Faculty

Marvin Astrada has completed an M.A. and Ph.D. in Politics and International Relations at Florida International University, and a JD at Rutgers University Law School. His graduate and legal studies and research have focused on law, foreign policy, international organization, strategic studies, culture, and international relations theory.

Presently, he is a Research Associate at the Federal Judicial Center, Washington, DC. He is responsible for the design and conduct of social scientific and legal qualitative/quantitative research projects pertaining to all facets of the administration of justice in the federal judiciary. Present projects include social scientific and legal research pertaining to mass incarceration and the efficacy of federal reentry/diversionary programs for offenders.

Previously, he served as Research Scientist with the Applied Research Center at Florida International University, where he was responsible for the FIUARC/U.S. Government Strategic Cultures Project. The project focused on developing a standard analytic framework to identify and assess the strategic culture of Latin American countries vis-à-vis U.S. foreign policy, and analyzed the regional impact of Islamic thought and Muslim identity in Latin America.

Dr. Astrada has taught introductory and advanced courses in politics, law, and international relations, has presented his research at professional conferences, and has published in the fields of law and international relations.

Seth Borenstein teaches journalism and society at New York University's Washington DC campus. He also is a national science writer for The Associated Press, the world's largest news organization, covering issues ranging from climate change to astronomy. He is the winner of numerous journalism awards, including the National Journalism Award for environment reporting in 2007 from the Scripps Foundation and the Outstanding Beat Reporting award from the Society of Environmental Journalists in 2008 and 2004. He was part of an AP Gulf of Mexico oil spill reporting team that won the 2010 George Polk Award for Environment Reporting and a special merit award as part of the 2011 Grantham environment reporting prizes. He was part of a team of finalists for the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the Columbia space shuttle disaster. A science and environmental journalist for more than 25 years, covering everything from hurricanes to space shuttle launches, Borenstein has also worked for Knight Ridder Newspapers' Washington Bureau, The Orlando Sentinel, and the Sun-Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale. He is the co-author of three out-of-print books, two on hurricanes and one on popular science. He has flown in zero gravity and once tried out for Florida Marlins (unsuccessfully).

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Ross Brater is an economist in the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.  He joined the Division shortly after he earned his Ph.D. in Economics from The Ohio State University, where he specialized in industrial organization and microeconomic theory.  He enjoys teaching courses on microeconomic theory, industrial organization, sports economics, and current issues.  While at Ohio State, he received the Economics Department's L. Edwin Smart Graduate Associate Teaching Award and its Departmental Citation for Excellence in Teaching.     
 
His current research interests include topics in theoretical industrial organization, with current focus on two-sided markets and consumer rewards programs.  He also holds an M.A. in Economics from The Ohio State University and a B.A. in Mathematics and Economics from Ohio Wesleyan University.

Dr. Gary Brooks’ career includes accounting and finance work with leading defense contractors and over 13 years of active duty service in the military. Primarily, his work for the last 25 years has been in support of the intelligence community. His focus has been the federal budget process to include effective reporting and execution. Gary teaches intermediate accounting as an adjunct professor at several universities including George Mason University and the University of Virginia.

Originally, from Ohio, Gary started college at Miami University. Brooks earned his bachelor’s degree in business with a minor in accounting from the University of Maryland, University College. He completed a Master of Business Administration from Averett University, and he earned a Doctorate, Business Administration, from the University of Phoenix. His dissertation topic was retirement planning behaviors and procrastination among Generation X. Gary holds the following designations: CPA, CIA, CITP, CGMA, CGFM, and CDFM-A.

Ron Christie is Founder and CEO of Christie Strategies LLC, a full-service communications and issues management firm in Washington, D.C. Christie is also the author of three books. His most recent title, Blackwards: How Black Leadership is Returning America to the Days of Separate But Equal was published in September 2012. His two previous books were Acting White: The Birth and Death of a Racial Slur (2010, St. Martin’s Press) and Black in the White House (2006, Thomas Nelson/Nelson Current). Christie served as a Resident Fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government Institute of Politics for the Fall 2011 term at Harvard University. Christie presently teaches as an Adjunct Professor at the McCourt Graduate School of Public Policy and the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University. In August 2015 he was named to the Board of Advisors for the inaugural Georgetown University Institute of Politics and Public Service.

