GW Alliance for a Sustainable Future Celebration

Associate Professor, Performance and Director of Performance Studies

Robert Baker has been a pillar of the Washington D.C. classical music scene for over 30 years. He has performed in over 55 productions with the Washington National Opera, including high-profile premieres of works by Phillip Glass and Jake Heggie. Other career highlights include his Metropolitan Opera debut and a Grammy-winning recording with the National Symphony Orchestra.

As an esteemed interpreter of Britten, Mr. Baker has sung the Serenade across the country. He has collaborated on over 20 premieres of new works and frequently performs contemporary music. Mr. Baker has been on the faculty of The George Washington University since 1992. His acclaimed career also includes singing with the US Air Force and major symphonies across the country. After 30+ years on stage, Mr. Baker continues to captivate audiences with his versatile artistry.

Senator for Delaware | Co-Founder and Co-Chair, Senate Climate Solutions Caucus

Chris Coons was elected to the United States Senate in 2010 following terms as New Castle County Council President and New Castle County Executive. In the Senate, he chairs the Ethics Committee, and he also sits on the Appropriations, Judiciary, Foreign Relations, and Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committees.

Chris is a pragmatic legislator eager to find bipartisan solutions to the issues confronting Delaware and the nation. In 2019, he launched the bipartisan Senate Climate Solutions Caucus with Senator Mike Braun (R-Ind.) to tackle partisan gridlock on climate issues. Senator Coons is a strong proponent of funding for climate mitigation, adaptation, and resilience programs. He has also led several pieces of bipartisan legislation, including the Energy Savings Through Public-Private Partnerships Act, Partnerships for Energy Security and Innovation Act, and the Financing Our Energy Future Act, which would take important steps to support energy efficiency and clean energy research, development, and deployment.  His PROVE IT Act, introduced with Senator Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), would require a study of global emissions intensity to hold countries with dirty production and manufacturing accountable.

Chris graduated from Amherst College with a B.A. in chemistry and political science and earned a law degree from Yale Law School and a Master’s in Ethics from Yale Divinity School. A longtime New Castle County resident, Chris lives in Wilmington with his wife, Annie. They have three children, Michael, Jack, and Margaret.

Director of Choral Activities

Versatile, engaging, and spirited, conductor and artistic leader Erin Freeman serves in multiple positions throughout the District of Columbia and the Commonwealth of Virginia and maintains an international presence through guest conducting engagements. Ms. Freeman is Artistic Director of The City Choir of Washington, Artistic Director of Wintergreen Music, Resident Conductor of the Richmond Ballet, the State Ballet of Virginia, and Director of Choral Activities at George Washington University. She recently concluded successful tenures as Director of the award-winning Richmond Symphony Chorus and Director of Choral Activities at Virginia Commonwealth University.

Guest conducting engagements include the Detroit Symphony, Buffalo Philharmonic, Portland (Maine) Symphony, South Carolina Philharmonic, Charlottesville Symphony, Virginia Symphony, and additional ensembles in New York, Massachusetts, Maryland, Virginia, Georgia, Missouri, North Carolina, and Illinois. She has conducted at Carnegie Hall, Boston Symphony Hall, La Madeleine in Paris, and the Kennedy Center, and has led and/or prepared the Richmond Symphony Chorus for multiple recordings, including the 2019 GRAMMY-nominated release of Mason Bates’ Children of Adam on the Reference Recording label. After a year of creating online, interactive experiences for multiple organizations, in 2021-2022, Ms. Freeman returned to the podium in engagements with the Virginia, Portland, Detroit, Williamsburg, and Richmond Symphony Orchestras, choral preparation for the Defiant Requiem Foundation, a performance of Faure’s Requiem in Carnegie Hall with Distinguished Concerts International New York, two productions with the Richmond Ballet, and the Richmond Symphony Chorus’ 50th anniversary celebration, featuring Haydn’s The Creation. The 2022-2023 season brought appearances with the Detroit Symphony, the Toledo Symphony, the Savannah Philharmonic, the Washington Metropolitan Philharmonic Orchestra, and multiple performances with the Richmond Ballet, Wintergreen Music, and The City Choir of Washington. 

In 2023-2024, Ms. Freeman makes her debut with the New York City Ballet in George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker, The Washington Ballet as part of 10,000 Dreams – A Celebration of Asian Choreography at the Kennedy Center, and the Saint Louis Symphony Chorus, preparing Fauré Requiem for Stéphane Denève; and at Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts conducting Carmina Burana with the Richmond Ballet; Cadogan Hall in London, England leading Everyday Wonders - The Girl from Aleppo by Cecilia McDowall; and the Musikverein in Vienna with Berkshire Choral International, featuring Bruckner’s Te Deum and Elgar’s The Music Makers. 

A recent finalist for Performance Today’s Classical Woman of the Year, Ms. Freeman has also been named one of Virginia Lawyers Weekly’s “50 Most Influential Women in Virginia” and an “Extraordinary Woman Leader” by the VCU School of Business. Freeman holds degrees from Northwestern University (BMus), Boston University (MM), and Peabody Conservatory (DMA).

