Sonia Livingstone is Professor of Social Psychology in the Department of Media and Communications at the London School of Economics and Political Science. She is author or editor of eleven books and 100+ academic articles and chapters on media audiences, children and the internet, domestic contexts of media use and media literacy. Recent books include Young People and New Media (Sage, 2002), Audiences and Publics (edited, Intellect, 2005), The Handbook of New Media (edited, with Leah Lievrouw, Sage, 2006), Harm and Offence in Media Content (with Andrea Millwood Hargrave, Intellect, 2006), Public Connection? Media Consumption and the Presumption of Attention (with Nick Couldry and Tim Markham, Palgrave, 2007) and The International Handbook of Children, Media and Culture (edited, with Kirsten Drotner, Sage, 2008). She also recently directed the research project, UK Children Go Online, for the ESRC's e-society programme. She serves on the UK's Council for Child Internet Safety, the DCSF's Ministerial Taskforce for Home Access to Technology for Children, Ofcom's Media Literacy Research Forum, and the Board of the Voice of the Listener and Viewer. She has advised Ofcom on advertising unhealthy foods to children and on media literacy, and advised The Byron Review on children's online risk. She was President of the International Communication Association 2007-08.

McCrae A. Parker's keynote speech, entitled "Intersections", will present case studies from the field that demonstrate how the intersection of news and information literacy, social media, and youth enthusiasm are giving rise to vibrant civic participation not only in the online community but in physical communities. The work presented will feature innovative practice and lessons learned in engaging youth and encouraging them to meet community challenges through education, amplification of their voice, and collective action.

McCrae has 15 years of experience in the fields of youth policy, workforce development, education, and media policy. He is currently the Director of Strategic Initiatives at Youth Radio, a national youth media education and production organization based in Oakland, CA. Prior to work with Youth Radio, McCrae was a consultant for a number of media education and community-based organizations. As a Senior Associate at Children Now, he was the principal author and coordinator of the Fall Colors, a comprehensive examination of how race, gender and class are portrayed in primetime time television. While at Children Now, he also authored reports on local news coverage of youth and youth policy issues, and race and gender in video games. He also  developed policy recommendations for comment to the Federal Communications Commission regarding public interest obligations of commercial broadcasters to children. McCrae's professional interests include developing cross-cutting program models in converged media production, social communications, education, community building and workforce development.

Chris Sperry is the Director of Curriculum and Staff Development for Project Look Sharp, a media literacy initiative at Ithaca College founded in 1993. He has taught secondary social studies and media studies at the Lehman Alternative Community School in Ithaca, New York since 1979. He is the co-author of numerous curriculum kits that integrate media decoding and critical thinking into the curriculum. These include Media Construction of: War, Presidential Campaigns, the Middle East, Soviet History, Africa, Economics, and Global Warming. He is the recipient of the 2005 National PTA and Cable Leaders in Learning Award for Media Literacy and the 2008 National Council for the Social Studies James M. Becker Award for Global Understanding.

William Kist has been researching classroom uses of new media for over a decade.  His profiles of teachers who are broadening our conception of literacy were included in his award-winning book, New Literacies in Action and will be expanded in his upcoming book focusing on social networking due out in late 2009 from Corwin Press. While an associate professor at Kent State University, Bill remains active as a new media artist himself. Nominated for an Emmy for music composition, Bill is directing his own screenplay, Field Trip, to begin shooting as an independent feature in 2010.  Bill’s blog may be found at www.williamkist.com.

Frank Baker is the creator of the nationally recognized Media Literacy Clearinghouse web site. As a professional development teacher trainer, he helps teachers understand how to incorporate state teaching standards for media literacy into instruction. He is past president of NAMLE, and coordinated the National Media Education Conference in St. Paul MN in 1999. He is the author of two books: "Political Campaigns and Political Advertising: A Media Literacy Guide" (2008, Greenwood Press) and "Coming Distractions: Questioning Movies" (2007, Capstone Press).

Renee Hobbs is one of the nation's leading authorities on media literacy education. She is a Professor of Communication at Temple University's School of Communication and Theater, where she founded the Media Education Lab, a center for research and community service in media literacy. She has created numerous award-winning multimedia curriculum materials for K-12 English language arts educators and students. Her book, Teaching the Media: Media Literacy in High School English (2007, Teachers College Press) provides the first large-scale empirical evidence of the impact of media literacy education on adolescents' reading comprehension and critical analysis skills.