Madeline Di Nonno

CEO, Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media

Madeline Di Nonno is the Chief Executive Officer of the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, the only research based non-profit working with the entertainment and media community to improve unconscious gender bias in media and entertainment through evidence-based research, education and advocacy. Madeline leads the Institute’s strategic direction, financial and operational activities. Madeline brings over thirty years of executive leadership experience in the entertainment, non-profit, digital media and consumer packaged goods industries.

Previously, Madeline served as President and CEO of On The Scene Productions, and drove the company’s new business development and content distribution platforms for the entertainment, healthcare, and consumer products clients such as Nike, Gatorade, Iconix, and PepsiCo.

Prior to On The Scene, Di Nonno served in executive marketing positions for Anchor Bay Entertainment/Starz Media and Echo Bridge Home Entertainment where she led global brand marketing, for home entertainment and limited theatrical releases in North America, United Kingdom and Australia. As Executive Vice President and GM for Nielsen EDI, Madeline drove innovations in product development, new business development and client management.

Previously, Di Nonno served as Senior Vice President, Marketing Alliances and Digital media at the Hallmark Channel, and nearly eight years at Universal Studios Home Video as Vice President, Strategic Marketing. Madeline began her career at ABC Television Network in corporate publicity. Madeline holds a bachelor’s degree from Boston University.

Madeline serves on the Board of Directors for the Television Academy Foundation; Board of Advisors for the LA Press Club; Co-Chair, Digital Hollywood’s “Hollywood for Social Change”: Board Advisor GameChanger Films and Rutgers University Institute for Women’s Leadership.

Danelle Marqui Brown

Founder, By Mnemosyne

Danelle Marqui Brown is the founder of By Mnemosyne (est. 2013)—an interdisciplinary creative think tank that utilizes the arts, design, and events to initiate progressive thinking and radical change in the fields of science, education,and healthcare. She has 15 years of experience within the fields of design, design research, marketing, and experiential storytelling. Danelle has worked for a variety of accounts and companies within sectors such as healthcare, science, lifestyle, entertainment, architecture/real estate, consumer goods, education, and non-profit.

Danelle holds a master of liberal arts degree, with a concentration in the history of science, technology and medicine, from the Harvard Extension School (HES); a professional certificate in Religious Studies and Education through a partnership with the Harvard Divinity School (HDS) and HES; and a bachelor of fine arts degree, with a concentration in interior design and sustainability, from the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT). She is a former certified birth doula through DONA International and a current member of the New York Academy of Sciences, the New York Academy of Medicine, the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, and the Art Directors Club. She serves as a mentor for The Global STEM Alliance’s Next Scholars program, and sits on The Music & Health Clinic Steering Committee for The Louis Armstrong Center for Music & Medicine.

JJ Johnson

Founding Partner, Sinking Ship Entertainment

J.J. Johnson is an Emmy award-winning Executive Producer and director. He is a founding partner of Sinking Ship Entertainment, and the creative vision behind all of the company’s programs. Since the company’s inception in 2004, J.J. has created and executive produced 15 series including international hits This is Daniel Cook, Annedroids and Dino Dan. His dinosaur series Dino Dan won the Emmy for Best Preschool Series in 2015, while the girl-led STEAM series Annedroids has experienced unprecedented sales success in selling to every country worldwide.

Rita Karl

Executive Producer, PBS SciGirls
Managing Director of STEM Media & Education, Twin Cities PBS

An accomplished leader of high-profile science, technology, engineering and mathematics, or STEM, education initiatives, Rita Karl serves currently as the Managing Director of the STEM Media & Education Department for Twin Cities PBS and the Executive Producer of PBS SciGirls. The Emmy award-winning SciGirls program is funded by the National Science Foundation and draws on cutting-edge research about what engages girls in STEM learning and career paths. The SciGirls television show, website and national outreach initiative reach millions of children and thousands of educators nationwide. In 2016, SciGirls Stories: Real Women, Real Jobs, a series of short films of women in non-traditional STEM jobs, won a Regional Emmy for best teen show. Ms. Karl previously served as the Director of Education at the Challenger Center for Space Science Education in Washington, D.C. leading STEM education and outreach programs for an international network of space science learning centers located in schools, universities and museums. In Egypt, as the Director of the USAID project, Educational Technology in Schools, Ms. Karl led a team that trained thousands of K-12 educators and administrators in technology-enhanced instruction and impacting over 25,000 students. At the NASA Johnson Space Center, Ms. Karl designed and led the NASA-award winning Texas Aerospace Scholars program, now in its sixteenth year, encouraging students to consider engineering careers at NASA.

Courtney McCarthy

Strategist of Computer Science Education in Media, Google

Courtney McCarthy joined Google in March 2015 and is currently the Strategist of Computer Science Education in Media. She and her team are working to diversify and change the perception of Computer Science in media, so as to inspire more girls to become creators of technology.

Previously, Courtney was at Fox Broadcasting Company, working in Marketing Strategy and Media Promotions. There she helped draft campaign plans and create online promotions for Fox’s primetime TV line-up, including 24, Brooklyn Nine-Nine The Simpsons, etc. Before that, she worked in Home Entertainment at Lionsgate and at NBCU’s Focus Features.

Courtney grew up in Saint Paul, Minnesota and graduated from Chapman University in Orange, CA with a Bachelors in Advertising and Public Relations. In addition to being a major film & TV buff, she loves traveling, writing, hiking and has even hang glided in the Swiss Alps!

Karishma Shah

Chief Catalyst, Google X

Karishma is X’s youngest hire and helps their moonshots enter and scale in the real world as their Chief Catalyst. She was listed on Forbes’ 30 Under 30 Consumer Technology 2016 list for her achievements including cofounding a natural language processing moonshot, leading operations for Project Wing drone delivery, and program managing the rapid prototyping team at X. Additionally, she started Google’s 10x Thinking Team and with her startup at UPenn, won a Global Entrepreneurship Week Award and Mark Cuban’s Movers & Changers competition.

Krishna Somandepalli

PhD Student, University of Southern California (USC) Viterbi School of Engineering

Krishna Somandepalli is a PhD student at the University of Southern California (USC) Viterbi School of Engineering. He is a member of the Signal Analysis and Interpretation Laboratory (SAIL) and advised by Prof. Shrikanth (Shri) Narayanan. At SAIL, he coordinates the efforts of the Media Informatics and Content Analysis (MICA) group in developing engineering models for a quantitative study of multimedia content. Prior to USC, Krishna received a Masters degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from University of California at Santa Barbara. His research interests are primarily multimodal representation learning for media content.