Filmmaker, Writer and Social Activist

Ms. Ibrahim believes in the power of artists to reflect the times and to utilize storytelling to build bridges, and to heal, unite and educate. She is an award-winning filmmaker based in New York and working worldwide. Currently a producer at Redfitz Films, Ms. Ibrahim previously worked on and produced film projects that went on to screen at the top international film festivals such as the International Film Festival Rotterdam, Toronto International Film Festival, Los Angeles Film Festival, Cinéma du Réel in Paris and Sundance Film Festival, among others. Ms. Ibrahim produced and directed the four-part 'Behind the Scenes' documentary Fishing Without Nets for VICE, filmed in Kenya based on the feature film of the same name, which won the best directing award in the US Dramatic Category at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival. A graduate of UC Berkeley, Ms. Ibrahim’s work has taken her around the world and throughout Africa. She was most recently in Senegal, where she directed and produced the short film Sega, starring Alassane Sy (Restless City, Mediterranea), which examines the issue of migration and repatriation. She is passionate about human rights, humanitarian issues and global education. Ms. Ibrahim is actively engaged in domestic and international community service, including filmmaking workshops and volunteer efforts focusing on education initiatives and leadership. Ms. Ibrahim is proud of the organizations in which she has been able to combine filmmaking and advocacy such as Cell-ED, Kickstart International, Gobee Group, and the International Rescue Committee, as well as past participation with United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for World Refugee Day in Kakuma Refugee Camp, where she participated in a film workshop for refugee youth. Outside of her film work and travel, she is currently developing filmmaking workshops for girls, which will be held at the Bronx Documentary Center.

Special Advisor to the Children's Rights Division of Human Rights Watch

Lois Whitman is the founder and former director (1994-2012) of the Human Rights Watch Children’s Rights Division. Human Rights Watch’s Children’s Rights Division investigates and works to end human rights abuses of children around the world, including the use of children as soldiers; objectionable forms of child labor; torture of children; attacks on students, teachers, and schools; children incarcerated with adults or subjected to extreme sentences; police violence against street children; and migrant children. Ms. Whitman has been associated with Human Rights Watch since 1987 and is currently Senior Advisor to the Children’s Rights Division. She has conducted human rights investigations and written reports on abuses in many countries around the world, including Turkey, Greece, Northern Ireland, Macedonia, Romania, Bulgaria, Liberia, Jamaica, Cuba, and Sri Lanka and has testified before the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child and United States Congressional committees. Earlier, as General Counsel to the NYC Commission on Human Rights, she drafted the gay rights bill that was passed by the NYC Council in 1986. Ms. Whitman has taught Women and the Law at Hunter College, Law and Social Work at Stony Brook School of Social Work, and Human Rights of Children at the Columbia School for International and Public Affairs. A lawyer and a social worker, Ms. Whitman received a BA from Smith College, a Master’s Degree in Social Work from Columbia University, and a law degree from Rutgers University. She received the Smith College Medal in 2002, the Dean’s Medal from CUNY Law School in 2009, and an honorary degree from Le Moyne College in 2015. She is currently on the board of Physicians for Human Rights and the Board of Visitors of CUNY Law School.

Psychologist, Disability Rights Advocate, Model

Dr. Sheypuk has combined her psychologist’s expertise with her bedrock sense of social justice to advocate on behalf of the mainstreaming of Americans with disabilities, in the context of their professional, consumer, social and sexual lives. Her tireless promotion of her own story as an active urban professional woman living with a disability has earned her the tagline "Carrie Bradshaw on Wheels," and has brought hope and inspiration to hundreds of thousands of disabled women around the world.

Earning the title of Ms. Wheelchair New York in 2012, and becoming the first fashion model in a wheelchair to "walk" the runway at New York Fashion Week in 2014, Dr. Sheypuk has used her expanding global media profile to advocate for greater commercial attention to women with disabilities as a major consumer market. Dr. Sheypuk has written passionately about this "unseen giant" of the demographic, constituting more than $200 billion in consumer purchasing power. Her emphasis on the glamour and sexuality of the disabled female has encouraged countless disabled women in their quest to explore and express their own inherent beauty and desirability.

Professionally, Dr. Sheypuk has focused on issues of dating, intimacy and sexual fulfillment among people with disabilities. Her private practice, employing Skype-therapy methods to treat disabled patients, is a model for reaching out to those who might not otherwise seek help from the psychological profession. People with disabilities seek her out as a psychologist who has experienced and overcome obstacles similar to theirs.

In a more popular context, Dr. Sheypuk has initiated a regular expert-in-residence column for the women’s magazine SheKnows, and she is also an editorial board member and writer for Women’s eNews.

