Carol Jenkins is President of the Women's Media Center and a Founding Member of its Board of Directors. An Emmy award-winning former news anchor and correspondent who covered presidential politics as well as international issues, Ms. Jenkins leads the Women’s Media Center’s online publication and its advocacy initiatives.

She is a national spokeswoman for women and the media, arguing the case for inclusion of women throughout the media: in ownership positions, at the highest levels of management and creativity, as well as the telling of women's stories in television and film, radio, print, and online.

As president of the Women’s Media Center, Ms. Jenkins has testified before Congress and the FCC, and written about what she calls The Invisible Majority—the 51 percent of the population (women) who occupy only 3 percent of "clout" positions in media.

As a media and political analyst, she has appeared as a guest and in debates at top national outlets. Her commentary, written for www.womensmediacenter.com, has appeared in The Nation.com, The Huffington Post, Television Week, and other print and online sources. A frequently sought speaker and moderator, she also conducts media training seminars and private sessions for women across the country.

Ms. Jenkins enjoyed a 30-year, award-winning tenure with several New York City news departments, including 23 years at WNBC-TV, where she co-anchored the pivotal 6 p.m. newscast. She was most identified with her reporting of national political stories, including from the floor of Democratic and Republican national conventions that yielded Presidents Carter, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton. From South Africa she reported on the release of Nelson Mandela after 27 years in prison, and anchored and co-produced an Emmy-nominated prime time special on apartheid. She hosted her own daily talk show, Carol Jenkins Live, on WNYW-TV.

Carol Jenkins is the author, with her daughter Elizabeth Gardner Hines, of Black Titan, A.G. Gaston and the Making of a Black American Millionaire. The life story of Ms Jenkins' uncle, it was selected by the Black Caucus of the American Library Association as one of the best non-fiction books of 2004. She is an executive producer of the PBS documentary, What I Want My Words To Do To You, which won the Freedom of Expression Award at the Sundance Film Festival in 2003.

Among Ms. Jenkins' interests is promoting the cause of the women and children of war ravaged Africa. She serves on the USA board of AMREF, the African Medical and Research Foundation. Founded 50 years ago as The Flying Doctors, AMREF is the largest African health organization working on the continent. Ms Jenkins has visited AMREF projects in South Africa, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda, and has written about the former girl soldiers of Uganda.

Ms. Jenkins, a second-generation journalist, is working on her next family memoir, a historical look at women and people of color in the media. She has written articles for More, Ms, and Opportunity Journal and her essay, “Standing By: Women in Broadcast Journalism” appeared in Sisterhood is Forever: The Women's Anthology for a New Millennium. She has served on the boards of the Ms. Foundation for Women and the Feminist Press, among others.

Carol Jenkins has been honored by the Association of Black Journalists/New York Chapter with Lifetime Achievement and International Reporting Awards, UPI, The Feminist Press, The Daily News’ Front Page Award, YWCA, Girl Scouts of America, Save the Children, Single Parents' Association, United Negro College Fund, Hale House, National Mothers Day Committee as Mother of the Year, the Police Athletic League as Woman of the Year, Abbot House as Humanitarian of the Year, and as Distinguished Alumna of New York University, among many others. She holds honorary doctorates from The College of New Rochelle and Marymount Manhattan College.

For the past decade, Glennda Testone has been a leader in the fields of media advocacy and social justice.  Testone joins the Women’s Media Center from the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), where she served as the Senior Director of Media Programs.  During her six years at GLAAD, Testone played a pivotal role in key milestones in gay media activism, most notably leading the team that persuaded the New York Times to make its watershed decision to include same-sex union announcements.  She was also instrumental in securing a commitment from Nielsen Media Research to work to include gay and lesbian viewers in its television rating system

While at GLAAD, Testone managed and led over half the organization’s staff of 45 and was responsible for directing all of the organization’s programmatic activities, including: GLAAD’s media training program; multiple public service announcement (PSA) campaigns; national, regional and people of color media outreach (in English and Spanish); national news and entertainment-based media advocacy, GLAAD’s field operation and its newly created youth media program.   Testone was also responsible for the annual nominations and voting process for the highly coveted GLAAD Media Awards.

Testone has served as a primary spokesperson for GLAAD and for the lgbt movement, appearing on CNN, FOX News, and MSNBC, and in outlets such as The Boston Globe, The New York Post, The Chicago Tribune, Time Out and W magazine.  In 2001, Testone was a member of GLAAD’s program team acknowledged by PR Week with its covered PR Week Award for Non-Profit Team of the Year for its work in heightening awareness of homophobia through its Laura Schlessinger campaign.  In 2005, Testone won Syracuse University’s Foundation Award for Outstanding Alumni and in 2006 she served as an Associate Producer on the Logo & VH1-televised GLAAD Media Awards. 

Originally from Syracuse, New York, Testone has a Bachelor’s degree in Broadcast Journalism and Philosophy from Syracuse University and a Master's degree in Women's Studies from The Ohio State University. Her Master’s thesis focused on feminist representation in mass media, specifically news reports on the "death of feminism." 

