Jose Antonio Tijerino is president and CEO of the Hispanic Heritage Foundation, which focuses on education, workforce development, and community service through connectivity, innovation, leadership and cultural pride. Under Tijerino’s leadership, HHF is recognized as a creative, agile, impact-focused organization boasting a network of 150,000 vetted Latinos (15-35-year-olds) mobilized in the STEM fields, entrepreneurship, finance, media, and other priority areas for America. Tijerino also serves as executive producer of the star-studded Hispanic Heritage Awards broadcast on PBS stations. HHF’s programs and agile approach have been recognized by Fortune 500 companies, government agencies including the White House, nonprofits and Government of Mexico. Tijerino’s blogs and media presence have made him a national voice on Latino issues and speaks on diversity and Latino issues at top companies, universities, influential events, US Congress, and The White House.

Ángel Cabrera is the president of George Mason University, Virginia’s largest public research university operating several campuses across the Washington, D.C., metropolitan region and in Incheon, South Korea. Before becoming Mason’s president in 2012, Cabrera led IE Business School in Madrid, and Thunderbird School of Global Management, now affiliated with Arizona State University. Cabrera is the first native of Spain to have served as president of an American university. Cabrera chairs the Commission on International Initiatives for the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities, and serves on the advisory boards of the Council for the International Exchange of Scholars (Fulbright Program), Georgia Institute of Technology, and ITESM in Monterrey, Mexico. He serves on the boards of the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, National Geographic, the Bankinter Foundation of Innovation in Madrid, and other civic organizations. He has served on the corporate boards of three public companies: eFunds, PetSmart and, currently, Inovio Pharmaceuticals.

Aleida Olvera is a rising junior at Georgetown University majoring in Computer Science with a minor in Statistics. As the Director of her university’s inaugural hackathon and president of the Georgetown Computer Club, she uses these roles to pursue her passions and works to rewrite the common narrative in technology by encouraging more women and people of color to explore computer science. It was her freshman year that she was given the opportunity to become a Microsoft Student partner, which she uses to put on events that promote technical literacy to the Georgetown student body. Aleida is a part of the National Center for Women and Information Technology as a TECHNOLOchica and a 2015 National Aspirations in Computing Awardee, as well a part of the Hispanic Heritage Foundation as a Code as a Second Language Fellow, an ESA Loft Innovation Fellow, and the 2015 National Hispanic Heritage Youth Awardee for Innovation and Technology. This summer, Aleida will be working at Codecademy as Curriculum Development Fellow, where she will focus on continuing to improve accessibility in technical education.

Michael A. Echols is the CEO of Max Cybersecurity LLC. He launched Max after 7 years at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and run IACI at Kennedy Space Center. Mr. Echols developed and implemented cybersecurity strategies to assist DHS’ to meet its cyber mission by identifying opportunities to enhance the effectiveness of information sharing operations, technology and policy. Mr. Echols led several White House national security initiatives and most recently authored three Forbes online articles and was featured on a PBS cybersecurity special. Mr. Echols is being honored by University of Maryland University College in 2018 as a Distinguished Alumni. Mr. Echols is a graduate of the National Preparedness Leadership Initiative – Harvard Kennedy School of Public Health and the Federal Executive Institute. He holds a Master of Business Administration, a Master of Science in Biotechnology, a Graduate Certificate in Technology Management, and a Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice; all from the University of Maryland.

Gabriel Arteaga enjoys working with individuals and teams to crowdsource big ideas and training future makers. He is the CEO and Co-Founder of Create&, a design strategy firm that uses design sprints (a creative problem-solving framework) to help businesses, entrepreneurs, and community institutions launch big ideas and solve their most wicked problems. He also trains future makers in the design sprint framework, so that they can apply entrepreneurial skills and innovation to solve big problems and test new ideas, quickly. The problem solving framework Create& uses acknowledges the values and constraints of the ventures they work with and the individuals they seek to train, and helps them build empathy for users, design strategic implementation plans, and clear pathways to success.

Tara is a global health professional with over 8 years of experience in project management, development and implementation in the nonprofit, public sector and social enterprise spaces. She has dedicated much of her life to cultivating leaders, managing interdisciplinary teams, and developing organizations across a wide variety of issue areas. She is currently pursuing her Masters of Public Health at The George Washington University's Milken School of Public Health with focus on the intersection of women’s health, business, and innovation. Prior to graduate school she managed thousands of volunteers at over 300 partner hospitals at the non-profit organization Project Sunshine. During her tenure she designed, prototyped, and scaled two new hospital programs. In addition, Tara is the founder of Period Portraits a project grounded in design thinking theories, breaking down the stigma of menstruation through vulnerable storytelling and empowering photographed portraits. She is interested in using design thinking and creative problem solving to uncover new solutions to social impact issues.

Brian Romero is a Software Developer contractor at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (U.S. Customs and Border Protection) with the role of engineering highly scalable and efficient Enterprise applications. He currently acts as one of the Technical Lead developers who support fulfill the agency’s mission via software. As a rising developer he started emerging a passion for coding in college while majoring in a combined Business and I.S. degree from George Mason University. Shortly after graduating, he started a software company with the idea of creating a social-financial network to connect people in a private and highly secure way. Brian has a passion for the outdoors and fitness, which he believes fuels creativity while programming and thirst for solving bigger problems. This summer, Brian will be working on contributing with technical education to the youth and adults while training for an Ironman triathlon in Mont-Tremblant.

Maia has over ten years of experience in program management and service design in the fields of anti-human trafficking, product development, and innovation. Currently, she is an innovation delivery specialist at Booz Allen Hamilton, where she utilizes human-centered design, instructional design, and business strategy to drive organizational change and impact. Prior to Booz Allen, she co-founded Create&, a design strategy firm that builds innovation ecosystems through community-centered design, and trains future makers in the practice of design thinking. In this capacity, she co-founded and continues to co-organize Unleaded, a design thinking meetup in Washington D.C. that runs workshops addressing issues such as gun safety, family homelessness, and healthcare delivery. Finally, Maia received an MBA from Johns Hopkins University, and a BA (summa cum laude) from UC Berkeley.