Dr. Cedric Alexander has spent nearly four decades in search of a better way to police our nation. He’s the author of The New Guardians, and he has served as a law enforcement analyst on ABC, CBS, NBC and CNN. In 2015 he was appointed to the President’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing. He has served at every level of government: as a Federal Security Director in the US Department of Homeland Security, as a Deputy Commissioner for Criminal Justice in New York State, as Public Safety Director in a major county, and as a City Chief of Police and Deputy Mayor.

Cindy L. Bethel, Ph.D. (IEEE and ACM Senior Member) is a Professor in the Computer Science and Engineering Department and holds the Billie J. Ball Endowed Professorship in Engineering at Mississippi State University (MSU). She is the 2019 U.S. Fulbright Senior Scholar sponsored by the University of Technology Sydney. She is the Director of the Social, Therapeutic, and Robotic Systems (STaRS) lab and a Research Fellow with the MSU Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems Human Performance Group and the MSU Social Science Research Center. She is a member of the Academy of Distinguished Teachers in the Bagley College of Engineering at MSU. She also was awarded the 2014-2015 ASEE New Faculty Research Award for Teaching. Cindy has managed over $8 million dollars in grant funding since starting as an Assistant Professor at Mississippi State University in August 2011. She was a NSF/CRA/CCC Computing Innovation Postdoctoral Fellow in the Social Robotics Laboratory at Yale University. From 2005 - 2008, she was a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow and was the recipient of the 2008 IEEE Robotics and Automation Society Graduate Fellowship. She graduated in August 2009 with her Ph.D. in Computer Science and Engineering from the University of South Florida. Her research interests include human-robot interaction, human-computer interaction, robotics, and artificial intelligence. Her research focuses on applications associated with robotic therapeutic support, information gathering from children, and the use of robots for law enforcement, search and rescue, and military.

Paul L. Brayfield graduated Summa Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Science degree in Technical Management/Business Information Systems. His additional certifications include; Project Management Institute (PMP), ITIL Foundation and Scrum Master (CSM). Paul has worked his entire career working with computers & information systems, spanning multiple industries; banking, telecom, government & education.
He starting programming using NEAT/3 (National's Easy Auto-coding Technique) & COBOL with many others throughout the years including; CICS, Assembler, JCL, RPG, C++, VB, HTML and .NET. He has worked in many other job roles as; systems analyst, business analyst, consultant, operations manager, QA & release manager, systems development manager, and project manager. Through his career, he has developed extensive skills to provide leadership for management and implementation of enterprise technology solutions. Paul is able to leverage best practices in system requirements development, as well as project, budget and vendor management.
One of Paul’s major accomplishments was the development and implementation of an enterprise system for the Saudi Arabian national bank, this required four years of on-site leadership, an adventure of a lifetime for him and his family.
Paul has two married daughters and two exceptional grandsons. He enjoys boating, fishing and hiking.

Ms. Brewer serves as a cybersecurity analyst for the Cybersecurity Advisor (CSA) program with Department of Homeland Security, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). CISA is the Nation’s risk manager, empowering partner organizations to defend against today’s threats and collaborating to build more secure and resilient infrastructure for the future.
Ms. Brewer supports the production of methodologies & the development of tools used by the CSA program to measure and strengthen the cybersecurity management capabilities of critical infrastructure organizations across the Nation. Additionally, Ms. Brewer provides surge support to advance CSA outreach objectives within all U.S. states, local, tribal, and territorial governments. The CSA program deploys regionally-located personnel across the Nation to promote cybersecurity preparedness, risk mitigation, and incident response capabilities through engaging with stakeholders, partnerships, and direct assistance activities.
Within DHS, Ms. Brewer has also supported Cybersecurity Education, Awareness, and Workforce Development (CE&A), sustaining the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Careers and Studies (NICCS). During this time she collaborated with DOD & the National Institute of Standards and Technology, promoting NIST Cybersecurity Framework. Prior to joining DHS, Ms. Brewer supported the United States Air Force 333rd Squadron, Cyber Defense School, where she focused on digital forensics confirming digital security & data integrity.
Ms. Brewer holds a M.S. in Computer Science and Information Technology Sciences from the University of South Alabama and undergrad in Computing Systems and Technology from Tulane University.

Peter F. Cipriano serves as a Senior Enterprise Architect for Unisys supporting Public Sector US&C, focusing on providing clients with business and user-centric solutions. Peter brings over 23 years of experience with commercial, Federal, DoD and Intelligence clients advising them on transforming their legacy IT environments into modern Digital Government solutions leveraging cloud, mobile and security services.
Peter is a patented engineer with deep global experience advising clients on cloud migrations, communicating digital requirements and integrating managed services into existing business models. Peter was nominated and won the 2017 Vertical Solution Win of the Year award for his leadership on a critical large opportunity for Unisys. Peter is a recognized thought leader on cloud and cloud migrations strategies briefing senior Federal, State and DoD leaders on how to take advantage of Digital Technology by promoting best practice adoption and cyber security.
Peter is a 1996 graduate of Marist College in Poughkeepsie, NY with a degree in Computer Science. Peter attended Marist College through the Montgomery G.I Bill and proudly served in the United States Army Reserve as an Engineer in the 854th Engineer Battalion.

