General Session Speakers
Friday Morning Speaker
Justin Reich is an associate professor of digital media in the Comparative Media Studies/Writing department at MIT and the director of the Teaching Systems Lab. He is the author of Iterate: The Secret to Innovation in Schools and Failure to Disrupt: Why Technology Alone Can’t Transform Education, and he is the host of the TeachLab Podcast. He earned his doctorate from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and was the Richard L. Menschel HarvardX Research Fellow. He is a past Fellow at the Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and Society. His writings have been published in Science, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Washington Post, The Atlantic, and other scholarly journals and public venues. He started his career as a high school history teacher, and coach of wrestling and outdoor adventure activities.
Follow Justin on Twitter or see all his publications on Google Scholar.
Saturday Morning Speaker
Barbara M. Hunter, APR, became the executive director of the National School Public Relations Association in November 2020. Prior to joining NSPRA, she spent five years as the president/CEO of Hunter Communications LLC, based in Alexandria, Virginia.
She also spent 14 years as the chief communications officer in two school districts in Northern Virginia—Alexandria City Public Schools and Fairfax County Public Schools, the 10th largest in the nation.
She started her career in school communications at AASA, the School Superintendents Association, as editor of The School Administrator magazine. Barbara also served as the director of communications for the National School Boards Association.
Under her leadership and with a phenomenal staff, NSPRA has increased its membership by 50 percent, which now stands at more than 2,800. NSPRA has also increased its Seminar attendance by nearly 40 percent with a record-breaking in-person attendance in 2023 of more than 1,500.
Barbara was the inspiration behind and a primary contributor to NSPRA’s Rubrics of Practice and Suggested Measures, which now serves as the standard for evaluating school communication programs. She has earned dozens of awards and national recognition, including a Silver Anvil Award of Excellence from the Public Relations Society of America and a Gold Medallion from NSPRA for a community engagement campaign on changing school start times.
She holds a bachelor’s degree in communications and management from Hood College and a master’s degree in public relations management from The American University. In addition, she holds accreditation in public relations (APR) and has served as the NSPRA Mideast Region vice president as well as president of the Chesapeake chapter of NSPRA.