Our Team

The CGN Team

Our backgrounds are diverse. We are entrepreneurs, CEOs, and educators. But most importantly, we are parents. We have experienced the challenges of the college admissions process with our own children, and are concerned that this often highly stressful and confusing experience results in less than optimal outcomes.

Our team is supported by the experts—admissions leaders, financial aid professionals, counselors, authors, professors, and more—who join our live events to give timely and practical advice to our audience.


Adnan Sehic

Sr. Marketing Manager

  • 14+ years of experience in developing and scaling multi-million dollar B2C and B2B digital marketing campaigns across varied industries
  • Proven expertise in strategizing and implementing complex, multi-channel campaigns
  • Part of a family of educators spanning K-12

Alexis McLaughlin

Chief Operations Officer

  • ​Parent of high school sophomore
  • CEO-in-Residence & Strategic Facilitator, Katahdin Group
  • Founder & CEO of Parker & Ace
  • CEO, 20/20 Onsite
  • SVP and GM, Target Optical
  • Marketing Leader at General Mills and Pepperidge Farm

Bob Block

Co-Founder and
Head of School Partnerships

  • ​Parent of one student entering college and another who is a rising junior.
  • Former VP of Corporate Development for ACT
  • CEO of Professional Examination Service (acquired by ACT)
  • Built and managed partner ecosystem for Family Education Network (acquired by Pearson in 2000)

Brennan Barnard

Director of College Counseling

  • ​Director of College Counseling at Derryfield School and Khan Lab School
  • College admissions advisor to Harvard School of Education
  • Author, “The Truth About College Admissions”, John Hopkins University Press
  • Regular Forbes contributor on higher education enrollment trends
  • Father of two high school graduates

Christine Griggs

Chief Financial Officer

  • Over 25 years of Finance and Accounting experience, with a focus on start-ups and early-stage revenue companies
  • Played a key role in taking T2 Biosystems through the IPO process
  • Key contributor to the merger of Chil Semiconductor into International Rectifier, leading the integration of financial and accounting systems
  • Demonstrated expertise in cash flow management and strategic spend control

Daniel Domenech

Superintendent-In-Residence

  • Executive Director, AASA, The National Superintendents Assoc (retired)
  • Chairman, ACT Board of Directors
  • Superintendent, Fairfax County Public Schools

Diana Carson

Director, Career Programming

  • Developed content with outside partners as a senior producer for FamilyEducation Network.
  • Former teacher at the high school and college levels, as well as developmental editor in textbook publishing for the college market.
  • Worked within Boston Public Schools to initiate and execute on strategic partnerships aimed at meeting students’ basic needs for food, clothing, and medical care.
  • Mother of two twenty-somethings

Ian Marlier

Chief Technology Officer

  • Led customer-facing product development efforts at CollegeVine, closing the guidance gap at high schools across the United States
  • Managed engineering team responsible for the performance of Wikimedia Foundations software and properties (Wikipedia, Wiki data, and others)
  • Led a team of engineers at Hubspot (pre- and post-IPO) to understand and quantify the impact of performance problems and reliability issues, customer comm., and more.

James Donald

Executive Producer

  • ​Parent of two middle-schoolers
  • Seventeen years of documentary filmmaking
  • One Peabody Award, six Emmy nominations, two wins. 15+ other awards.
  • Spent five years at edX.org, where he learned the core principles of successful e-learning

Jermon Clark

Associate Producer

  • Emory University, Class of 2022
  • BAs in Human Health and Integrated Visual Arts
  • Selected to Emory’s Leadership Oxford program
  • Lead Diversity Ambassador at Emory
  • Interned at City of Atlanta

Jon Carson

Co-Founder and CEO

  • Scaled first national college admissions advisory brand in U.S. to over 500 advisors while striking large strategic partnerships with Fidelity, US News, NPR, and Care.com (CollegeVine)
  • Built largest event management and fundraising platform for school/charity fundraisers with half a billion dollars raised (Bidding For Good)
  • Built largest K-12 education website with 25% of all U.S. school districts building their first website (Family Education Network)
  • Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year finalist (2x)
  • High School Dad

Jon Castro

Producer

  • 9+ years experience working as a senior college advisor for several international companies
  • Lived in China for 6+ years, helping students and high schools plan their college admissions
  • Former middle school teacher in Asia
  • Worked with several US admissions firms assisting American students in finding their right school fit

Michael Kolowich

Chief Product Officer

  • Parent of five college graduates
  • Six-time founder/CEO of media and tech companies
  • Emmy-winning TV News reporter in Boston
  • VP/Partner at Bain and Company
  • Founder of ZDNet
  • Founding publisher and columnist at PC/Computing magazine
  • President of AT&T New Media
  • CEO of Individual Inc (first internet content IPO)
  • Founder and CEO, KnowledgeVision Systems

