Jim Morris' Cinderella story is testimony to the power of dreams and their ability to inspire and transform human life. His story is the subject of the 2002 film from Walt Disney, The Rookie, starring Dennis Quaid. The paperback, The Rookie, formerly known as The Oldest Rookie, was released in 2002. His story was also featured in the TNN documentary, Fame for 15, which earned rave reviews. A school teacher by trade, Jim is a polished public speaker whose miracle story captivates and inspires audiences to never give up on a dream.

Growing up as a navy brat, Jim's family moved constantly throughout his childhood. Baseball became his way to make friends when he moved from place to place. Originally drafted in the 1st round in 1984, Jim's dream was to become a major league baseball player, but his career was derailed by a series of debilitating arm injuries before he got out of the lower minors in 1988. Instead, Jim got married, raised a family of three, and got his college degree before becoming a high school science teacher and baseball coach in a financially depressed area of West Texas (he also became an All-American punter in college football at the age of 27). His baseball career was reduced to playing in beer leagues and throwing batting practice to his high school baseball team.

At the age of 35 and some 11 years after retiring from minor league baseball, Jim was giving a speech to his high school team about the importance of dreams and hard work when his high school players challenged him to pursue his dream of pitching in the major leagues. Jim made the following bet with his high school team: if they won the District Championship for their division, he would tryout for the first major league team that came through town.

Jim's team fulfilled their end of the bargain, which committed him to a big league tryout, where he miraculously threw 12 consecutive pitches at a rate of 98 mph, almost 10 mph harder than he had some 15 years earlier! Inspired by his family and students, Jim immediately signed a professional baseball contract. After just 3 months in the minor leagues and with his family and students in attendance, Jim returned to Texas as a major league player and struck out all-star Royce Clayton with a 98 mile per hour fastball in his first big league game. Jim Morris' ragtag rise from obscurity became the feel-good story of 1999. After pitching for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays in 2000, Jim signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers and retired from baseball in 2001.

As a speaker, Jim inspires and motivates audiences to never give up on their dreams. With a Walt Disney film and a major bestseller, Jim is part of the landscape of American heroes.

Travis Roy first put on ice skates at just 20 months old. As years passed, his love for the game of hockey quickly became a passion. In the fall of 1995 Roy accomplished one of his dream goals by earning a hockey scholarship to Boston University. At twenty-years of age he entered into his first collegiate hockey game. Eleven seconds into his first shift, his life changed forever as he crashed into the boards and cracked his fourth and fifth cervical vertebra, paralyzing him from the neck down.

Despite this ill twist of fate, Roy has continued to persevere and defy the odds. With an intense rehabilitation regime, he has regained some movement in his right arm. While coming to grips with his life as a quadriplegic, he returned to Boston University less than a year after his accident. Four years later, he graduated with a degree in public relations from Boston University's prestigious College of Communication. In the storied history of BU Terriers hockey, Roy's #24 is the only jersey to have been retired.

In 1997 Roy wrote his autobiography with Sports Illustrated’s E.M. Swift titled Eleven Seconds which chronicles his accident, rehabilitation, and perseverance through personal tragedy. Eleven Seconds was recently updated with an 'Afterword' chapter and is currently in its sixth printing.

An articulate advocate for individuals living with spinal cord injuries, Roy is a frequent speaker on the hope research carries and the need for increased funding, including testifying before a US Senate Committee hearing for The National Institute of Health in Washington, DC, addressing the Massachusetts state legislature and providing testimony to the Maine state legislature. In 1997, he founded the Travis Roy Foundation, a 501 (c)(3) nonprofit that focuses on finding a cure for spinal cord injuries and provides grants to spinal cord injury survivors in financial need to help them purchase costly adaptive equipment necessary to live more active and independent lives.

Actively involved in the activities of the Foundation that bears his name, Roy is a popular motivational speaker and has also worked as a color commentator for college hockey games on ESPN and WMTW-TV8 in Maine. A Boston, MA resident, he spends his summers with his family on Lake Champlain in Vermont. Roy can also be found supporting his Terriers at Boston University hockey games, or with a paint brush in his mouth working on his latest work of art.

Deborah A. Santiago, PhD, is the Vice President for Policy and Research at Excelencia in Education and brings her extensive experience in education policy and research to the challenge of accelerating Latino student success.  As an analyst at the U.S. Department of Education she led components of the Department’s reauthorization of the Higher Education Act, participated in several evaluations of national programs, and was responsible for developing the agency’s initial budget for student financial aid programs. As Deputy Director of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans, Deborah worked with federal agencies to evaluate how their programs served Latinos and produced multiple reports on the status of Latinos in education, including primary author of “Creating the Will: Hispanics Achieving Educational Excellence.”

Her current research focuses on accountability, institutional practices, and Latinos in higher education. Recent publications include the policy report, “How Latinos Pay for College: Patterns of Financial Aid,” and “California Policy Options for Accelerating Latino Student Success in Higher Education.” Deborah has a bachelor’s degree in economics, a master’s degree in urban affairs, and a doctorate degree in education policy.