Mytoan Nguyen-Akbar, Ph.D
Principal/Founder
Mytoan Nguyen-Akbar, PhD, is Founder/Principal of Community and Cultural Impact Partners, LLC, a recently formed entity with a focus on helping public sector agencies, community groups, and private foundations through rigorous stakeholder engagement, measurement, learning, and evaluation frameworks, and mixed methods approaches to help clients track, operationalize, and tell their impact story. Dr. Nguyen-Akbar spent 6 years in her role as Impact and Assessment Manager at the City of Seattle Office of Art & Culture (ARTS), and then subsequently, one year in the Mayor’s Innovation and Performance Team/City Budget Office. At ARTS, Dr. Nguyen-Akbar worked on grantmaking reports to the Arts Commission, developed an internal contracting audit with a justice lens, managed multiple field studies and reports on arts education, cultural space programming, creative economy stakeholder engagement and research, and cultural recovery funding reports. In the Seattle Mayor’s Office, Dr. Nguyen-Akbar helped develop digital tools, organizational change management, mass communications, and documentation of promising practices for recruiting and supporting minority-owned businesses. This effort required the transformation of citywide procurement, a complex and multi-level stakeholder engagement that required data and digital transformations at all processes of government procurement. Mytoan grew up in Northern California and has over 20 years of social science research, policy and evaluation, teaching/lecturing, and scholarly publishing experience mainly in the US, but also while living abroad in Australia, Chile, and Vietnam. She earned her BA in Political Economy at the University of California, Berkeley and PhD in the Sociology of Race and Inequality at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where she was trained by leading experts in qualitative and quantitative methods of research and community engaged and participatory research methods. Dr. Nguyen-Akbar has been awarded the American Sociological Association Minority Predoctoral Fellowship, a Mellon Graduate Fellowship, multiple Foreign Language and Areas Studies grants, the Midwest Sociological Society’s Jane Addams Award, Fulbright Fellowship, Lois Roth Foundation fellowship, and Society for the Study of Social Problems Global Section’s Best Graduate Paper Award.
Anh Thang Dao-Shah, Ph.D
Affiliate
Anh Thang Dao-Shah, PhD, was born in Vietnam, grew up in Germany and Poland and earned her Ph.D. in American Studies and Ethnicity from the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. Dr. Dao-Shah has 10 years of experience in research, teaching, and consulting in diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging with a special focus on the cultural and healthcare sector. Her consulting clients include the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Kenneth Rainin Foundation, Akonadi Foundation, Grantmakers for the Arts, the Federation of States Humanities Council, California Council for the Arts, DataArts/SMU, the City of Berkeley, the National Folklife Network, and National Farm to School Network. She served as the Senior Racial Equity and Policy Analyst at the San Francisco Arts Commission, where she led the agency to pass the first racial equity action plan in the City and County of San Francisco. She was also the first Director of Health Equity at the Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital. Dr. Dao-Shah currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Diasporic Vietnamese Artists Network, a non-profit organization in San Francisco that aims to connect artists of the Vietnamese diaspora with the diverse audience of the Bay Area. Dr. Dao-Shah is a published writer with academic essays, poetry, and prose featured in Positions, the Vietnamese Studies Journal and multiple anthologies and textbooks.
Lara Davis
Affiliate
Lara Davis is the impact producer with Visionary Justice StoryLab. She designs and implements investment programs and social impact campaigns supporting early career filmmakers of color with an emphasis on young women and LGBTQIA2SP+ communities. Through partnerships that center advocacy and collaborative research, creative workforce development and community engagement, Lara works to advance Visionary Justice StoryLab’s strategies for building the narrative power of BIPOC creative voices. Throughout her career as a nonprofit executive, arts administrator and cultural entrepreneur, Lara has fiercely championed art as a powerful lever for social change. Before joining Visionary Justice StoryLab, Lara served as program director for Arts Corps, a nationally recognized creative youth development organization and managed The Creative Advantage, a multimillion-dollar collective impact partnership for K-12 arts education in Seattle, Washington. Lara believes that stories preserve, challenge, and shape culture. She is committed to cultivating liberatory environments where emerging filmmakers of color can engage, deepen practice and create stories that spur imagination and action. Lara loves playing music, being in nature, and spending time with her partner and cat. She is a former Seattle Arts Commissioner, recipient of the National Guild for Community Arts Education Service Award, the Americans for the Arts Emerging Leader Award, and a GMF Marshall Memorial Fellowship.
Ricky Reyes, MA
Affiliate
Ricky Reyes is a Chicago-based, Seattle-born researcher, creative, oral historian and arts administrator. Trained in digital humanities, coding, and data analysis at the University of Chicago (M.A. in Digital Studies of Language, History, and Culture), public administration at Seattle University, and oral history methods through the Seattle Black Spatial Histories Institute, Ricky’s research explores assumptions on race, class, and gender that produce real-life impacts on those at the center of structural oppression and using storytelling and data as a vehicle. Rick’s work experience includes community outreach, project management, and data analysis with the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Seattle Black Spatial Histories Institute, the University of Chicago, Seattle University, the Seattle Office of Arts & Culture, Tacoma Division of Community and Economic Development (Arts & Cultural Vitality), Wa Na Wari and WA-BLOC Seattle.
