Laila holds an AB in Social Studies with an emphasis on post-colonial theory and history from Harvard University and an MM from the New England Conservatory in Jazz Voice. While in college, she held leadership roles on the Undergraduate Council, the Arts & Humanities Student Board, and a variety of activist organizations, including the Harvard Graduate Student Union.

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Dr. Sakk performed his post-doctoral research in bioinformatics with the USDA-ARS located in Ithaca, NY. In addition, he functioned as a lecturer in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell University where he taught courses in system theory at both the graduate and undergraduate levels. Dr. Sakk also has a breadth of industry experience in the fields of pattern recognition, machine learning, speech recognition, signal processing and power systems. He has been a participating member of the IEEE, Sigma Xi, and Sigma Pi Sigma. Dr Sakk is currently working on machine learning techniques for financial data analysis and blockchain applications and is currently a member of the Morgan State University Fintech Center for Blockchain Technologies.

Ceyhun Elgin is primarily affiliated with Columbia University as a lecturer in discipline but also works as a Professor of Economics at Bogazici University in Turkey. He got his BA in economics from Bogazici University and then subsequently obtained his Ph.D. in economics at the University of Minnesota in 2010. His research interests are in applied macroeconomics, economic growth, development economics, and political economics with a particular emphasis on the economics of the informal sector. Previously, Dr. Elgin also had visiting positions at Boston University, Tilburg University, NYU, IMF, and the World Bank.

Dr. Hannah T., who earned her PhD in psychology from Columbia University in 2023, is currently a postdoctoral research fellow at the Rotman Research Institute in Toronto. Her research focuses on how memory influences adaptive behavior, using methods like eye tracking and magnetic resonance imaging to study memory in healthy young adults, older adults, and individuals with epilepsy.