Prior to joining GLAAD, Testone worked at Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR), a New York City-based media watchdog group that offers criticism of media bias and censorship. Testone worked on its Women’s Desk where she contributed research to several print and broadcast pieces on women’s representation in the media. 

Tristin Aaron is Media Director for the Women’s Media Center. With more than a decade of experience in public relations, Aaron got her start as head of publicity at groundbreaking punk record label Lookout!, eventually building her own PR firm, before moving to one of New York’s most respected agencies, Ken Sunshine. Aaron has placed countless stories in the top tier of broadcast, print, and online media; has run various large-scale events; and has worked with clients ranging from major cultural institutions to environmental activists, authors, playwrights, pop stars, and film festivals. A skilled media trainer, as well as a writer and blogger, Aaron has a deep knowledge of popular culture.

Since agitating for the ERA as a little girl in the 1970s with her grandmother, Aaron has spent her life trying to contribute to the feminist movement, volunteering in a rape crisis center and a battered women’s shelter. In 2000, she co-founded, and was a featured speaker at, the original Ladyfest, which is now a global youth phenomenon, with chapters and festivals all over the world. Spurred by her Turkish-American heritage, she has a keen interest in international women’s issues, and hopes to promote greater understanding between feminists and Muslim women.

A North Carolina native, Aaron attended Reed College, where she majored in History, completing a senior thesis on the role of women in the Chinese Revolution.

As Media Manager for The Women’s Media Center, Rebekah Spicuglia coordinates the WMC's media training and spokesperson programs, advocacy campaigns, and web content, combining her dedication to feminist, progressive values with her film production background to create and advocate for representative media.

Previously, Spicuglia served as a Media Field Strategy Fellow at the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), where she contributed to GLAAD's Media Essentials guide for community organizations, developed a media toolkit for immigration equality for same-sex couples, and worked extensively on GLAAD’s “Announcing Equality” program in coordinating a national survey of newspaper policy and creating toolkits to encourage people to share their personal stories in visible ways.

Through her NonCustodial Parent Community blog, Spicuglia also serves as a spokesperson on parenting issues. MSN highlighted Spicuglia as one of eight “Moms Inspired to Change History,” and Spicuglia has been featured in or written for the NYTimes, Slate, Huffington Post, About.com, Brain,Child magazine, WBAI, Feministing, Feminist.com, MomsRising, Mamapalooza, Wikipedia, and the WMC website.

Originally from Virginia, Spicuglia grew up in California, where she worked on several film and television projects before attending the University of California at Berkeley, earning a Bachelor's degree in Mass Communications.

Maya Iwata brings her passion for actualizing progressive values and her desire to be a part of change across issues to the Women’s Media Center.   This commitment to social justice lead her to a career of  more than 12 years in senior and executive management at grassroots community based organizations in the areas of health, mental health, youth development and social justice.  Some of her past organizational affiliations include Gay Men’s Health Crisis, Brooklyn AIDS Task Force, Heights Hill Mental Health Service Community Advisory Board, and most recently, Sisterhood Mobilized for AIDS/HIV Research and Treatment, Inc.  

From these experiences, Maya realized the interconnections among programming, funding and organizational sustainability.  To ensure organization’s missions, she has a long track record of diversifying funding by type and by number of stakeholders.  For example, she once raised the budget of an organization she worked for by one third within six months. This multi-year funding proved critical when the organization was faced with the possibility of losing its major source of funding, a government contract, due to state budget cuts.

Originally born in Virginia, but raised outside of New York City, Maya received her Bachelor’s degree with honors from Cornell University.  Her undergraduate social psychology thesis was a replication of a study from the 1970’s on the generic masculine.  She returned to New York City to obtain her Masters from Columbia University’s School of Social Work.

Rachell Arteaga brings her passion for creating visibility for women and people of color in the media to The Women’s Media Center as the Administrative Coordinator. Before joining the WMC, she has had the pleasure of donating her time to the WMC’s cause as a volunteer. Prior to joining the staff full-time, Rachell has worked with the Center for Puerto Rican Studies, housed at Hunter College, CUNY, where she has been instrumental in the success of cultural and academic projects such as Puerto Rican Music Roots and Beyond, spearheaded by world-renowned Puerto Rican musician William Cepeda, and “Assessment and Valuation of Puerto Rican, Chicano, Latino and Hispanic-Caribbean Art,” the first symposium of its kind, dedicated to showcasing and valuing the works of Latino artists. She has also promoted cross-cultural understanding through national and international education initiatives at the university level.

Rachell has always had a keen in media; particularly in gender, race and cultural representations in children’s media and how it can affect the way children learn and perceive the world. A native New Yorker, she earned her Bachelor of the Arts in Media Studies and with a minor in Sociology at Hunter College. There she was able to acquire internships at Sesame Workshop and the Jim Henson Company. Currently, she also works with the Paley Center for Media on the weekends as a Recreating Radio Sound Engineer, helping children discover the rich history of “old-time” radio while giving them a chance to re-enact a radio play themselves.