Libby Lai-Bun Chiu is the Senior Advisor for Learning Initiatives at the Illinois Arts Council where she serves as the Project Director of the Education Leaders Institute, an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts hosted by the Council that challenges selected state teams to imagine and help create a healthy national education environment in which the arts are a foundation. She is concurrently leading the Illinois State Board of Education and Illinois Arts Council Partnership and is an adjunct professor of arts education at Goucher College in their distance learning program. Libby is an overseer of The Boston Conservatory, a board member of the Boston Dragon Boat Festival and an active member of the Asians and Asian Pacific Islanders in Philanthropy.

Libby is a former teacher and principal in the Boston Public Schools and adjunct professor of Early Childhood and of Asian American Studies at the University of Massachusetts. She has served as Deputy Director and acting Executive Director of the Massachusetts Cultural Council, Vice President for External Affairs at The Boston Conservatory and, most recently, Executive Director of Urban Gateways: Center for Arts Education. She has been a review panelist for the Endowment and state and regional arts agencies and was most recently the keynote speaker for the Nebraska Arts Council's statewide arts conference. While living in Boston, she was appointed by two Boston mayors to serve as the founding Chair of the Boston Human Rights Commission and a Trustee of the Boston Public Library. Aside from her education and community service experience, Libby also trained seriously in classical ballet and modern dance.