Mr. Christie is also a Co-Founder of NoLabels.org – a non-partisan group seeking real policy solutions in Washington, D.C. Along with former Gov. Jon Huntsman, Christie is a co-host of No Labels Radio heard each Saturday on Sirius XM POTUS Channel 124. He also is a Columnist at The Daily Beast.com.

Mr. Christie, a veteran senior advisor of both the White House and the Congress, brings years of government relations experience. Most recently, Christie served as Vice
President of Navigators LLC – a strategic consulting and communications firm. He previously served as Executive Vice President and Director of Global Government Affairs at Ruder Finn and Of Counsel at the DC law firm of Patton Boggs, LLP. From 2002 to 2004, he was Acting Director of USA Freedom Corps and special assistant to President George W. Bush. He began service at the White House in 2001 as deputy assistant to Vice President Cheney for domestic policy, advising the Vice President on policy initiatives in health care, budget, tax and other policy areas.

Prior to joining the Vice President's staff, he briefly served as counsel to U.S. Senator George Allen (R-VA). He also served as senior advisor to former House Budget Committee Chairman and current Ohio Governor John Kasich from 1992 - 1999.

As a frequent commentator on current political events, Christie served as a political commentator for BBC Worldwide Television for their global 2012 election night coverage. He reprised this role to cover the 2014 midterm election cycle. He has appeared as a political/legal analyst on The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer, On the Record with Greta Van Sustern, Real Time with Bill Maher, Lou Dobbs Tonight, Hardball with Chris Matthews, Fox News Sunday, Hannity, The O'Reilly Factor, and The Tavis Smiley Show.

Active in international affairs, he was elected as a term member to the Council on Foreign Relations in 2001. While serving in the White House, Christie was asked by President Bush to lead an American delegation to an international conference on volunteerism and civic engagement hosted by then Prime Minister Tony Blair in London, England. Subsequent to the volunteerism summit, Christie worked with then Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown to devise an expanded call for civic engagement in Great Britain.

A native of Palo Alto, California, he received his B.A. from Haverford College and his J.D. from the George Washington University National Law Center. He serves as a member of the Board of Directors for The Prevent Cancer Foundation and the American Conservative Union.

SAG-AFTRA eligible as a background actor, you can catch Christie in the 2015 seasons of House of Cards and VEEP. He was commissioned as a member of the Honorable Order of Kentucky Colonels in 2011.

Brent J. Cohen is the Managing Director at Public Service Consulting Group, LLC and a part-time faculty member at New York University’s Washington, DC campus. Brent is a proven government leader and noted justice reform expert, with senior-level experience at the City and Federal level and a track record of legislative, policy, and operations successes.

Previously, Brent was a Senior Policy Advisor to the Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Justice Programs at the United States Department of Justice. Among other responsibilities, Brent built a $40 million government-wide portfolio to more appropriately respond to justice-involved young adults; led the Department’s efforts for President Obama’s My Brother’s Keeper Initiative to address persistent opportunity gaps among boys and young men of color; and, oversaw the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.

In 2013, Brent was one of twelve individuals appointed by the President of the United States to the 2013-2014 class of White House Fellows, and was assigned to work with the Director of the Office of Personnel Management. Immediately prior to the Fellowship, he was the Director of Legislative and Government Affairs for the New York City Department of Probation, and an
Adjunct Assistant Professor at New York University. In his role as Director, Brent successfully developed relationships with state and local elected officials to implement the department’s ambitious reform agenda, including the passage of the landmark “Close to Home” legislation, which realigned the state’s juvenile justice system.

Brent began his career as a teacher in South Los Angeles. He earned a Bachelor of Arts from  the University of California at Berkeley, and a Master of Public Administration from New York University’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service.

