Frank Scholar is different than any other academic conference because our belief is that we put the scholar first. We bring people together, people from very different disciplines who share one common thing and that is that they believe that scholarship can be used to advance social causes and change the world. We hope that Frank Scholar could be the annual space for researchers who want to drive change with their work to meet and can be an incubator for innovative, progressive and awesome projects. We’re trying to build a community of people across multiple disciplines who are working in public interest communications in their research. This is our first year and it’s going very well. I’m very excited about the wonderful dialogue in the room and the energy and the passion. I’m a Frank Scholar because I want my research to have big impact, big change and big influence. I’m a Frank Scholar because I believe the social change communication research can change the world. I’m a Frank Scholar because I want to share my ideas, my communication skills and experiences and I want to learn something from this event. So invigorating to be around scholars who are also interested in social causes and identify as activists. The best questions and the best research are developed by conversations with peers. I believe interdisciplinary research is the way of the future. There is an incredible change that can happen with communication that can affect society, change the world, change people, modify behaviors and it’s important that we stick together and bond together and do research together. I believe that strategic, well-targeted communication can empower people to believe that they can make change happen if they believe that it needs to happen. Frank Scholar is a very cool people, they’re concerned people and they’re folks who have a unique and wonderful view of the world. In addition to that, they’re folks who are receptive perhaps to working with one another across disciplines which is really very very important and they want to as you say make a difference. So that’s why I’m proud to be a Frank Scholar. We’re trying to create connections, we bring people together, exchange ideas, have a safe environment where they just are together with people from very different disciplines, they are scholars that they’re using their research, answering questions that help change the world in some ways and make it a little bit better place. The stakes are so high that we know we must take a very deliberate and strategic science-based approach and there is just a wealth of information across all these disciplines to guide us and we’re trying to just bring that all together under the umbrella of Frank Scholar. I am so excited that Frank Scholar is finally here and I can’t wait to see what happens at Frank Scholar 2017.