The Santa Barbara International Film Festival has announced that board member Lynda Weinman has been elected as new board president. The news comes on the heels of the Riviera Theatre becoming the festival’s home and the expansion of their education program.

Lynda Weinman, a multi-hyphenate teacher, writer, entrepreneur, and learning activist, began her involvement with the Santa Barbara International Film Festival as a tribute sponsor through her company lynda.com. Lynda.com then moved on to be a first presenting sponsor before Ms. Weinman herself joined the board of the festival.

As co-founder of lynda.com, Ms. Weinman was responsible for the student-centered teaching philosophy and served as the executive chair of the company until its purchase in 2015 by the LinkedIn Corporation. Before launching lynda.com, she was a faculty member at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, and worked as an animator and motion graphics director in the special effects film industry. She also taught at UCLA Extension, American Film Institute, and San Francisco State University’s Multimedia Studies Program.