Ben Cohen has served as the Chief Information Officer for the Mississippi Department of Transportation since 2014. Cohen began his career with MDOT in 2001 as a developer on the financial system. 9 years later, he moved into a project manager role overseeing IT tasks for the financial and fleet management systems. During his career at MDOT, Cohen has managed various business oriented IT projects in the areas of payroll/HR, cash flow, project/program management, contract management, capital assets, finance, and transparency. His current areas of focus include mobile app development, field data collection, business intelligence and reporting, as well as workforce development. Cohen holds a Master of Science degree in Computer Science from Mississippi College (2006) and a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from the University of Southern Mississippi (2001).

Michael Hankins has experience with all major CADD and GIS systems being used today. Autodesk, Bentley, GeoMedia, ArcGIS. He has successfully designed training courses, delivered projects, and taught GIS on several platforms at Fort Sill, Fort Bragg, Savannah River Nuclear Facility, Glenn Research Center (NASA), Panama Canal Authority to name a few. He spent 25 plus years in the private sector working as a GIS Professional. He has spent the last 6 years with the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks where he works side by side with MDWFP officials and Wildlife Biologist to provide GIS solutions that provide the information to make informed and timely decisions.

As the CIO of Mississippi Department of Employment Security, Mohammed Jalaluddin leads a team of IT professionals in delivering technology and information services. He serves as the project director for the ReEmployUSA Consortium, a collaboration between MS, ME, CT and RI to deliver Unemployment Insurance system, a one of a kind in the nation serving multiple states using a common application operating in the cloud. He has over 25 years of IT experience primarily in application development and management of which 20 years has been in state government.

Doug Mays is a Product and Strategy leader with over 13 years of experience across a wide swath of industries. From single board and modular networking and compute hardware, renewable energy and on-board vehicle power systems, and financial software to networking, unified communications, and cloud services, Doug has a history of delivering successful, market-ready solutions. Doug came to C Spire in 2015 to build our Cloud Services practice and has delivered some of our most innovative cloud products. Doug now leads all product efforts for C Spire Business across Voice/UC, Data/Networks, and Managed & Cloud Services.

Nishanth Rodrigues is The University of Mississippi's Chief Information Officer. Nishanth has more than 25 years of diverse IT experience in academia, manufacturing (automotive and pharmaceutical) and professional health care organizations. In his current role, Nishanth leads university-wide IT services for UM and assists the institution achieve its objectives using innovative technology approaches. He provides leadership for the continued development of an innovative, robust, and secure information technology environment throughout the University. His prior role was the Assistant Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at Michigan State University. Nishanth led a team responsible for all aspects related to Infrastructure, Data Center, Electronic Medical Record, Service Management and Operations for the approximately 65,000 member campus spanning over 10,000 acres. Before that, Nishanth was Director of IT Technology/InterOperability at Bronson Healthcare in Kalamazoo, Michigan. For his service, he was awarded the Bronson President's Leadership Award and earned the highest employee opinion survey results in 2013. Other positions Nishanth has held include Global Systems Engineering Manager at Perrigo Inc. in Allegan, Michigan, and Director of Operations and Infrastructure/Site Service Delivery Director and Clinical Systems Team Manager at Borgess Health/Ascension Health in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Nishanth earned his Master of Business Administration degree from Michigan State University. His professional memberships include the Intel Corp. Mobility Advisory Board, Michigan Healthcare Cybersecurity Council, Big Ten Academic Alliance and several committees at other national organizations.

Artis Smith is an Information Technology Manager and certified Project Management Professional (PMP)® at Jackson State University.
She earned a bachelors and a masters degree from Jackson State University in Computer Science and Education respectively. She began her career in the late 1980s. Over the years, she has held many positions including Analyst/Programmer, Project Manager, Hardware and Software Tester, Business Analyst, Technical Writer, Information Technology Manager, and Contract Administrator. She has managed many cross-functional teams and together they completed projects on schedule and within budget. A partial list includes software upgrades and patches, software procurements and installations, as well as planning and promoting Information Technology Day for faculty, staff, and students hosted by the entire Information Technology Department.
Artis served on the committee to establish the first Mississippi Chapter of the Project Management Institute (PMI). PMI is a non-profit organization consisting of more than 2.9 million professionals in almost every country in the world. She served as Vice President of Membership for the Central Mississippi Chapter.
Her professional interests are to promote and fine-tune project management at Jackson State, elevate awareness of and fortify data security best practices, and offer suggestions and solutions to enhance organizations.
Artis enjoys spending quality time with family and friends, traveling, and reading. She resides in the Madison-Ridgeland area with her family.

Charlie Welch is a GIS professional with over 19 years’ experience in GIS and web mapping applications as well as 3D visualization. His expertise covers a wide range of GIS custom applications, internet-mapping solutions, mobile GIS, GPS systems, and management of various applications. Charlie is also the director of GIS at the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks where he provides GIS consulting in a variety of sectors, including forestry mapping, wildlife management, fisheries management, asset management, emergency response systems, and UAV / remote sensing technologies.

Dana Wilson is the General Manager for Mississippi Interactive, LLC (MSI) a subsidiary of NIC. With more than eleven years of eGovernment experience, Dana leads the team that has helped the State of Mississippi deliver over 250 online, mobile, and IoT solutions, providing citizens an efficient and secure way to engage agencies, departments, local, and state government. Under her leadership, Mississippi’s self-funded eGovernment program has resulted in an over $11 million cost avoidance for the state since its 2010 inception.