Thomas A. (Tad) Devine is a Democratic media consultant and campaign strategist who has developed strategy and produced political ads for candidates in the United States and around the world.  He is president of Devine Mulvey Longabaugh, a media and strategic consulting firm in Washington, D.C.  He has created media in twenty winning U.S. Senate and Gubernatorial campaigns as well as dozens of winning races for the U.S. House of Representatives and local elected officials.  Tad has extensive experience at the highest levels of U.S. Presidential campaigns including serving as a senior advisor to both Al Gore and John Kerry in their Presidential campaigns and is considered a leading expert on the Democratic Party’s presidential nominating process and general election strategy.
 
Tad has also worked on eleven winning campaigns for President or Prime Minister outside the United States including three winning general election campaigns for Fianna Fail in Ireland.  Mr. Devine has taught courses on campaigns and media at New York University, The University of Pennsylvania, Boston University, The George Washington University Graduate School of Political Management, and led a study group as a Resident Fellow at The Institute of Politics at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government. In October 2010, Tad Devine was recognized as one of “the most respected media consultants” in the nation by USA Today.

Tad is a member of the Board of Directors of the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES), a nonpartisan NGO, which is a global leader in electoral administration and participation, as well as the promotion of democracy around the world. He is a member of the Bar in the State of Rhode Island and the District of Columbia.

Justin Evans holds a PhD from the University of Chicago's Committee on Social Thought, and an MFA in fiction from Otis College. He has previously taught humanities at Villlanova University and George Mason University. His primary research interest is the relationship between philosophy and literature in the twentieth century. He writes essays about social matters, literary criticism and fiction. He is working on a volume of fictions and essays, 'The Philosophers Bench.' The missing apostrophe in 'philosophers' is, he regrets, not a typo.

Alicia L. Gleason earned her MFA in Creative Writing (Fiction) from George Mason University, where she was a teaching fellow. She writes short stories, flash fiction, and is at work on her first novel. Her fiction was awarded an Honorable Mention for the Shelley A. Marshall Fiction Contest, and has appeared in Cleaver Magazine and Oblong.
 
Alicia has taught writing and literature classes at George Washington University, and George Mason University. She finds that her work as a professional writer (or perhaps more accurately, as a professional reviser of her drafts) serves as a helpful model for students as they develop writing habits and techniques that acknowledge the power of revision. Alicia earned her BA from Colgate University and is TEFL certified.  

Dave Gottesman is the CountyStat Manager for Montgomery County, Maryland (pop. 1,004,709), in the Office of the County Executive. CountyStat is Montgomery County's performance management and data analytics team designed to drive accountability, transparency, and the strategic use of data to monitor and improve the performance, effectiveness, and efficiency of County services. Prior to joining Montgomery County, Dave served from 2008 to 2012 as the Director of Budget and Performance Management for the Town of North Hempstead, New York (pop. 230,000). He is a member of the Government Finance Officers Association of the U.S. and Canada and served on their Committee on Governmental Budgeting and Fiscal Policy from 2011 to 2017.

Dave holds an MPA in Public and Nonprofit Management from NYU’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, a BA in Journalism from the University of Maryland, College Park, and a Certified Public Manager designation from the Metropolitan Washington Council of Government’s Institute for Regional Excellence. He is currently a Local Government Fellow with Results for America.

Dr. Grant, of National Opinion Research Center (NORC), University of Chicago, has nearly 15 years of experience conducting research and analysis on democratization and reform; youth activism; political Islam; terrorism and insurgency in particularly in North Africa. Her publications include: Climate Change, Migration and Other Adaptation Strategies in the MENA Region (forthcoming in the International Organization for Migration, 2013); The Impact of U.S. Military Drawdown in Iraq on Displaced and Other Vulnerable Populations: Analysis and Recommendations (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2009); Political Activism among Jordanian Youth (2013); and “Trafficking in Africa” in Transnational Threats: Smuggling and Trafficking in Arms, Drugs and Human Life New York: Praeger (2007).

