Marian Miner Cook
Athenaeum

Diane Wagner ‘87 is the executive producer of The Migrant Child Farmworkers – Now High-Profile Professionals^©. After a successful career in market research consulting for Fortune 500 clients, Wagner is now an independent storyteller who is passionate about telling stories that inspire audiences, especially children, to elevate their self-image, better recognize their potential, and gain access to more educational opportunities.

Wagner studied Economics at Claremont McKenna College and subsequently earned her MBA from U.C. Irvine.

The screening will be followed by a panel discussion moderated by Diane Wagner who will be joined by producer Jesse Gift and several individuals featured in the film (Tony Cárdenas, Enrique Diaz, Lisa Ramirez and Dr. Ramon Resa). Brandon Guzmán (a former undocumented migrant child farmworker and featured presenter Xolo Maridueña's manager) may also attend.

This program is co-sponsored by the President’s Office and Open Academy.

SPECIAL SCHEDULE: Film will be screened during dinner starting at 6:20 pm and will be followed by comments from Diane Wagner and audience Q & A.
 

Michael Vorenberg received his A.B. and Ph.D. from Harvard University and is professor of history at Brown University, where he has taught since 1999. He is the author of Final Freedom: The Civil War, the Abolition of Slavery, and the Thirteenth Amendment, a Finalist for the Lincoln Prize and a major source for Steven Spielberg’s 2012 film Lincoln. His most recent book is Lincoln’s Peace: The Struggle to End the American Civil War, which was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 2025. He is currently on the board of editors of the Journal of Constitutional History and was previously on the board of editors of Law and History Review. He is also a Distinguished Lecturer for the Organization of American Historians. His forthcoming article comparing declared states of emergency in Civil War-era America and present-day America will be published in the summer of 2026.

Professor Vorenberg's Athenaeum presentation is co-sponsored by the Salvatori Center’s Lofgren Program in American Constitutionalism.
 

David Brooks is a columnist for The New York Times and a contributor to The Atlantic. He is a commentator on “The PBS Newshour" and founder and Chair of Weave: The Social Fabric Project. 

His forthcoming book “How To Know A Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen” will be published in October. His previous three books were “The Second Mountain,” “The Road to Character,” and “The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement,” all #1 New York Times bestsellers.

Mr. Brooks has taught at Yale and Duke and now teaches at the University of Chicago. He has received over 30 honorary degrees from American universities and is a member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. 

Mr. Brooks's Athenaeum presentation is co-sponsored by the Valach Speaker Series and the Open Academy at CMC.

(Photo credit: Howard Schatz©SCHATZ-ORNSTEIN)

Sir Malcolm Evans, KCMG (Knight Commander of the Most Distinguished Order of St Michael and St George) and OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire), is the Principal of Regents Park College at Oxford University. 

Prior to his role at Oxford University, Sir Malcolm was Professor of International Law at the University of Bristol, where previously he had been Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences and Law. His research interests center on the international protection of human rights, with particular focus on the prevention of torture and the freedom of religion in recognition of which he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth in 2015. He also works extensively on issues concerning the international law of the sea, including in particular questions concerning maritime boundaries and the protection of human rights at sea. Among his many roles, Sir Malcolm has served as a member and, from 2011-2020, Chair of the United Nations Subcommittee for the Prevention of Torture. In 2015 he was appointed a Member of the Panel of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse in England and Wales, then the largest and most wide-ranging public inquiry yet undertaken, which concluded its work in late 2022. He has also served as a member of the Advisory Panel on Freedom of Religion and Belief of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

Sir Malcolm read Law at Regent’s Park College (1979-82), returning for doctoral research (1983-87) for which he was awarded the degree of DPhil. Sir Malcolm holds an Honorary Doctorate from Bangor University and is a Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales. 
 

Ken Liu is an American author of speculative fiction. A winner of the Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy awards for his fiction, he has also won top genre honors in Japan, Spain, and France.

Liu’s most characteristic work is the four-volume epic fantasy series, The Dandelion Dynasty, in which engineers, not wizards, are the heroes of a silkpunk world on the verge of modernity. His debut collection of short fiction, The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories, has been published in more than a dozen languages. A second collection, The Hidden Girl and Other Stories, followed. He also penned the Star Wars novel, The Legends of Luke Skywalker. His latest book, All That We See or Seem, is a techno-thriller about the fight against loneliness in the age of AI.

He’s often involved in media adaptations of his work. Recent projects include The Regular, under development as a TV series; Good Hunting, adapted as an episode in season one of Netflix’s breakout adult animated series Love, Death + Robots; and AMC’s Pantheon, adapted from an interconnected series of Liu’s short stories.

Prior to becoming a full-time writer, Liu worked as a software engineer, corporate lawyer, and litigation consultant. He frequently speaks at conferences and universities on a variety of topics, including futurism, machine-augmented creativity, history of technology, bookmaking, and the mathematics of origami.

Mr. Liu is the Gould Center for Humanistic Studies' 2025-26 Ricardo J. Quinones Lecturer.

Photo credit: Lisa Tang Liu

(Special Note: This event had originally been scheduled for Monday, September 22, 2025. We are honoring the head table sign-ups from that original date. Students who had secured a head table spot (or were waitlisted for the head table) will have the right of first refusal for the head table. If you had a confirmed spot at the head table, we are aware of who you are and we will contact you directly in early March.)