SANA SONI, Director of Sales at Giant Pictures, specializes in independent film, currently Director of Sales. She has an extensive background in film and TV sales from multiple studios and independents in both Los Angeles and London, including Signature Entertainment, Discovery, Warner Bros, NBC Universal, National Geographic, 1091 Pictures and Walden Media. A UCLA and New York Film Academy graduate, she brings market expertise to features in development and those looking for distribution. During the pandemic she executive produced a short-form series which was shot entirely remotely, called The Myth of Control, leading up a team of just under 80 across 8 countries. The series is now complete and seeking distribution. Sana has spoken at the DC Independent Film Festival and Raindance Film Festival, judged for the Brooklyn Film Festival and been a reader for Killer Shorts horror short script competition, and is in the advisory groups for Film Hub Wales and the UK Asian Film Festival. Basically she just loves all things film/entertainment.

ALEX STICKLE, CEO, CIO and Founder of Poiesis Capital Management, a hedge fund operating out of Manhattan and Washington, D.C. Before founding PCM, Alex had already founded a tech consulting company and completed his first distressed debt deal by the age of 13, foreshadowing his future as a transformative leader in finance and technology.  At PCM, Alex integrates discretionary macro, systematic macro, and special situations trading with unique litigation finance working with anti-terrorism specialists, blending these approaches into a new type of multi-strat quant hedge fund.

DEIRDRE EVANS-PRITCHARD (DCIFF Executive Director & Programmer) spent many years integrating digital media and arts into higher education and working in international cultural exchange.  Projects have included: Kidding Around: The Child in Film and Media Conference & Festival (2009), DC Meets Delhi Film Festival (2007), documentaries for A&E and The Learning Channel, and programming for Channel 98.  Years ago she was the program editor for the Anthropos Documentary Film Festival at the AFI in Los Angeles. 2011 was her first year as festival director. A Senior Fulbright Scholar in Communications to Lebanon, visiting faculty at the University of Southern California’s Center for Visual Anthropology and adjunct faculty at the USC Cinema School, she describes herself as a translator: between cultures, mediums and creative spaces. She is passionate about visual literacy and the need for everyone to be trained in digital media skills and analysis. She is working on her epic book/film/exhibition experience on the place of the screen in human civilization.

LORI DONOVAN, Treasurer,  is the Senior Staff Attorney and Founding Director of Hayven, a non-profit organization focused on caring for patients and families during their cancer journeys. Her mission is to improve cancer resources by organizing existing ones; by leveraging new media to gather patient-to-patient and caregiver-to-caregiver insights and information; then by developing and sharing hope-based new-media services that leverage this collective wisdom and link cancer survivors and co-survivors to each other and to best-of resources. Beyond cancer, her vision also includes helping others adapt and duplicate our successes for other life-changing chronic conditions as well as in the global public health arena.

DEBORAH ISAAC is a native Washingtonian and a political communications leader with nearly a decade of experience in Public Affairs and Marketing. She excels at building cross-functional relationships across both the public and private sectors. Deborah has produced large scale events campaigns engaging the White House, Nickelodeon, Washington DC’s Mayor Muriel Bowser, JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon, American-entertainer Pharrell Williams, and other business executives.Most recently, as Deputy Press Secretary for DC Public Schools, Deborah built fostered public trust through integrated media campaigns. She is a natural team-builder, project manager, and innovator, committed to leveraging her talents for the betterment of society.