Prior to joining NORC, Grant was a Resident Program Manager in Juba, South Sudan for the National Democratic Institute (NDI) and NDI Program Manager for Southern Africa. Grant is a former senior political scientist at RAND focused on North Africa, and an analyst with the U.S. Department of State, Office of Opinion Research, where she conducted public opinion research in the MENA. She is a former associate professor at Al Akhawayn University, Morocco, and also an adjunct professor at the George Washington University, where she taught a graduate seminar in the Politics of North Africa (2009-2013) and International Relations. She has traveled extensively throughout the Middle East and North Africa, and has lived in Morocco, Iraq, and Tunisia.

Jessica Gresko is a reporter for The Associated Press in Washington. Since joining the AP in 2005 in Miami she has reported from a cargo ship, a hurricane hunter plane and a space shuttle launch pad. She has covered stories including a mine collapse in Utah, a mass shooting in Alabama and an execution in Delaware. She has interviewed newsmakers from Donald Trump to Michelle Obama and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and twice worked as the state political editor during Florida's legislative session. Gresko moved to Washington in 2009 and now covers courts. She is a graduate of Columbia University in New York and holds a master’s degree in the study of law from Georgetown University Law Center.

Dr. Wendy Grossman is a curatorial associate at The Phillips Collection with over fifteen years of teaching and curatorial experience. Her main interests are in the history of photography, early twentieth-century European and American modernisms, museum studies, the relationship between African art and modern art, and the artist Man Ray. She has lectured internationally, curated exhibitions on these topics, and taught in the University of Maryland overseas program in Vienna, Austria, and at several universities in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area. Dr. Grossman was a visiting professor at Middlebury College, Vermont, for the 2005-2006 academic year. She has published extensively in professional journals, exhibition catalogues, and anthologies. Her exhibition catalogue, Man Ray, African Art and the Modernist Lens, was awarded Le prix international de livre d’art tribal in 2010. Her most recent exhibition, Man Ray—Human Equations: A Journey from Mathematics to Shakespeare concluded its international tour in Israel in January 2016.

Vicky Kiechel, AIA and LEED AP, is a practicing architect and native Washingtonian. She works for the Cadmus Group, Inc., an environmental consultancy, on the development and implementation of green building policy for clients in the public (federal, state, and local) and private sectors. Her clients have included the US Green Building Council, US EPA, the states of Wisconsin and Arkansas, and the Appalachian Regional Commission. Vicky’s design work includes small-to-medium scale residential and institutional projects such as the Washington, DC offices of the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Educational Fund and the Maury Public Elementary School Library for the DC Capitol Hill Libraries Project, a public-private partnership. Vicky teaches in the Global Environmental Politics Program at American University, where she was named Most Innovative Green Teacher of the Year in 2010. She holds degrees from Yale College; Oxford University, where she was a Rhodes Scholar; and the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Abby Lindsay is a Part-time Lecturer at New York University and American University, focused on Global Environmental Politics. Her current research analyzes the use of science and social learning within collaborative water governance in Peru. From 2013-2015 she coordinated the Partnership on Technology Innovation and the Environment, a collaborative effort between the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Center for Environmental Policy, Environmental Defense Fund, and other public and private partners focused on scaling up water technology adoption. From 2009-2013, Abby worked at the U.S. Department of State on trade-related environmental cooperation, where she collaborated with over 15 countries to advance environmental protection and improve private sector environmental performance. Abby is currently finishing her Ph.D. at American University in International Relations, focused on Global Environmental Politics. She holds a MA in Global Environmental Politics from American University, a MA in Law and Diplomacy from the Fletcher School, a MA in Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning from Tufts University, and BS in Environmental Science from the University of Mary Washington. She has also completed research on renewable energy, climate change policy, sustainable development, global forest governance, and environment and trade.

