Jason Reynolds

Jason Reynolds is an American author who writes novels and poetry for young adult and middle-grade audiences, including Ghost, a National Book Award Finalist for Young People’s Literature. He is the current National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature (2020-2021). A native of Washington, D.C., Reynolds began writing poetry at 9 years old, and is the recipient of a Newbery Honor, a Printz Honor, an NAACP Image Award, and multiple Coretta Scott King Award honors.

 

 

 

 

Dr. Safiya Noble

Dr. Safiya Umoja Noble is an Associate Professor at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in the Department of Information Studies where she serves as the Co-Director of the UCLA Center for Critical Internet Inquiry. Her academic research focuses on the design of digital media platforms on the internet and their impact on society. She is the author of a best-selling book on racist and sexist algorithmic bias in commercial search engines, Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism.

 

 

 

 

Nancy Pearl

Nancy Pearl is a best-selling author (Book Lust), librarian, and literary critic, but first and foremost, she is a reader and has spent her life promoting reading as one of the most beneficial and joyful experiences anyone can have. In 1998, as executive director of Seattle Public Library’s Washington Center for the Book, she wondered what would happen if everyone in Seattle read and talked about the same book and developed the program to find out. The One City, One Book program was such a good idea that it has been replicated and refreshed thousands of times ­nationwide.