Wendy Priesnitz is a writer and former educator who was a pioneer in the 1970s in homeschooling her own children. In 1987, Wendy wrote School Free - The Homeschooling Handbook, which is now in its fifth edition. Her more recent book on the subject, Challenging Assumptions in Education (2000), is a controversial look at what’s wrong with public education and the need to deschool society. It is on the reading list for some college education programs internationally, and has just been updated and reissued in 2008. Wendy and her husband started The Alternate Press, which 30 years later is now publishing three monthlies: Natural Life Magazine, Life Learning Magazine, and Natural Child Magazine. She is also a poet, with two published collections and a web blogger.

Linda Quirke is a professor of sociology at Wilfrid Laurier University. Her areas of expertise are schooling and childrearing. She has conducted research on homeschooling, private schooling and parenting advice. Her next research project will explore physical activity, children's health and obesity as they relate to parenting practices.

Michael Reist is a teacher with over 25 years’ experience in the classroom. He heads the English Department at Robert F. Hall Catholic Secondary School in Caledon East. He and his wife homeschooled their four children through the elementary years. He is a frequent speaker to local parent groups and education conferences on everything from homeschooling, to how boys and girls learn differently, to bullying. Michael is the author of “The Dysfunctional School: Uncomfortable Truths and Awkward Insights on School, Learning and Teaching”. He writes extensively for publications and has traveled throughout Ontario for the Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association presenting his workshop entitled “Replacing the Hard Drive: New Ways of Being a Teacher”. He is a founder of the famous democratic free school in Toronto called The Beach School. He lives in Caledon East with his family.