Marcos L. Martínez earned his MFA in Creative Writing (Fiction) from George Mason University, where he was a teaching fellow and received the Outstanding Graduate Student award.  His fiction, poetry, and non-fiction have appeared in numerous publications including The Washington Blade, RiverSedge, Whiskey Island, The Harvard Gay & Lesbian Review, and the HIV +/- Here and Now Project.  A Lambda Literary Fellow, Marcos’ work explores the troubled relationships between humanity and nature; he is currently working on a novel and a companion collection of poetry.

Marcos has taught writing and literature at George Mason University; as a Sally Merten Fellow, he taught creative writing in Northern Virginia high schools and public libraries.  As co-founder and Editor-in-Chief of Stillhouse Press, an independent non-profit publisher, he has trained BFA and MFA students in the art and business of the book publishing industry.  He finds that his experience as both a writer and an editor provides unique insights to guide students through the process of brainstorming, scaffolding, constructing, and remodeling their written works.  Marcos earned his BA in Liberal Studies from Georgetown University.

Dr. McGarry is  a working professional who has enjoyed careers in both academia and for-profit and not-for-profit institutions.  She is currently a Senior Consultant to the US Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census where she is engaged in supporting the development and testing of the 2020 US Census.  In her capacity as a Senior Consultant, she identifies, monitors, and reports on the more than 5,000 technical requirements to ensure a reliable and comprehensive 2020 Census.  Reliability affects the proposed use of not only the internet for Census survey response but also the use of mobile devices and analysis and reporting.  Additionally, Dr. McGarry consults with the DC government on the institution and design of their enterprise architecture development.

In addition to her professional activities, she teaches at the George Washington University in the graduate programs.  Courses she teaches are Systems Development Life-cycle, Program Management, Telecommunication, and Technology and Society.

In her personal life, she races sailboats on the Chesapeake Bay and spends a lot of money on her 36’ C&C for cruising around the Bay. She also fosters Cocker Spaniels.

Steve McMahon is an attorney and longtime political strategist who has worked on Democratic political campaigns and advised some of America's leading companies for over 20 years. He was a senior advisor in three presidential campaigns, and the lead strategist in Howard Dean's 2004 presidential campaign, which revolutionized the use of the internet in political campaigns. 

McMahon is a co-founder of Purple Strategies (www.purplestategies.com), one of Washington's leading public affairs firms that leverages political strategies to move and shape public opinion on behalf of some of America’s leading companies and brands. He appears regularly as a political commentator on MSNBC, CNN, CNBC and other television networks. Steve began his career on the Senate staff of United States Senator Edward M. Kennedy and is an attorney by training.

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Dr. Alexander Nagel received his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. He is working on the archaeology and art of three UNESCO world heritage sites in Iran (Persepolis, Pasargadae, Susa), on materials excavated at Greece (Stratos, Tegea, Loukou), and ancient Yemen. His scholarly interests include research on polychromy and heritage preservation, ancient ceramics technology, and museum exhibitions, which he put into practice in capacities when curating a great number of exhibitions at the Smithsonian Institution’s Freer Sackler, as a Research Associate at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History, at the Pergamon-Museum in Berlin, Germany, as well as foreign Embassies in Washington, DC. He has published widely on pigments and original decorations at Persepolis, terracotta figurines from Greece, and has organized conferences on heritage and display of ancient near eastern materials in the museum, the role of color in the ancient world, and preservation challenges. He finds that his excitement as a museum professional and archaeologist can serve as a helpful model for students as they develop an interest in the humanities and acknowledge the power of heritage and the past for the future.

Matthew Noble-Olson received his Ph.D. from Brown University in Modern Culture and Media. His research focuses on experimental film and media, American cinema, early cinema, the historicity of media, representations of nature, and the relation between art and cinema. He is currently working on a manuscript titled Late Cinema: Avantgarde, Medium, Capital and has forthcoming essays on the work of Douglas Gordon and Philip Solomon. He has taught numerous courses on film and media, art history, and critical theory at Brown University, Georgetown University, The Corcoran College of Art and Design, and the Maryland Institute College of Art.

