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ID: A white woman smiling, looking sideways, with short blonde hair with one side shaved. She is wearing a blouse with ribbon designs, and black pants.

Melissa Malzkuhn is a Deaf creative and product leader, narrative strategist, and education innovator who has spent nearly two decades designing learning experiences at the frontier of language, technology, and equity. As Founder and Director of Motion Light Lab and Co-Director of the Visual Language and Visual Learning Center at Gallaudet University, she has built globally recognized programs where rigorous research becomes lived, immersive experience — and where communities historically excluded from technology become its authors. Her work sits at a rare intersection: product R&D leadership, visual communication expertise, and Deaf cultural knowledge, with a portfolio of shipped products across immersive media, sign language technology, and bilingual education. Melissa builds ecosystems — from research and narrative architecture to shipped products and global coalitions. She is an Obama Fellow, an Ashoka Fellow, a 2024 Elevate Prize winner, and part of Forbes' inaugural Accessibility 100.


For my full CV, click here.
To explore more of my work, please visit these sites:
Motion Light Lab, Crest Network, Visual Language and Visual Learning - Research Briefs, The ASL App, To Sign is Human - Instagram.

For speaking engagements and/or consultation requests, please go here.