Mike Leber

VP of Programming and Production

  • Father with college up ahead
  • Senior Coordinating Producer ESPN
  • Led production for 10 Super Bowls and 6 Olympics
  • Coordinated content production across TV, radio, print, digital, and social
  • 5-time Emmy Award winner

Nicole Konstantinakos

Senior Content Producer & Editor

  • Led development of cross-platform content as Deputy Food Editor at America’s Test Kitchen
  • Edited 30+ cookbooks, including NYT best sellers and IACP Award winners
  • Conducted UX research for major tech clients as Senior Researcher at Sapient
  • Co-directed statewide higher education initiatives at California Campus Compact
  • Assistant taught undergraduate courses at Brown and Harvard
  • Parent of two feisty teens

Steve Stalzer

Head of AI

  • Father of recent college grad and current college student
  • CEO of Ternium.AI
  • VP of Applied AI, McGraw Hill
  • CTO, Authess (AI startup acquired by Reed Elsevier)

Rob Lippincott

Senior Editorial Advisor

  • Parent of two college graduates
  • SVP of Education for PBS
  • SVP Product Development for Discovery Education
  • SVP & GM of Programming for FamilyEducation Network (acquired by Pearson)
  • Member of College Guidance Network advisory board

Our advisory board

We know we don’t have all the answers, so we have built a world-class advisory board that can give us guidance, tell us the hard truths, and provide input as we develop our programming and technology platform.


Anne L. Bryant

Executive Director, Emeritus

  • Executive Director, National School Boards Association
  • Executive Director, American Association of University Women
  • Trustee and Board Chair, Simmons College
  • Trustee, National Teachers Hall of Fame
  • Board Chairperson, National Student Clearinghouse

Diane Cano

SVP of the Enterprise Technology Program Management Office, Audacy

  • General Manager, IT at Educational Testing Service
  • Adjunct Professor, Mechanical Engineering at The College of New Jersey
  • Parent of two students currently at public research universities
  • BS, Mechanical Engineering at Northwestern University; MS, Technology Management at University of Pennsylvania; PhD, Education at Rutgers University

Diane Campbell

Director of Counseling, Liberty Commons High School and President of RMACAC

  • ​Colorado Counselor of the year
  • President, Rocky Mountain Assoc. of College Admissions Counseling (RMACAC)

Hardin Coleman

Professor, Boston University School of Ed.

  • ​Dean, BU/Wheelock School of Education and Human Development
  • Professor of Counseling and Applied Human Development
  • Associate Dean, University of Wisconsin School of Education
  • Ph.D., Counseling Psychology, Stanford University

Jim Larimore

Former Chief Officer, Center of Equity in Learning, ACT

  • Dean of Students, Amherst College
  • Deputy Director, Post-Secondary Success, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
  • Dean of Students, Swarthmore College
  • B.S. Texas A&M University, MA Education, Stanford University

Mike Marriner

Founder/CEO, Road Trip Nation

  • Executive Producer, PBS series Road Trip Nation

Candice Mackey

College Counselor, LA Unified School District

  • Undergrad Admissions Reader, UCLA
  • College Instructor, UCLA College Counseling Certification Program
  • Editorial Advisory group, Fiske Guide to Colleges

Dorletta Payton

Director of College and Career Readiness, Valley View School District 365U

  • ​Director of College and Career Readiness, Valley View School District 365U
  • Former Director of Education, Quad County Urban League
  • Chairperson Emeritus, DuPage County ACT-SO (Afro-Academic, Cultural, Technological, and Scientific Olympics)
  • BA, Economics at Stanford University; MBA, Finance and Marketing at The University of Chicago

Marten Roorda

Senior Advisor at New Markets Venture Partners

  • CEO of ACT
  • CEO of Cito
  • Publishing Director, Reed Business Information
  • Editor-in-Chief, Scripta Media B.V.

Mike Sexton

Former Admissions Officer

  • Former VP Enrollment, Santa Clara University
  • Former Dean of Admissions, Lewis & Clark
  • Former Director of Admissions, Rhodes College

Stephen Smith

Founder, Naviance

  • Founder and CEO of Intellispark
  • Founder of Naviance
  • VP Digital Product Development, Peterson’s

Nancee Sorenson

Chancellor, Louisiana State University Eunice

  • Former President Brandon Campus, Hillsborough Community College and
  • Hillsborough Community College District
  • Former Acting President, East Campus, Pima Community College and
  • Pima County Community College District
  • Colvert Scholar and Gleazer Scholar at University of Texas at Austin
  • Completed Community College Leadership Program