John Prados is an analyst of national security based in Washington, DC. Prados holds a Ph.D. from Columbia University in Political Science (International Relations) and focuses on presidential power, international relations, intelligence and military affairs. He is a senior fellow and project director with the National Security Archive at George Washington University. Prados heads the Archive’s documentation projects for the CIA and for Vietnam, and assists with the Archive’s projects on Afghanistan and Iraq. His current book is The Family Jewels: The CIA, Secrecy, and Presidential Power (University of Texas Press). Recently out in paperback are Vietnam: The History of an Unwinnable War, 1945-1975 (University Presses of Kansas), and Islands of Destiny: The Solomons Campaign and the Eclipse of the Rising Sun (NAL/Caliber). His current e-book is “Rethinking National Security” (nowandthenreader.com). Other notable works include How the Cold War Ended: Debating and Doing History (Potomac), Normandy Crucible: The Decisive Battle That Shaped World War II in Europe (NAL/Caliber), and In Country: Remembering the Vietnam War (Rowman & Littlefield).

Prados is author of seventeen other books, with titles on national security, the American presidency, intelligence, diplomatic and military history, including Vietnam, the Soviet Union, and World War II. Pathbreaking at the time were his history of the National Security Council, Keepers of the Keys; while The Soviet Estimate: U.S. Intelligence and Soviet Strategic Forces became a key resource for understanding Soviet military power.

Unwinnable War is the winner of the Henry Adams Prize in American History. In addition the works Vietnam: Unwinnable War, Keepers of the Keys and Combined Fleet Decoded were each nominated by their publishers for the Pulitzer Prize. Awarded works in addition to Unwinnable War include Combined Fleet Decoded, which won the book award of the New York Military Affairs Symposium and was a “notable naval book of the year” for the U.S. Naval Institute; The Soviet Estimate which received the book prize of the Consortium for the Study of Intelligence; and Valley of Decision, also a “notable naval book of the year” for the U.S. Naval Institute. Prados has chapters in thirty-two other books, and entries in five reference works. More are forthcoming.

Prados has written other books and many papers and articles on the CIA, including Safe for Democracy: The Secret Wars of the CIA (Ivan Dee Publisher). Works on Vietnam include The Hidden History of the Vietnam War, a volume examining the lack of “perfect strategies” for the United States in that conflict (Ivan Dee Publisher); The Blood Road (John Wiley’s Sons), a book reframing the war through the lens of the Ho Chi Minh Trail (John Wiley & Sons); Valley of Decision, a detailed history of the siege of Khe Sanh (Houghton Mifflin), written with veteran Ray Stubbe; Inside the Pentagon Papers (Harper & Row), a study of this controversial Department of Defense war review (University Press of Kansas), written and edited with Margaret Pratt-Porter; Operation Vulture, a diplomatic-military history of Dien Bien Phu; and In Country, an anthology of combat writing from the Vietnam war (Rowman & Littlefield).

Prados is author of twenty-three books in all. Among other works are William Colby and the CIA: The Secret Wars of a Controversial Spymaster; Hoodwinked: The Documents That Reveal How Bush Sold Us a War; The White House Tapes: Eavesdropping on the Presidents (written and edited book and CD collection); America Responds to Terrorism (written and edited);  and Presidents’ Secret Wars, now in its third edition. Safe for Democracy and Vietnam: Unwinnable War have appeared in French translation.

Prados has served as historical consultant to RGoldfilms, originators of the Oscar-nominated history documentary The Most Dangerous Man in America (2009),  to Carl Colby Films for The Man Nobody Knew: In Search of My Father, CIA Spymaster William Colby (2011), and to WGBH Television for their production of The American Experience: Spy in the Sky (2003).

His papers have appeared in the journals Intelligence and National Security, Journal of American History, Diplomatic History, Political Science Quarterly, and the Journal of East-West Studies. His “Electronic Briefing Books” on important subjects of Iraq, intelligence, and Vietnam war history can be found on the National Security Archive website, www.nsarchiv.org.

