Jury Alumni

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  Yuko Osawa

  Principal Designer, argodesign

  2022 Consumer Technology Jury Member

  Yuko Osawa is a Principal Designer at argodesign in Brooklyn, New York. With a career spanning 20+ years, she has lived and worked in Japan, Australia, the UK, Canada, and the US. Her work spans immersive exhibitions and digital design for subjects as diverse as corporate digital transformation, DNA sequencing, and connected toys for kids. She is inspired by the messiness of complex problems. Outside of work, Yuko is an avid snowboarder, rock climber, and plant mama. Her favorite food is cake. (That’s not a joke.)

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  Milena Sadée

  Design Director, Airbnb

  2022 Consumer Technology Jury Member

  Milena Sadée is a Director of Design for Workshop at Airbnb. Prior to this role, she led a 30 person, multidisciplinary team within Amazon Devices that focused on early concept ideation and development across Echo Products, Alexa AI, Emerging Devices and more. Previously she led the interactive team at 2x4, an award winning global design studio with clients such as Prada, MoMA and Nike. There she focused on retail, event, exhibition, and installation design.

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  Sarah B. Brooks

  IBM Distinguished Designer, Strategic Foresight, IBM

  2022 Design Education Initiative Jury Captain

  Sarah leads a Strategic Foresight practice within IBM design. Her 20+ years of research and practice center on the personal and organizational capabilities individuals and teams need to confidently navigate uncertainty, imagine, and work toward regenerative and equitable futures. She is an intrapreneur who has operationalized design education and practice across enterprise, startup, non-profit, Federal Government, and community contexts. She lives by the ocean in Montauk, New York with her husband Freddie and their dog, Juno.

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  Shalini Agrawal

  Associate Professor, Critical Ethnic Studies, California College of the Arts

  2022 Design Education Initiative Jury Member

  Shalini Agrawal is trained as an architect and brings over 25 years of experience in community-engaged practice. She is Founder & Principal of Public Design for Equity, a practice that re-envisions and activates new systems towards equity-driven outcomes, and Director of Pathways to Equity, a leadership experience for ethical community-engaged design. She is an award-winning educator at California College of the Arts as Associate Professor in Critical Ethnic Studies, Individualized, Interdisciplinary Design Studios and the Decolonial School. Shalini’s research and practice focuses on revealing the historical legacies of colonization in architecture and design and dismantling its lasting impacts.

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  Ruki Neuhold-Ravikumar

  Acting Director, Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum

  2022 Design Education Initiative Jury Member

  Ruki Neuhold-Ravikumar is the Nerman Family President-select of the Kansas City Art Institute.
  
  Originally from Chennai, India, Ruki draws from her international experiences as a designer to reimagine education and improve access to creative career pathways. Most recently, she has served as the Acting Director of Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design museum. At the height of the pandemic, Ruki was the Smithsonian’s Acting Under Secretary for education, responsible for leading a Smithsonian-wide team that responded to the distance-learning needs of families that were caught in the digital divide. Ruki has also served as the Smithsonian’s Associate Provost for education and was Director of education at the Cooper Hewitt.
  
  Before joining the Smithsonian in 2017, she was the Associate Dean of the College of Fine Arts and Design at the University of Central Oklahoma, where she had advanced from Professor to Director of graduate programs and Chair of the Department of Design.
  
  Ruki has served in leadership roles at all levels of the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA), including the AIGA Design Educators Community and local and national boards. She has been recognized by AIGA's Oklahoma Chapter with the Fellow Award in 2015 and her alma mater, Iowa State University with the Design Achievement Award in 2021.

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  Pierce Otlhogile-Gordon, Ph.D.

  Equity Innovation Studio Director, Think Rubix

  2022 Design Education Initiative Jury Member

  Dr. Pierce Otlhogile-Gordon is an innovation catalyst, researcher, facilitator, and evaluator, impassioned by the space between transformation and liberation.
  
  As the Director of the Equity Innovation studio at Think Rubix, a Black-led social innovation consultancy. Dr. Gordon serves as a shepherd for Equity Innovation to shape our collective future.
  
  He’s taught courses in design, evaluation, international development, and equity across four continents, co-designed partnerships, products, and services with local and international changemakers to support social change, and researched the complexity, evaluation, and emergence of design and innovation across the world.
  
  What can we build together?

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  Omari Souza

  Assistant Professor, Communication Design, Texas State University

  2022 Design Education Initiative Jury Member

  Omari Souza is an assistant professor in the Communication Design program at Texas State University. He is the organizer of the State of Black Design Conference (online, April 2021). He previously organized and hosted a multipanel event titled "The State of Black Design" (online, Sept. 2020), which drew a live audience of 2,071 — the second-largest Livestream audience for an educational event in Texas State's history.
  
  Omari is a first-generation American of Jamaican descent, raised in the Bronx, New York. Before arriving at Texas State, he gained work experience with companies and institutions such asVIBEmagazine, the buffalo News, CBS Radio, and Case Western Reserve University. He earned a BFA in Digital Media from Cleveland Institute of Art and an MFA in Design from Kent State University. Omari's research explores the idea of perceptions and how visual narratives influence culture — how we view ourselves and others around us.

