Meet the Speakers
Chaka Booker
Chaka Booker is the Chief People Officer for The Broad Foundation and Family Office. Founded by philanthropists Eli and Edythe Broad, the organization stewards groundbreaking institutions in education, science, workforce development, and the arts. Prior to this role, Chaka was managing director for The Broad Center, a national nonprofit focused on leadership development that partnered with 40+ organizations annually. Through his work, Chaka has crisscrossed the country developing talent, advancing DEI, building partnerships, leading teams, advising, innovating, and executing. He believes in the power of working across sectors to solve social issues and regularly consults for non-profits, universities, foundations, private sector firms, start-ups, and everything in between.
Chaka is a Pahara Fellow at The Aspen Institute and a Forbes contributor on leadership and entrepreneurship. He is the author of two books; The Empowered Candidate: The Power You Have to Land the Job You Deserve and Mastering The Hire: 12 Strategies to Improve Your Odds of Finding the Best Hire (HarperCollins). He has degrees in economics and psychology from UCLA and an MBA from Stanford University.
Rich Stowell
Rich Stowell is the Director of Communications for Alpine School District in Utah. Serving 85,000 students in 92 schools, it is Utah’s largest school district.
Rich began his education career in the San Francisco Bay area as a founding teacher in two charter schools. After earning a master’s degree in mathematics education he enlisted in the US Army and took a role as a public affairs noncommissioned officer. He became inspired by the power of public relations and strategic communications and after two overseas deployments earned a PhD. in communications from the University of Utah. He has taught at the University of Utah and the University of San Francisco.
His work focuses on values-based communications and trust-building capacity. Based on his roles at Waterford Upstart, an in-home early learning software program, and at ParentGuidance.org, a school-supported mental health resource for parents, he began to study and write more about parenting and parent-to-child communication.
Liliana Sánchez
Liliana Sánchez is a sophomore at UC Merced, with plans to transfer over to UC Santa Barbara to major in ethnomusicology during her junior and senior years. She began her college journey as a freshman at Spelman College, a historically Black women’s institution in Atlanta, Georgia. A graduate of a K-8 Spanish/English dual language immersion program, Liliana continued her Spanish studies through AP Spanish at Patterson High School and has also explored Arabic through summer programs. She spent her sophomore year of high school at King’s Academy in Jordan and as a percussionist, she was the section leader of the PHS percussion section during her senior year.
An avid traveler who has explored four continents, Liliana is also deeply interested in politics and social justice. Liliana is a writer, poet, dancer, and musician who believes that languages and the arts enrich our world. She has shared her passion in various forums, including testifying before the California legislature, delivering motivational messages at state conferences, and co-presenting seminars on multilingualism, equity, and the arts.
She has facilitated professional development sessions and student focus groups and recently co-presented a paper titled “Silenced Language” at the 2024 Language Policy and Planning Conference in Ottawa, Canada. Currently, Liliana is interning with Parsec Education and Voices College-Bound Language Academies.