Assistant Director of Choral Activities | Choral Pianist

Jeff Kempskie is active in the Washington, D.C. area as a church musician, choral conductor, pianist, organist, and singer. He has served as Director of Music and organist at St. Mark's Episcopal Church, Capitol Hill since 2010, where he directs the Chancel Choir and manages all other aspects of the music program. Mr. Kempskie has been on the faculty of The George Washington University since January 2016 and is the accompanist and assistant conductor for the University Singers. He has directed the Women's Ensemble, coached various chamber ensembles, and accompanied a variety of student recitals. Over the past few years he served as Associate Director of the Reston Chorale and Assistant Music Director for the Cantate Concert Choir. As a singer, Mr. Kempskie has sung with numerous groups including the Cantate Chamber Singers, early music ensemble Chantry, and with the choirs at Washington National Cathedral and St. Paul’s K Street.

Prior to moving to Washington, D.C., Mr. Kempskie taught choral music at the Eaglebrook School and Quabbin Regional Middle/High School while serving as organist or music director at a variety of churches of different denominations—Unitarian Universalist, Catholic, Episcopal, and Presbyterian—in Massachusetts and New York. He has been piano and organ accompanist for choirs at the Eastman School of Music, Smith College, and the University of Massachusetts Amherst. In addition, he has music-directed or played keyboard for nearly 60 musical theater productions.

Mr. Kempskie received his Bachelor’s degree in Music Education and a Master’s degree in Choral Conducting from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, studying conducting with Dr. E. Wayne Abercrombie. He also earned a Master’s degree in Organ Performance and Literature from the Eastman School of Music, where he studied with Dr. William Porter.

Associate Professor, Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering

Dr. Saniya LeBlanc is an associate professor in the Department of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering at The George Washington University. Her research goals are to create next-generation energy solutions leveraging advanced materials and manufacturing techniques. Prior to joining GW, she was a research scientist at a startup company where she created research, development, and manufacturing characterization solutions for power generation technologies. Previously, she was a math and physics teacher at a multicultural high school in the D.C. public school system through Teach for America. Dr. LeBlanc is a recipient of the National Science Foundation CAREER award. In 2018, the American Society of Engineering Education named Dr. LeBlanc one of its “20 Under 40” high-achieving researchers and educators, and she also received the GW Morton A. Bender Teaching Award.

Dr. LeBlanc obtained a PhD in mechanical engineering with a minor in materials science at Stanford University. She was a Churchill Scholar at University of Cambridge where she received an MPhil in engineering, and she has a BS in mechanical engineering with a minor in French from Georgia Institute of Technology.

Executive Director, GW Alliance for a Sustainable Future | Founding Director, Planet Forward

Frank Sesno serves as Director of the George Washington University Alliance for a Sustainable Future, which coordinates and amplifies the university’s teaching, research, convening, and outreach around climate change and sustainability.  The Alliance was launched in 2023 to increase the impact of the university’s work addressing climate change and sustainability and educating the next generation of environmental leaders.

An Emmy-award winning journalist, Mr. Sesno is a professor in GW’s School of Media and Public Affairs, which he led as director from 2009 to 2020, and where he teaches classes on environmental reporting. He is the founding director of Planet Forward, a multi-media platform that publishes stories by college students around the world about ideas and innovation to “move the planet forward.” Mr. Sesno is host of Maryland Public Television’s annual Chesapeake Bay Summit and has hosted programs for New York Public Broadcasting on climate change and sea level rise.

Author of Ask More: The Power of Questions to Open Doors, Uncover Solutions, and Spark Change, Mr. Sesno teaches the art of the interview, helping students learn how outcome-driven inquiry, purposeful questioning, and active listening can lead to better journalism through discovery, understanding, and empathy.

Mr. Sesno’s diverse career spans more than four decades in journalism, including 21 years at CNN, where he served as White House correspondent, anchor, Sunday talk show host, and Washington Bureau Chief. In those roles, he covered presidential campaigns and political conventions, superpower summits and arms negotiations, wars in the Mideast and Latin America.  He was at the Berlin Wall when President Reagan declared, “Mister Gorbachev, tear down this wall,” and on the West Front of the Capitol when Barack Obama was sworn in as America’s first Black president.  He led CNN’s D.C. coverage as Washington Bureau chief after the 9/11 attacks, and produced and reported a documentary about America’s brittle energy supply lines after Hurricane Katrina. 

Mr. Sesno has interviewed five U.S. presidents and engaged with some of the world’s leading figures in politics, business, science, and culture including Bill Gates, Hillary Clinton, Colin Powell, Walter Cronkite, Benjamin Netanyahu, Nancy Pelosi, and Anthony Fauci.  He has moderated a wide range of conversations and worked with many influential organizations including the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Kavli Foundation, The White House Historical Association, and the Hospice Foundation of America.

Before joining CNN, Mr. Sesno worked as a radio correspondent for the Associated Press at the White House and in London. He has won several prestigious journalistic awards, including an Emmy, several cable ACE awards, and an Overseas Press Club Award.

Mr. Sesno serves on the board of directors of the Global Council for Science and the Environment and is a member of the Poynter Institute’s National Advisory Board. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and serves as an emeritus trustee of his alma mater, Middlebury College from which he holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in American History.  He holds three honorary degrees in recognition of his work in journalism and civil discourse.

In 2023, GW alumni Ted and Meredith Segal generously endowed The Sesno Series, which convenes high level conversations at the university about issues concerning American democracy and civil discourse.