NCAC ‘s Youth Free Expression Program provides advocacy training, guidance on activism to defend banned books and opportunities for leadership on issues like student free press freedom. Students also will receive assistance in amplifying their voices with publishing opportunities.
MEET OUR TRAINERS
Betsy Gomez
Betsy Gomez is the Assistant Director of Communications & Outreach for ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, and Coordinator for Unite Against Book Bans and the Banned Books Week Coalition. Betsy is the former coalition and editorial director for the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, an advocacy organization dedicated to the First Amendment rights of the comics community. Gomez edited and designed the award-winning publication CBLDF Presents: She Changed Comics, which profiles more than 60 groundbreaking women who expanded the expressive possibilities of the comics medium. With more than a decade of professional experience defending intellectual freedom, Gomez also has an extensive background in educational publishing as a content developer and editor. She also oversaw the Berkeley Poetry Slam and helped organize other San Francisco-Bay Area arts events for more than a decade.
Emily Kirkpatrick
Emily Kirkpatrick, Executive Director of the National Council of Teachers of English, is known for creating humanistic innovations that merge research, policy, and practice to address persistent societal inequities. A transformative leader, Ms. Kirkpatrick has dedicated her career to public service and civic engagement, seeking to increase national literacy and social mobility, educational justice and equity, and advancing the inclusion and empowerment of women. A hallmark of her leadership is working shoulder to shoulder with educators, parents, and students to develop novel approaches to literacy. Efforts she has led have received international and national recognition, cross-sector financial investment, and attracted the partnership of the world’s most admired thought leaders, corporations, and institutions. Kirkpatrick holds an MBA from Bellarmine University, a bachelor’s degree from Centre College, and is a member of the International Women’s Forum, American’s Languages Initiative, the Conference of Executive Officers at the American Council of Learned Societies, and the Public Policy Committee for the American Society of Association Executives among other leadership roles.
Lin Oliver
Lin Oliver is a children’s book author, writer-producer of family and children’s television series, and movies, a former Vice-President of Universal Studios, and co-founder of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. She served as the Executive Director of SCBWI from its inception in 1971 until 2022. While Lin mostly writes funny books, such as Who Shrunk Daniel Funk? novels, she also writes about challenges people face. The New York Times best-selling book series Hank Zipzer: World’s Best Underachiever, which she co-wrote with Henry Winkler, is about a boy with learning differences. Her latest novels, ALIEN SUPERSTAR, which detail the adventures of an alien who arrives in Hollywood to star in his own television Oshow, provide a satiric look at our culture and a commentary on authoritarian regimes. Lin, a college student (and hippie) who marched for peace and protested war, attended UCLA and UC Berkeley where she majored in English, and received a Masters in Educational Psychology. Reflecting on her college days, Lin says, “I’m glad I attended school when young people were speaking up about world politics and taking a role to shape our government and change our future.”