Meet the Team
Charles Mitchell ’05 | Co-Founder & CEO
The experience of being a Bucknell student on the morning of September 11, 2001, transformed Charles’ life and set him on the path of becoming a civil society entrepreneur. In addition to co-founding the Open Discourse Coalition, Charles has served as executive vice president and then president of an award-winning think tank furthering bipartisan policy reforms, founding president of a public interest law firm representing mistreated workers, founding chairman of a First Amendment watchdog group, co-founder of a community schoolhouse, elder in his family’s church, and volunteer in numerous inner-city education initiatives. He is the only person ever to receive both the Overton Award and the Thomas A. Roe Award from the State Policy Network in recognition of those efforts. Charles and his wife, Charissa Reimer Mitchell ’05, live in Central Pennsylvania with their four daughters, who are frequent and enthusiastic attendees of ODC events.
Dawn Toguchi ’06 | Executive Director
Dawn (Meling) Toguchi is a 2006 graduate of Bucknell University, holding a degree in business management. She earned an MBA from Duquesne University while working in finance for U. S. Steel in Pittsburgh. Dawn has spent the last decade in marketing, communications, and development for nonprofits.
Angela Kahler | Office Manager
Angela joins Open Discourse Coalition after a 34-year career at Bucknell University where she most recently served as Budget Manager and Academic Assistant in the Management for Organizations Department in the Freeman College of Management. She was awarded the John F. Zeller Award for Support Staff Excellence.
Carol Platt Liebau | Senior Advisor
Carol Platt Liebau has worked as a think tank president, attorney, author, political and policy advisor, and media commentator. She has served as legislative assistant to Senator Christopher S. “Kit” Bond of Missouri; as a consultant to the U.S. Senate campaigns of John D. Ashcroft of Missouri (1994) and Congressman Tom Campbell of California (2000 and 2010); and as law clerk to Judge David B. Sentelle of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit. Carol is a graduate of Harvard Law School—where she served as the first female managing editor of The Harvard Law Review—and Princeton University, where she was editorial chairman of The Daily Princetonian.