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  Pickett Slater Harrington

  Faculty, Masters of Arts in Social Design, Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA)

  2022 Design for Social Impact Jury Captain

  Pickett has spent his career igniting social change. He is the founder and managing principal at Joltage, a social change design firm that champions innovative solutions to social challenges, and serves as full-time faculty in the Master of Arts in Social Design (MASD) at the Maryland Institute of Art (MICA).
  
  Pickett has deep experience connecting and working with communities, for profit businesses, nonprofit institutions and government partners to address complex, systemic social issues.
  
  Pickett holds a Master in Social Work, with a concentration in organizations and communities, from the University of South Carolina. He lives in Baltimore, Maryland with his wife and two kids and enjoys woodworking, sailing and sci-fi.

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  Brian C. Rubin

  Senior Education Designer, Education Design Lab

  2022 Design for Social Impact Jury Member

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  Ian Yang

  Founder & CEO, Gantri

  2022 Furniture & Lighting Jury Captain

  Ian founded Gantri in 2016 to reimagine how design is developed, made and sold. After joining the San Francisco TechShop, he became fascinated with the potential of 3D printing and sought to build a new way for creators to bring original designs directly to consumers that’s simpler, more accessible and more sustainable.
  
  Prior to founding Gantri, Ian led product and growth at Lovely, a design-forward apartment rental marketplace that exited in 2014. He was also a business strategy consultant at OC&C, advising Fortune 500 technology and consumer goods companies.
  
  Ian graduated from the London School of Economics with honors in 2010. He was awarded Apartment Therapy’s Design Changemaker and House Beautiful’s 2020 Visionary.

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  Estelle Bailey-Babenzien

  Business Founder, Creative Director and Interior Designer, Dream Awake Studio

  2022 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member

  Estelle Bailey-Babenzien is of British and Ghanaian descent and was born and raised in the UK. She graduated from Central Saint Martins in London, with an honors degree in Fashion- communication and promotion, and moved straight to New York City. Since then, she has built her career as a creative director in the fields of music, fashion, and interior architecture and design. In 2015, she cofounded the men's/unisex clothing brand Noah with her husband, designer Brendon Babenzien. Noah has two stores in the United States, two stores in Japan, and shop-in-shops in three Dover Street Market stores globally. Simultaneously, Estelle continues to grow her design studio, Dream Awake Design, which focuses on experiential and interior design, and creative direction for commercial and residential projects and brands. She lives in Brooklyn, NY, with her husband and their six year-old daughter, Sailor.

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  Jeremy Cai

  CEO, Italic

  2022 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member

  Jeremy Cai was born and raised in Illinois where his entrepreneurial streak began while operating a lending business at his middle school lunch table. Jeremy studied at Babson College before dropping out as an early member of the Thiel Fellowship to pursue a career in technology. Since then, Jeremy has brought many successful companies to life, including Fountain, a leading software platform that businesses such as Uber and Amazon use to hire millions of people each year, Not Pot, a cult-favorite wellness brand, and Tonari , a Japanese anime
  studio.
  
  In his current role as CEO of Italic, Jeremy oversees global strategy and culture.

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  Bryan Jay Calvero

  Founder, Period Correct

  2022 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member

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  Eny Lee Parker

  Founder, Eny Lee Parker

  2022 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member

  Eny Lee Parker is a spatial designer based in New York, emphasizing in objects, furniture and lighting, using clay as her main medium. Parker reclaims the essence of making used in traditional craft from our past – the slowness, the intention, the respect for natural resources, creating contemporary objects that brings awareness to our presence as well as to non-living things.

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  Christina N. Harrington, Ph.D.

  Assistant Professor, HCI Institute, School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University

  2022 Health & Wellness Jury Captain

  Christina Harrington (she/her) is a designer and qualitative researcher who works at the intersection of interaction design and health and racial equity. She combines her background in electrical engineering and industrial design to focus on inclusive approaches to support historically excluded groups such as Black communities, older adults, and individuals with differing abilities in areas of health, wellness, and community building. She looks to methods such as design justice and community collectivism to broaden and amplify participation in design as a universal language of communication and knowledge. Dr. Harrington is the Director of the Equity and Health Innovations Design Research Lab at Carnegie Mellon University.

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  Nadia Beyzaei

  Sessional Faculty & Health Design Lab Staff, Emily Carr University of Art + Design

  2022 Health & Wellness Jury Member

  Nadia Beyzaei (MRes, BSc) is a designer and researcher working in the spaces of health and community engagement. Nadia is the Coordinator of the Health Design Lab at Emily Carr University and an instructor in the Faculty of Design + Dynamic Media. Through her role at the Health Design Lab, Nadia has been a communication designer and design researcher on Indigenous health, aging, and complex care projects, while supporting the dissemination of research both locally and internationally.
  
  Nadia holds a Master of Research in Healthcare + Design degree from the Royal College of Art, with her thesis work focusing on how design can enhance engagement in evidence-based medicine.
  
  Through her 7 years at BC Children's Hospital Research Institute, Nadia has worked on a range of behavioural health research projects, including UX/UI projects which aim to improve access to care, and service design projects across clinics at BC Children's Hospital. Her practice focuses on making complex topics accessible and approachable through visual and strategic design.