Davan Maharaj served as Nairobi bureau chief for the Los Angeles Times. During his tenure, he wrote "Living on Pennies", a six-part series about how half the people in sub-Saharan Africa live on less than a dollar a day. He is now the managing editor of the Los Angeles Times.

Cinny Kennard is the former managing director and managing editor of NPR West, where she oversaw the production of News & Notes and Day to Day. She was recently appointed a senior fellow at the USC Annenberg School for Communication's Center on Communication Leadership and Policy.

Tom Miller's acclaimed travel books include The Panama Hat Trail, On the Border, and Trading with the Enemy: A Yankee Travels Through Castro's Cuba. His articles have appeared in many magazines and newspapers. How I Learned English is his latest book.

Hector Tobar is a national correspondent for the Los Angeles Times and was part of the writing team that won a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the 1992 riots. Tobar is the author of The Tattooed Soldier and Translation Nation.

Morley Winograd served as Vice President Al Gore's senior policy advisor in the National Partnership for Reinventing Government. Morley is the coauthor of Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube and the Future of American Politics.