LAMcon10 Speakers and Presenters:

Dr. Lonnie Bunch

Lonnie G. Bunch III, is the director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture.

As the museum’s director, Bunch has identified the museum’s mission, is developing exhibitions and public programs and coordinating the museum’s fundraising and budget development.

Dr. Bunch was recently interviewed on NPR’s Talk of the Nation. Listen to his interview here!

In addition to the Keynote Speaker, LAMcon10 will also feature a plenary session led by Elizabeth Merritt of American Association of Museums' Center for the Future of Museums, and Dr. Peter Bishop, Associate Professor in the Future Studies program at the University of Houston, Clear Lake. This innovative and interactive session will treat on the future of communication, problem-solving, and idea-gathering, through crowd sourcing.

(Taken from the Smithsonian Institute website: http://www.si.edu/)

Elizabeth Merritt, Founding Director, Center for the Future of Museums
(M.A. Duke University, B.S. Yale University, Museum Management Institute)

Merritt has 15 years experience in museums, including administration, curation and collections management. Before joining AAM in 1999, she was Director, Collections and Research, at Cincinnati Museum Center, responsible for the administration of the curation, collections management, research, and conservation efforts related to the natural history and science, history, and children's museums. Her areas of expertise include museum standards and best practices, ethics, collections management and planning, and assessment of nonprofit performance. She is a Master Gardener, a competitive fencer, and serves as chair of the fundraising taskforce for the Yale Fencing Association.

(Taken from the Center for the Future of Museums website: http://www.futureofmuseums.org/about/profiles/)

Dr. Peter Bishop is an Associate Professor of Strategic Foresight and Coordinator of the graduate program in Futures Studies at the University of Houston.

Dr. Bishop specializes in techniques for long term forecasting and planning. He delivers keynote addresses and conducts seminars on the future for business, government and not-for-profit organizations. He also facilitates groups in developing scenarios, visions and strategic plans for the future. Dr. Bishop's clients include IBM, the NASA Johnson Space Center, Nestle USA, the Texas Department of Transportation, Tetra Pak, the Shell Pipeline Corporation, the Defense and Central Intelligence Agencies, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the Waitt Family Foundation, the California Environmental Protection Agency, and the Center for Houston's Future. Dr. Bishop is also a founding board member of the new Association of Professional Futurists, and he is President of his own firm, Strategic Foresight and Development, which offers education and training in futures thinking and techniques to the corporate market.

(Taken from the University of Houston website: http://www.tech.uh.edu/Directory/Bishop/Peter/)