Westminster Speaker Series

Bryan Alexander is an award–winning, internationally known futurist, researcher, writer, speaker, consultant, and teacher, working in the field of higher education’s future.

He completed his English language and literature PhD at the University of Michigan in 1997, with a dissertation on doppelgangers in Romantic-era fiction and poetry.  Then Bryan taught literature, writing, multimedia, and information technology studies at Centenary College of Louisiana.  There he also pioneered multi-campus interdisciplinary classes, while organizing an information literacy initiative.

From 2002 to 2014 Bryan worked with the National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education (NITLE), a non-profit working to help small colleges and universities best integrate digital technologies.  With NITLE he held several roles, including co-director of a regional education and technology center, director of emerging technologies, and senior fellow.  Over those years Bryan helped develop and support the nonprofit, grew peer networks, consulted, and conducted a sustained research agenda.  In 2013 Bryan launched a business, Bryan Alexander Consulting, LLC.  Through BAC he consults throughout higher education in the United States and abroad.

Bryan speaks widely and publishes frequently, with articles appearing in venues including The Atlantic Monthly, Inside Higher Ed.  He has been interviewed by and featured in the New York Times, the Washington Post, MSNBC, the Wall Street Journal, US News and World Report, National Public Radio (2017, 2020, 2020, 2020, 2020), Marketplace, the Chronicle of Higher Education (2016, 2020), the Atlantic Monthly, Reuters, Times Higher Education, the National Association of College and University Business Officers, Pew Research, Campus Technology, The Hustle, Minnesota Public Radio, USA Today, and the Connected Learning Alliance.

Bryan’s book Academia Next: The Futures of Higher Education (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2020), won an Association of Professional Futurists award.  His Universities on Fire: Higher Education in the Age of Climate Crisis appeared in 2023 and won the 2025 Frederic W. Ness Book Award.  His new book, Peak Higher Ed: How to Survive the Emerging Academic Crisis, appeared in January 2026. His other books include Gearing Up For Learning Beyond K-12 and The New Digital Storytelling (second edition).

Bryan is currently a senior scholar at Georgetown University and teaches graduate seminars in their Learning, Design, and Technology program.

Dr. Thema Bryant is a psychologist, author, professor, sacred artist, and minister who is leading the way in creating healthy relationships, healing traumas, and overcoming stress and oppression. Dr. Thema Bryant is the author of life changing books including Matters of the Heart, Homecoming, which paints a road map for dismantling fear and shame to live a free and authentic life, Reclaim Yourself: The Homecoming Workbook, and The Antiracism Handbook: Practical Tools to Shift Your Mindset and Uproot Racism in Your Life and Community. Her books empower readers to connect with themselves and to others, exploring topics such as control issues, emotional unavailability, practical activation activities, case studies, and teaching how to shift mindset and patterns around mental health, relationships, and liberation. Expanding her work, Dr. Thema Bryant partnered with Gwyneth Paltrow’s goop on the Audible Original The goop Pursuit: Coming Home to Yourself, a four-part audio series taking listeners on an intimate journey of learning and unlearning. Dr. Thema also hosts The Homecoming Podcast, which is dedicated to helping listeners reconnect with themselves and heal from past wounds.

Dr. Thema Bryant completed her doctorate in Clinical Psychology at Duke University and her post-doctoral training at Harvard Medical Center’s Victims of Violence Program. Upon graduating, she became the Coordinator of the Princeton University SHARE Program, which provides intervention and prevention programming to combat sexual assault, sexual harassment, and harassment based on sexual orientation. She is currently a tenured professor of psychology in the Graduate School of Education and Psychology at Pepperdine University, where she directs the Culture and Trauma Research Laboratory. Her clinical and research interests center on interpersonal trauma and the societal trauma of oppression. Most recently, she was the 2023 president of the American Psychological Association (APA), the leading scientific and professional organization representing psychology with more than 150,000 members. She is a former president of the Society for the Psychology of Women and a former APA representative to the United Nations. Dr. Thema also served on the APA Committee on International Relations in Psychology and the Committee on Women in Psychology.

Her notable accolades include a 2013 APA award for Distinguished Early Career Contributions to Psychology in the Public Interest. In 2016, the Institute of Violence, Abuse, and Trauma presented her with their media award for the film Psychology of Human Trafficking, and in 2018, she received their Donald Fridley Memorial Award for excellence in mentoring in trauma. The California Psychological Association recognized her for Distinguished Scientific Achievement in Psychology in 2015. She is the editor of the APA text Multicultural Feminist Therapy: Helping Adolescent Girls of Color to Thrive and is a foundational scholar on the topic of the trauma of racism. In 2022, the International Division of the APA honored her for her International Contributions to the Study of Gender and Women, recognizing her work in Africa and the Diaspora. Dr. Thema is an ordained elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church and leads the mental health ministry at First A.M.E. Church in Los Angeles. Most recently in 2023, she received the Silverman Lifetime Achievement Award for Social Justice in Psychology.

Dr. Thema has raised public awareness regarding mental health by extending the reach of psychology beyond the academy and private therapy office through community programming and media engagement, including but not limited to Headline News, National Public Radio, CBS, the Washington Post, the LA Times, and CNN.

Darcie Little Badger is a Lipan Apache writer with a PhD in oceanography. Her critically acclaimed debut novel, Elatsoe, was featured in Time Magazine as one of the best 100 fantasy books of all time. Elatsoe also won the Locus award for Best First Novel and is a Nebula, Ignyte, and Lodestar finalist. Her second fantasy novel, A Snake Falls to Earth, received a Nebula Award, an Ignyte Award, and a Newbery Honor and is on the National Book Awards longlist. It is a breathtaking work of Indigenous futurism. Darcie draws on traditional Lipan Apache storytelling structure to weave another unforgettable tale of monsters, magic, and family. It is not to be missed.

Her third book, Sheine Lende, is the prequel to Elatsoe, which is centered on Ellie’s grandmother, deepens and expands Darcie’s one-of-a-kind world and introduces us to another cast of characters that will wend their way around readers’ hearts. Her newest book is Children of Owl (2026), which is a tale of three cousins and the world of creatures, ghosts, and murderers that surround their trailer park.

Darcie is an Earth scientist, writer, and fan of the weird, beautiful, and haunting; she is married to a veterinarian named Taran.