Ph.D., Clinical Associate Professor, Programs in Early Childhood Special Education at NYU

Barbara Schwartz is a leading faculty member with the programs in Early Childhood and Early Childhood Special Education where she is engaged in teaching, field supervision, professional development, program administration, as well as development and field-based research. Prior to joining the NYU faculty in 2003, she was Director of the Head Start Disabilities Services Quality Improvement Center for federal region II (New York, New Jersey, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands), where for 20 years she supported the implementation of services to support children with disabilities in Early Head Start and Head Start. She has been a Mayoral appointee to the NYC Early Intervention Coordinating Council (1994 - 2013), an adviser to the New York State Education Department and the New York State Early Intervention Program under the Department of Health, a Board Member of New York Zero to Three, and an active member of the NYS Association for Early Childhood Teacher Education, engaging in activities related to the NYS Regents review of Early Childhood Special Education Certification. She is on the editorial review board of the Journal of Early Childhood Teacher Education.
 
Barbara has been actively engaged in providing training and presentations at international, national, regional, and local events for over 30 years and has co-authored chapters on Head Start and early childhood special education. Over recent years she has been engaged with an intensive consultation process with the NYS Early Childhood Direction Center in Manhattan to support training to NYC Early Learn programs on effective inclusion of children with disabilities. Barbara has been a presenter at the renown 92Y Wonderplay Early Childhood Learning Conference for many years, most recently leading an interactive workshop called, Looking Beyond Labels: Feelings & Perceptions about Working with Children with Developmental Delays and/or Disabilities.

Student, Social activist and 92Y Teen Center

Leila Foulon is a 16-year-old high school junior; she is a social activist, budding scientist, photographer and a committed volunteer at the 92nd Street Y Teen Center.

Leila considers her work to promote women’s education in Bhutan as one of her greatest accomplishments. When she discovered (at age 7) that girls in some parts of the world did not have access to education, she and her father researched different parts of the world where education for girls is not a given, and eventually settled on the all-boys Choki Traditional Art School (CTAS) in Bhutan. The school agreed to accept girls if funding could be found to build a girls dormitory. Leila got to work, raising $7,780 through bake sales at school and other fundraising projects; she raised the rest by extending her fundraising efforts to the grown-ups in her life. CTAS built the dormitory, and Leila attended the opening (with her family) in Bhutan when she was 9. She returned in 2015 to celebrate the first graduating class, and seeing how her actions had profoundly affected the lives of the young women in Bhutan -- who were all able to get jobs because of their education -- inspires her to continue giving back.

Leila is also committed to the scientific field, with particular interests in biology, bioengineering and bioethics. She attended the Engineering Academy at the University of Pennsylvania, where she developed a detailed research proposal on preventing cancer cell growth in tumors by over-exaggerating the presence of an essential protein. After a brief introduction to the world of in-vitro fertilization (shadowing a doctor in that field), she went on to explore bioethics through an internship at the NYU Center for Bioethics, where she is writing a teaching resource module for high school teachers who want to include ethical issues around gender selection and “designer babies” in their lessons or curricula.

Leila’s favorite hobby is photography, inspired in part by the beauty of Bhutan. She had a photo published in Photographer’s Forum Best of Photography 2015, and received eight medals from the National Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, including a Golden Key award for her photo of the Tiger’s Nest monastery in Bhutan, “Isolation.”  That award led to her photograph being exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art as part of a student art exhibit. 

She also volunteers regularly at 92Y’s Teen Center, working with children as a homework helper, reading to Kindergartners and helping out in an after-school science and art program.

Founder and President of Rise

Amanda Nguyen is the Founder and President of Rise, a non-profit dedicated to protecting the rights of sexual assault survivors. Amanda is the architect of the Sexual Assault Survivors’ Bill of Rights, federal legislation that was signed into law by President Obama in October 2016. Amanda was motivated to pursue justice after battling the legal system to keep her own rape kit from being destroyed in Massachusetts. In addition the federal legislation, Rise is pushing similar measures in Statehouses across the country. 

Amanda began her start in public service at NASA headquarters where she worked on the last space shuttle launch, public-private partnerships and the Asteroid Redirect Grand Challenge Mission. She previously worked at the White House in the Office of Public Engagement and the Chief of Staff’s office, at Morgan Stanley in public finance investment banking, and at the Harvard-Smithsonian Astrophysics Center as an Origins of Life fellow analyzing the Kepler exoplanet mission. Most recently, Amanda was the Deputy White House Liaison at the Department of State. Before this role, she served in the State Department’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons as a speechwriter. Amanda is also a 2016 TED fellow.
Amanda graduated from Harvard College, where she created the first student-written course on modern slavery. While in college, Amanda co-founded Wema Children, an orphanage in Kenya.