Meet the Team
This project owes its existence to the tireless efforts of our team members.
Lauren Arora Hutchinson, PhD, MPH
Director, iDeas Lab
Lauren Arora Hutchinson, previously a BBC journalist, is an award-winning audio storyteller, an academic, and the inaugural director of the Dracopoulos-Bloomberg Bioethics iDeas Lab. Hutchinson oversaw the production and development of the Feels Like Home project. Using her prior experience, she ensured the film and accompanying installations offer an authentic showing of the Feels Like Home families’ stories.
Rebecca Seltzer, MD, MHS
Executive Producer
Rebecca Seltzer is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, with joint faculty appointments at the Berman Institute of Bioethics, Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, and Bloomberg School of Public Health. Seltzer’s work, which spans clinical care, research, education, and advocacy, focuses on improving care and well-being for children with medical complexity and their families. With her extensive expertise on the topic and commitment to improving home accessibility, she grounded the project, working closely with the production team.
Mike Attie
Director/Editor
Mike Attie (he/him) is an award-winning filmmaker whose films have screened at major international film festivals including CPH:DOX, Hot Docs, San Francisco and Sundance. Attie’s feature documentary In Country was supported by the Sundance Documentary Fund, the Points North Institute and the Gotham Doc Lab. His 2020 short documentary film Abortion Helpline, This is Lisa played at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival, won the grand jury award at AFI Docs and was shortlisted for an Academy Award in the Documentary Short Subject category. Attie is a co-director of the in-progress feature doc, Untitled Pennhurst Film, which tells the story of a custodial institution turned haunted house. The film has been supported by the Ford Foundation, the Perspective Fund, the Catapult Film Fund and the Sundance Institute.
Kat Polijak
Director/Editor
Katarina Poljak (they/them) is an experimental and documentary filmmaker working across multiple mediums. Their films and performances have been presented at The Kimmel Center, Vox Populi Gallery, and international festivals. A graduate of The University of the Arts, they received the 2019 Shannon D. Moore Major Film Award, and their film Incredible Machine Glass Body won multiple festival prizes in 2020. Poljak is a 2025 Resident Artist at MOA Philly, where they continue to develop new experimental work . They are currently co-directing Untitled Pennhurst Film, a feature documentary supported by the Ford Foundation, Perspective Fund, Catapult Film Fund, and Sundance Institute.
Anna Oakes MS
Producer, iDeas Lab
Anna Oakes is a journalist and audio producer based in New York City. Her multimedia work focuses on the ways technology changes how we relate to each other – from AI companion chatbots, to data privacy and public health. She reports on immigration, healthcare and local politics in New York.
Cara Coleman, MPH, JD
Producer
Cara Coleman is Director of the Bluebird Way Foundation- a 501(c)3 committed to using the arts, humanities, storytelling and narrative medicine to humanize health care and health profession education. The foundation is in honor of and carries on the work of her daughter, Justice Hope, who had disabilities and was medically complex. In 2012, Justice and Cara began reading the children's book Cara wrote, I am Justice, Hear me Roar, to medical students and residents. Cara is also an Instructor of Medical Education at University of Virginia Medicine INOVA Campus and Associate Editor for Family Partnerships, Pediatrics Executive Editorial Board.
Lora Batson, MPH, MPAS, PA-C
Producer
Lora Batson is a licensed Physician Assistant and clinical researcher with a Master of Public Health from Johns Hopkins University. She brings over two decades of lived experience as a caregiver to a child with medical complexities, giving her a unique and deep understanding of healthcare navigation and advocacy. Her professional and research interests focus on family-centered care needs and supports for children with complex medical needs. Lora also contributes as a parent consultant on academic research initiatives and has been a dedicated Make-A-Wish volunteer for over a decade.
Hannis Brown
Audio Post-Production, iDeas Lab
Hannis Brown is a composer and sound designer. His recent commissions and honors include a 2025 Pulitzer Prize finalist distinction for Pineapple Street Studio's Hysterical, a 2022 du-Pont Columbia award and NAACP Image Award for The History Channel and WNYC's Blindspot: Tulsa Burning, 2019 du-Pont Columbia Awards for the New York Public Radio podcasts Trump, Inc and Caught, a 2015 Peabody Award for work on the podcast Meet the Composer, music for ETHEL string quartet, and scores for WNYC's Scattered and American Fiasco. Projects on the horizon include new collaborations with Johns Hopkins iDeas Lab, the BBC, Trevor Noah's Day Zero Productions, and Pineapple Street Studios.
Abby Brickler
Development Assistant, iDeas Lab
Abigail Brickler received her Bachelor of Science degree in biology from Dickinson College and her Master of Bioethics degree from the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics. She has provided production assistance to the iDeas Lab, as well as research assistance to the Berman Institute and the Geisinger Department of Bioethics and Decision Sciences in Pennsylvania. Her father lived at home while experiencing medical complexity, and she hopes this project will help provide other families the support they need.
Leah Lord
Administrator, iDeas Lab
Leah Lord is the administrative coordinator at the iDeas Lab & Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics. Leah provides organizational and financial support to the iDeas Lab team. Leah has a bachelor’s degree in Health Administration and Policy with a focus in Public Health from the University of Maryland Baltimore County. She is currently pursuing her Master’s degree in Business Administration.
Tony Phillips
Creative Advisor, iDeas Lab
Tony Phillips is a consulting editor and mentor to the Dracopoulos-Bloomberg Bioethics iDeas Lab, and he is the director and founder of the award-winning Sea Salt and Mango production company. Sea Salt and Mango has produced content for Princeton University’s School of Public and international Affairs, BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds. From 2016 to 2020, Tony served as Vice President of On Demand Content at WNYC Studios in New York overseeing content for Freakonomics Radio with Stephen Dubner, Glynn Washington’s Snap Judgement, John and Hank Green’s SciShow and The Anthropocene Reviewed. He also conceived and executive produced A Piece of Work with Abbi Jacobson for the Museum of Modern Art, NY.
Bonnielin Swenor
Consultant
Bonnielin K. Swenor is founder and director of the Johns Hopkins Disability Health Research Center (DHRC) and the inaugural Endowed Professor of Disability Health and Justice. She holds joint faculty appointments in the Departments of Epidemiology and Health Policy and Management at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and at the Wilmer Eye Institute at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Her work uses data-driven approaches to transform societal views of disability, an approach summarized by the DHRC motto: “shifting the paradigm from ‘living with a disability’ to ‘thriving with a disability.’” She was named a Health Equity Champion by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), serves on the U.S. Census Bureau Scientific Advisory Committee, and is an elected member of the National Academy of Social Insurance.
Brian Ricker, MBE
Production Assistant, iDeas Lab
Brian Ricker is a production assistant at the Dracopoulous-Bloomberg Bioethics iDeas Lab. After completing his undergraduate degree in medical humanities at Johns Hopkins, Ricker received his Master of Bioethics at the Berman Institute. Through this, he began his work with the iDeas Lab. He collaborated closely with the other Feels Like Home team members during the post-production and launch phases, assisting with communications, design, and final film edits.
Nour Malaeb
Website & Brand Designer
Nour Malaeb is a product designer interested in how technology amplifies different aspects of our humanity—both the good ones and the bad—across languages, cultures, and generations. In 2018, he graduated from the MFA Interaction Design program at SVA in New York, where his thesis explored how robotic furniture could be used to make homes more accessible.
