Yo-Yo Ma

Cellist Yo-Yo Ma’s multi-faceted career is testament to his belief in culture’s power to generate trust and understanding. Whether performing new or familiar works for cello, bringing communities together to explore culture’s role in society, or engaging unexpected musical forms, Yo-Yo strives to foster connections that stimulate the imagination and reinforce our humanity.

Most recently, Yo-Yo began Our Common Nature, a cultural journey to celebrate the ways that nature can reunite us in pursuit of a shared future. Our Common Nature follows the Bach Project, a 36-community, six-continent tour of J. S. Bach’s cello suites paired with local cultural programming. Both endeavors reflect Yo-Yo’s lifelong commitment to stretching the boundaries of genre and tradition to understand how music helps us to imagine and build a stronger society.

Yo-Yo Ma was born in 1955 to Chinese parents living in Paris, where he began studying the cello with his father at age four. When he was seven, he moved with his family to New York City, where he continued his cello studies before pursuing a liberal arts education.

Yo-Yo has recorded more than 120 albums, is the winner of 20 Grammy Awards, and has performed for nine American presidents, most recently on the occasion of President Biden’s inauguration. He has received numerous awards, including the National Medal of the Arts, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the Birgit Nilsson Prize. He has been a UN Messenger of Peace since 2006, and was recognized as one of TIME magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2020.

Louise Richardson

Dame Louise Richardson is president of Carnegie Corporation of New York, the philanthropic foundation established by Andrew Carnegie in 1911. Previously, she served as vice-chancellor (president) of the University of Oxford and of the University of St. Andrews, and as executive dean of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study.

A native of Ireland, she studied history in Trinity College Dublin before gaining her PhD at Harvard University, where she spent 20 years on the faculty of the Department of Government, teaching courses on international security and foreign policy. She currently sits on numerous advisory boards, while serving as a trustee of the Booker Prize Foundation, National Theatre in America, and the nonprofit Inter Mediate. Richardson is also a member of the selection committee of the Aurora Prize for Awakening Humanity. In 2023, the Irish government asked Richardson to serve as the independent chair of its Consultative Forum on International Security Policy.

A political scientist by training, Richardson is recognized internationally as an expert on terrorism and counterterrorism. Today considered a seminal work in the field, her groundbreaking study, What Terrorists Want: Understanding the Enemy, Containing the Threat (2006), was hailed by the New York Times Book Review as an “overdue and essential primer on terrorism and how to tackle it … the book many have been waiting for.” Other publications include Democracy and Counterterrorism: Lessons from the Past (2007), The Roots of Terrorism (2006), and When Allies Differ: Anglo-American Relations during the Suez and Falklands Crises (1996). She has written numerous articles on international terrorism, British foreign and defense policy, security institutions, and international relations; lectured to public, professional, media, and education groups; and served on editorial boards for several journals and presses.

Richardson’s many awards have recognized the excellence of her teaching and scholarship, including the Centennial Medal bestowed on her in 2013 by Harvard’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences for “having the vision to assess emerging threats, for transformative leadership, and for moving seamlessly between the roles of scholar and teacher.” She has been awarded 12 honorary doctorates, including from the universities of Aberdeen, Edinburgh, and St. Andrews in Scotland; Trinity College Dublin and Queen’s University Belfast in Ireland; the University of Notre Dame and Boston College in the U.S.; the University of the West Indies; Ben Gurion University of the Negev in Israel; the Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO) in Russia, and Université Grenoble Alpes in France. Richardson is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, and the Academy of Social Sciences in the United Kingdom, as well as an honorary member of the Royal Irish Academy and a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

In June 2022, Richardson was appointed a Dame Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (DBE) in recognition of her services to higher education. In 2024, the French government named Richardson a Chevalier in the Order of Arts and Letters for advancing arts and culture and for furthering ties between the U.S. and France.

Bryan Stevenson

Bryan Stevenson is the founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative, a human rights organization in Montgomery, Alabama. Under his leadership, EJI has won major legal challenges eliminating excessive and unfair sentencing, exonerating innocent death row prisoners, confronting abuse of the incarcerated and the mentally ill, and aiding children prosecuted as adults.

Mr. Stevenson has argued and won multiple cases at the United States Supreme Court, including a 2019 ruling protecting condemned prisoners who suffer from dementia and a landmark 2012 ruling that banned mandatory life-imprisonment-without-parole sentences for all children 17 or younger. Mr. Stevenson and his staff have won reversals, relief, or release from prison for over 140 wrongly condemned prisoners on death row and won relief for hundreds of others wrongly convicted or unfairly sentenced.

Mr. Stevenson has initiated major new anti-poverty and anti-discrimination efforts that challenge inequality in America. He led the creation of EJI’s highly acclaimed Legacy Sites, which include the Legacy Museum, the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, Freedom Monument Sculpture Park, and Montgomery Square. These new national landmark institutions chronicle the legacy of slavery, lynching, and racial segregation, and the connection to mass incarceration and contemporary issues of racial bias.

