March 12, 2025
“Guinn Center's Dignity Index and Civil Discourse”
Panelist Bios:
Jill Tolles — Guinn Center, Executive Director

Jill Tolles is the Executive Director of the Kenny Guinn Center for Policy Priorities. She has taught at the University of Nevada since 2005, where she received her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Communication Studies. She is also on the faculty of the National Judicial College, where she teaches courtroom management, collaborative decision-making, and procedural fairness to judges from around the nation and the world.
Prior to joining the Guinn Center, Jill served three terms in the Nevada Legislature as the Assemblywoman for District 25, where she has served on the Education, Judiciary, Commerce and Labor, and Ways and Means Committees. Additionally, she served in two special sessions and three interims on the Interim Finance Committee, Legislative Committee on Education, Legislative Committee on Energy, Commission on Special License Plates, and the Nevada Sentencing Commission.
Jill has given back to the community by serving on numerous boards and commissions over the years. She is currently an Education Alliance Board member, recent Vice Chair of the Attorney General’s Statewide Substance Use Response Working Group, Chair of the Northern Nevada Sex Trafficking Task Force, Junior Achievement Hall of Fame Recipient, Aspen Institute Rodel Fellow, FBI Citizen’s Academy Graduate, and member of the International Women’s Forum.
Prior to joining the Guinn Center, Jill served three terms in the Nevada Legislature as the Assemblywoman for District 25, where she has served on the Education, Judiciary, Commerce and Labor, and Ways and Means Committees. Additionally, she served in two special sessions and three interims on the Interim Finance Committee, Legislative Committee on Education, Legislative Committee on Energy, Commission on Special License Plates, and the Nevada Sentencing Commission.
Jill has given back to the community by serving on numerous boards and commissions over the years. She is currently an Education Alliance Board member, recent Vice Chair of the Attorney General’s Statewide Substance Use Response Working Group, Chair of the Northern Nevada Sex Trafficking Task Force, Junior Achievement Hall of Fame Recipient, Aspen Institute Rodel Fellow, FBI Citizen’s Academy Graduate, and member of the International Women’s Forum.
Amy Pason — UNR, Associate Professor

Amy Pason (Ph.D., University of Minnesota) is an Associate Professor of Communication Studies at the University of Nevada, Reno, specializing in rhetoric. Dr. Pason’s research and teaching centers on multiple facets of democracy in the US, especially in the ways that we can foster and support democratic culture.
She works to foster skills in students to deliberate and understand how to engage across differences to solve society’s “wicked problems” through organizing the Wolfpack Community Howl deliberative discussion events. She is currently developing research with the Guinn Center to understand how negative political rhetoric and incivility by elected officials undermines political participation thinking through the concept of dignity.
She works to foster skills in students to deliberate and understand how to engage across differences to solve society’s “wicked problems” through organizing the Wolfpack Community Howl deliberative discussion events. She is currently developing research with the Guinn Center to understand how negative political rhetoric and incivility by elected officials undermines political participation thinking through the concept of dignity.