that is equity-oriented, centered on youth interest, and socially connected. Her work decodes digital youth culture for parents and educators, offering ways to tap interests and digital media to fuel learning that is engaging, relevant, and socially connected. She is the director of the Connected Learning Lab and Professor in Residence and John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Chair in Digital Media and Learning at the University of California, Irvine. She is also co-founder of Connected Camps, a non-profit providing online learning experiences for kids in all walks of life. Her co-authored books include Hanging Out, Messing Around and Geeking Out: Kids Living and Learning with New Media and Affinity Online: How Connection and Shared Interest Fuel Learning and the reports, From Good Intentions to Real Outcomes: Equity by Design in Learning Technologies, and The Connected Learning Research Network: Reflections on a Decade of Engaged Scholarship.
Phyllis Marcus
Hunton Andrews Kurth
Phyllis is a Partner in Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP’s Competition and Consumer Protection group, where her practice focuses on children’s privacy and advertising counseling for retail and consumer products clients. She has unique expertise with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and with the FTC’s advertising principles. Prior to joining Hunton Andrews Kurth, Phyllis served for 17 years in the Federal Trade Commission’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, most recently as Chief of Staff for Advertising Practices. Phyllis led the FTC’s 2010-2012 review of COPPA, which resulted in landmark changes to the agency’s children’s privacy Rule.
Meghan McDermott
McDermott Consulting
For nearly 25 years, Meghan McDermott has worked at the intersection of education, technology, and social change. For 10 years, Meghan was the executive director of Global Action Project, an award-winning youth media arts organization. From nonprofit executive experience to directing strategy and grant-making for digital peer learning networks, Meghan has also taught, facilitated and evaluated programs and people in service to better learning. Most recently, Meghan was a Mozilla Foundation fellow examining digital and data rights. Meghan holds an MA from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and currently attends CUNY Law School.
Darris Means
University of Pittsburgh School of Education
Dr. Darris R. Means is an Associate Professor of Higher Education in the School of Education at the University of Pittsburgh. Darris researches postsecondary education access for rural youth, Black youth, and youth from working class backgrounds; science education and equity for Black students; and the postsecondary education experiences of Black lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer students. He is currently working on two research projects. First, he is a co-principal investigator on a participatory action research study being funded by the National Science Foundation. For this study, he is collaborating with Black undergraduate students to examine critical factors that support science degree persistence for Black students and working alongside the students to develop evidence-based solutions to address science education inequities. Second, Darris is working on a multi-phase study about the assets and resources rural Black youth employ to access and succeed in postsecondary education, while examining how racism, spatial inequities, classism, and other forms of oppression hinder their pathways to and through postsecondary education. The study has been supported with funding from the National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship and the American College Personnel Association: College Student Educators International. Darris’ scholarship appears in Teachers College Record, The Review of Higher Education, Journal of College Student Development, Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, and Journal of Research in Rural Education. He is also a co-editor of Case Studies for Student Development Theory: Advancing Social Justice and Inclusion in Higher Education. Prior to the University of Pittsburgh, Darris was an associate professor in the Mary Frances Early College of Education at the University of Georgia, and he was an administrator for a college access program, the Elon Academy, at Elon University in North Carolina. Reflecting his commitment to collaborating with youth to address pressing social issues, he continues to work with the Elon Academy as a summer instructor, teaching and working alongside youth to study and address social injustices and inequities. Darris’ hometown is Spartanburg, South Carolina. He earned his bachelor of arts in Sociology and Political Science from Elon University, M.Ed. in Counseling Education (concentration in Student Affairs) from Clemson University, and Ph.D. in Educational Research and Policy Analysis (concentration in Higher Education) from North Carolina State University.
Stephanie Reich
University of California, Irvine/ Connected Learning Lab
Trained as a community psychologist with a focus on children development, Stephanie Reich is a professor in the School of Education at the University of California, Irvine, with additional appointments in Informatics and Psychological Science. Her research focuses on understanding and improving the social context of children’s lives through exploring and intervening with the direct and indirect influences on the child, specifically through family, online, and school environments.
Craig Watkins
The University of Texas at Austin
S. Craig Watkins is the Ernest S. Sharpe Centennial Professor at the University of Texas at Austin. An internationally recognized expert in media, Watkins is the author of six books exploring young people’s engagement with media and technology. His two most recent books—The Digital Edge and Don’t Knock the Hustle—result from his work with the Connected Learning Research Network, a research collaborative funded by the MacArthur Foundation. Watkins is the founding director of the Institute for Media Innovation, a new boutique hub for research and design located in the Moody College of Communication. The Institute’s projects include: using AI to build a digital platform for mental health; examining how Black and Latinx children use AI-driven devices; exploring the economic impact of COVID-19 in the lives of young people; and studying the use of media and technology to address systemic racism.