Mr. Stevenson’s work has won him numerous awards including the prestigious MacArthur Foundation “Genius” Prize; the ABA Medal, the American Bar Association’s highest honor; the National Medal of Liberty from the American Civil Liberties Union after he was nominated by United States Supreme Court Justice John Stevens; the Public Interest Lawyer of the Year by the National Association of Public Interest Lawyers; and the Olaf Palme Prize in Stockholm, Sweden for international human rights. In 2002, he received the Alabama State Bar Commissioners Award. In 2003, the SALT Human Rights Award was presented to Mr. Stevenson by the Society of American Law Teachers. In 2004, he received the Award for Courageous Advocacy from the American College of Trial Lawyers and also the Lawyer for the People Award from the National Lawyers Guild. In 2006 New York University presented Mr. Stevenson with its Distinguished Teaching Award. Mr. Stevenson won the Gruber Foundation International Justice Prize and was awarded the NAACP William Robert Ming Advocacy Award, the National Legal Aid & Defender Association Lifetime Achievement Award, the Ford Foundation Visionaries Award and the Roosevelt Institute Franklin D. Roosevelt Freedom from Fear Award. In 2012, Mr. Stevenson received the American Psychiatric Association Human Rights Award, the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Fred L. Shuttlesworth Award, and the Smithsonian Magazine American Ingenuity Award in Social Progress. Mr. Stevenson was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Science in 2014 and won the Lannan Cultural Freedom Prize. In 2015, he was named to the Time 100 recognizing the world’s most influential people. In 2016, he received the American Bar Association’s Thurgood Marshall Award. He was named in Fortune’s 2016 and 2017 World’s Greatest Leaders list. He received the Martin Luther King Jr. Nonviolent Peace Prize, from the King Center in Atlanta in 2018. In 2020, he received the Right Livelihood Award from The Right Livelihood Foundation in Sweden. In 2023, he was awarded the National Humanities Medal by President Biden.

Mr. Stevenson has received over 60 honorary doctoral degrees, including degrees from Harvard, Yale, Princeton, the University of Pennsylvania, and Oxford University. He is the author of the critically acclaimed New York Times bestseller Just Mercy, which was named by Time Magazine as one of the 10 Best Books of Nonfiction for 2014 and has been awarded several honors, including the American Library Association’s Carnegie Medal for best nonfiction book of 2015 and a 2015 NAACP Image Award. Just Mercy was adapted as a major motion picture and the film won the American Bar Association’s 2020 Silver Gavel Award as well as four NAACP Image Awards. Mr. Stevenson is also the subject of the Emmy Award-winning HBO documentary True Justice. He is a graduate of the Harvard Law School and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.

Bree Drapa

Bree Drapa is the Library Director of the South Burlington Public Library in Vermont, leading a “Vermont Urban” library serving nearly 21,000 residents and working to remove barriers to access. She previously directed the Westford Public Library for almost 14 years (9 of those as a Solo Librarian), developing a passion for solo librarianship and small and rural libraries. In both roles, Bree has been passionate about making community connections and elevating the professionalism of small and rural library workers.

She is an inaugural and graduating member of ARSL’s Outstanding in Their Field Leadership Institute, co-hosts the monthly “Solo-ish Librarian Happy Hour,” and has co-chaired the 2023 and 2024 ARSL National Conferences. She will serve as the Northeast Regional Representative on the ARSL Board of Directors for 2027-2029. Her path to librarianship builds on earlier experience as a high school history teacher, community advocate, and mother of three.

Tyler Hahn

Tyler Hahn is the Director of the Cherokee Public Library in Cherokee, Iowa, where he leads initiatives focused on digital equity, inclusive engagement, and future-ready workforce development. A 2024 Library Journal Mover & Shaker and 2025 Distinguished Leadership Award winner from the Iowa Library Association, Tyler has expanded rural access to STEM education, built international esports partnerships for youth, and launched adult training programs in emerging technologies. He advocates for rural libraries as essential civic infrastructure—empowering communities through innovation, education, and connection.

Tyler has held several leadership positions within ARSL, including as the Co-Chair of the Advocacy Committee (2022-2023) and as Midwest Regional Representative on the ARSL Board (2024-2025). He will begin his term as Board Vice President/President-Elect in January 2027.

Linda Johnson

As president and CEO of Brooklyn Public Library (BPL), Linda E. Johnson leads one of the nation’s most historic and most innovative library systems. With 62 branches, BPL is the country’s sixth largest public library system and the ninth largest cultural institution in New York, operating with an annual budget of over $200 million while serving 2.7 million residents. Johnson has overseen the BPL’s transformation from an analog to a modern library with state-of-the-art technology available for free to all patrons. Working with elected officials, private foundations, and library stakeholders, Johnson and her team uphold the Library’s mission to ensure that all people have access to the world’s knowledge on every platform, in over 125 languages. BPL offered almost 87,000 programs in 2025 — all for free. Prior to joining BPL in 2012, Johnson served as president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, CEO of the Free Library of Philadelphia Foundation, and president of JCI Data. Johnson is currently the vice chairman of Hamilton College, where she chaired a national search for the College’s 21st president. She is also a trustee of the Metropolitan Opera and PEN America. Johnson has an MBA and a JD. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband Bruce Ratner. 

Tony Marx

Anthony W. Marx is President of The New York Public Library, the nation’s largest library system with 92 locations in the Bronx, Manhattan, and Staten Island and the most used research library in the world. Since joining NYPL in 2011, Marx has strengthened the Library’s role as an essential provider of educational resources and opportunities for all ages. The Library has created new early literacy and after-school programs for children and teens, dramatically increased free English language classes and citizenship support for immigrants, added programs on Rikers Island and at the Manhattan Detention Center, and improved services for scholars and students who rely on the Library’s research collections. Under Marx, the Library has also become a national leader on bridging the digital divide through its efforts to increase access to e-books, expand computer classes and coding training, and a groundbreaking program that provides home internet access to low-income families. Before joining the Library, Marx served as president of Amherst College from 2003 to 2011, during which time the college tripled enrollment for low-income students. Before Amherst, Marx was a political science professor, focusing on South African politics, and director of undergraduate studies at Columbia University. Marx has a BA from Yale, and an MPA and a PhD from Princeton.