Sarah Burtner, MPP
Affiliate
Sarah Burtner, MPP, is an expert in public sector budgeting, with experience at the state and local government levels on an array of policy issues. She is currently a Fiscal and Policy analyst for the City of Seattle Budget Office, overseeing the budget process for cabinet-level departments including immigrant and refugee affairs, arts and culture, and education and early learning in the City. Previously, Sarah was a Staff Finance Budget Analyst at the California Department of Finance, managing the budgets for state-funded childcare and preschool programs. Sarah has a Master's in Public Policy from UCLA and a Master's of Science in Special Education from CUNY Hunter College.
Janis Jordan, M.Ed.
Affiliate
Janis Jordan (she/her) is a strategic evaluation leader with expertise in equity-centered policy design. A proud Native woman, Janis is dedicated to ensuring that data, policy, and public service meaningfully benefit marginalized communities. Janis has developed city government wide evaluation standards, designed evidence-based policy tools, and advised executives on aligning performance metrics with equitable economic development priorities. Janis grew up in Aberdeen, Washington, a rural town which has been the driving force for her work in socio-economics and research around Race & Social Justice for community and wrap-around support. Her career spans roles with Washington State’s Department of Children, Youth & Families, the Urban Indian Health Institute, and Georgetown University’s Edunomics Lab, where she advanced statewide reforms, applied Indigenous evaluation methods to programs supporting Urban Native communities, and conducted multi-state education finance research. She serves as secretary-treasurer on the Pike Place Constituency board and as a board member at Freeway Park, bringing her expertise in governance and community engagement to strengthen Seattle’s public spaces. Beyond her professional work, she is an active supporter of Seattle’s vibrant performance arts scene, enjoys aerial yoga, and can often be found exploring the city’s best food and picnic spots. Janis has convened and led citywide senior data staff efforts to report on equitable funding and disbursement of federal pandemic relief funding, known as the Seattle COVID Relief and Recovery Rescue Plan.
Kara Wentworth, Ph.D
Affiliate
National expert on media impact and nonprofit impact measurement Human and equity-centered design facilitator Facilitates theory of change and impact framework development processes for doc film, social justice, media and arts nonprofits Executive Director of The Nonprofit Center, leading firm of 60+ consultants and facilitators Filmmaker and performance artist Queer intersectional creative approach
Tina LaPadula
Audrey Querns
Affiliate
Affiliate
Tina LaPadula serves as the Arts Education Project Manager for the Seattle Office of Arts & Culture where she oversees The Creative Advantage. Tina is a creative with a background in theatre and her work focuses on the intersection of art and social justice as exemplified by Arts Corps, the award-winning nonprofit she helped found. She has collaborated with The Frye Museum, The Museum of History and Industry, and Bumbershoot Arts and Music Festival to curate exhibitions and events that elevate the art and perspectives of young people. As a teaching artist, Tina has taught for Centrum Arts, Seattle Children's Theatre, The University of Washington, and in a multitude of schools and afterschool programs. She has served as a consultant to many cultural organizations facilitating workshops on equity and the arts. Tina supports the growth and development of teaching artists locally and nationally, most notably as the founder of the Seattle Teaching Artist Network, a faculty member for the WA State Teaching Artist Training Lab and as a national advisor for the Teaching Artist Guild. Her writing and opinion have been featured by Americans for the Arts and The National Guild for Community Arts Education.
Audrey Querns is an experienced arts education data specialist and additionally, has had extensive experience doing project management and helping organizations design and deploy essential systems. Audrey facilitates conversations among diverse internal and external stakeholders to build a vision and plan for action in which all voices are reflected, and actions are bold, clear, and achievable. After an early career at Amazon where she rose from customer service representative to senior project manager for all aspects of starting new customer service centers in the US, Europe and Japan, Audrey switched over to supporting public and non-profit agencies including Seattle Public Schools, Seattle Public Library, Seattle Housing Authority, 4Culture and ArtsFund. Since then, the through-line of her work has been a focus on planning and implementing innovative programs in which public, private, and non-profit agencies collaborate for the benefit of children and youth.
Vorada Savengseuksa, MPA
Affiliate
Vorada "Vora" Savengseuksa is a Seattle-based researcher and user experience (UX) designer with a passion for making technology, global health, and social policy more accessible and equitable. With expertise in social determinants of health (SDOH), aging policy and eldercare, health literacy and language access, and maternal and child nutrition, she applies human-centered design to create solutions that are both meaningful and practical. Bringing together research, design, and information architecture, Vora works at the intersection of data, visual storytelling, and policy to drive real impact. She thrives on collaboration, working across industries to bridge gaps in knowledge and access while using communication design to engage diverse stakeholders. She is especially proud of her work addressing health disparities—whether expanding pan-Asian and Pacific Islander senior centers to combat isolation or crafting linguistically relevant public health curricula for schools in rural Laos. At the heart of her work is a deep commitment to building more inclusive and effective digital and social environments. Vora has a Masters in Public Administration from the University of Washington, a BS in Nutritional Sciences from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and professional training in human-centered design and research.