Prados is also an award-winning designer of board strategy games for many publishers. He had authored dozens of feature articles and is a contributing editor to MHQ. His pieces have appeared widely, including in Vanity Fair, The Washington Post Outlook, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, The VVA Veteran, the American Legion Magazine, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Naval History, The American Prospect, Scientific American, Against the Odds, Strategy & Tactics and elsewhere. Internet articles have appeared at NeimanWatchdog.com, FP.org, Foreign Policy in Focus, SHAFR.org, History News Network, Tompaine.com, TNR.com, American Prospect Online, and elsewhere. His book reviews have also appeared widely. A variety of Prados commentaries and other materials are available on his website, www.johnprados.com.

Bulbul Tiwari received her PhD from the University of Chicago, focusing on South Asian cultural history. Dr. Tiwari received her BA in Literature from Harvard University. As a postdoctoral Humanities fellow at Stanford University she taught courses on media studies, religion and film. In addition to her scholarship, Dr Tiwari has written and directed plays, made films, designed websites and curated museum exhibits. All her projects demonstrate her interest in myths, storytelling and technology.

Dr. Tiwari's multimedia dissertation was the first entirely digital dissertation at the University of Chicago. In 2009 it received an international award from the University of Michigan's Humanities Center. In 2011, the project "Maha Multipedia" was published online. The digital launch was accompanied by an exhibit at Stanford University. Since 2013 Dr. Tiwari has lived in Washington DC, where she teaches courses for NYU DC and Georgetown University.

Patrick Tobin is a historian specializing on 20th century Europe, with particular concentrations on the Holocaust, transitional justice, and the relationship between law and memory. He received his PhD from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2013. His dissertation, currently being revised to manuscript, explores how and why West Germany went from providing general asylum to Holocaust perpetrators in the first postwar decade to one that actively sought them out for prosecution from the late 1950s on. In the process, the research examines the processes by which West Germans came to view their courts as a crucial venue in their attempts to confront and internalize the legacies of the Holocaust.

A native of Western Michigan, Patrick currently lives in Washington, DC, where he does research for the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and consults on public policy.

Michael Ulrich became Director of NYU Washington, DC
after over eleven years at the University of Maryland.  For most of that time, he directed study abroad and taught several short term courses for premedical students in London, Paris, Amsterdam, Madrid and Cape Town.  In the most recent national rankings, Maryland was #17 for study abroad participation among doctoral institutions, up from #43 when he began his oversight of the program.  NYU is #1 in this ranking.  Prior to his tenure at Maryland, Michael was on the biology faculty at Elon University where his duties included co-chairing the department, teaching biology and interdisciplinary courses and developing new study abroad programs.  He received a Ph.D. in Molecular Genetics from Washington University and graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Iowa with a BA in biology.  While in graduate school, Michael's first international experience was in El Salvador during their civil war volunteering at an orphanage and later in Jamaica performing similar service. 

In Washington DC, he mentors a student through Jan's Tutoring House and lives in Columbia Heights with his husband Paul, their AussieDoodle Boomer, and their elderly cat Bunny.

John Volpe received his Ph.D. degree in economics from New York University, where he was a teaching fellow.  He has held executive-level positions in the corporate, trade association, foundation, think-tank, consultancy, and academic arenas.  Dr. Volpe has taught undergraduate and graduate courses in finance and economics at New York University, Georgetown University, George Mason University, George Washington University, Johns Hopkins University, and Catholic University, among other institutions.  He has published extensively, mainly in the area of public policy, made numerous presentations to academic institutions, businesses, associations, and corporate groups, and consulted for a number of government agencies (including the Departments of State and Labor, and the U.S. Agency for International Development), associations (including the Employment Policies Institute, and the Association for Healthcare Philanthropy), think tanks (including Stanford Research Institute, the National Planning Association, the International Trade and Investment Center, and the Center for International Private Enterprise), and domestic and international corporations (including TRW and Diageo).