Chris Belden has led a NYWC workshop at BEGIN, for ABE/ESL students. He has published a novel, Squirt, and has also written numerous plays, screenplays and songs. He lives in Brooklyn, USA.

Tamiko Beyer leads NYWC workshops at Sylvia's Place. A queer mixed-race poet and freelance writer, Tamiko has lived in many different locales--from Tokyo Japan, to cabin in rural Washington state, to the Mission neighborhood in San Francisco--and is happy to have ended up in Brooklyn. Her poetry, articles, and reviews have appeared in a variety of print and online journals, including Calyx, Crab Creek Review, and DMQ Review. Currently, she is the Publications Coordinator for Women Make Movies. (Poem and interview with Tamiko.)

Barbara Cassidy leads a NYWC workshop at the Brooklyn Public Library, Ridge Girls, which is aimed at getting Bay Ridge girls of diverse backgrounds together to write.  She also leads a NYWC kids workshop at the Queens Public Library.  A graduate of Brooklyn College's MFA program, her play, Interim, was recently published in the anthology, New Downtown Now.

Judy Chicurel’s work has appeared in a number of regional and national publications, including The New York Times, Newsday, and YM magazines.  She recently signed option agreements for her screenplay, The Endless Summer of Miss Ursula Groves, and her play, Beautiful Pearl’s Tavern of the Orient.  Judy has led writing workshops with NYWC, and has taught writing for the National Writers Union Community Writing Program, and alternative high school programs.  She has a B.A. in English/Education and an M.L.A. in Urban Education from the City University of New York Graduate Center.

Andrew Cotto has led NYWC's Prime Time workshop and is a MFA fiction student at The New School.

Clarissa Cummings is a writer born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. Her work has been published in African Voices Literary Journal, Fierce Magazine, and the 2007 anthology "What Your Mama Never Told You". She leads a NYWC workshop for cancer survivors at the Creative Center.

Shaina Feinberg has led NYWC writing workshops at GEMS, Saint Francis Residence II, BRC Continuing Day Treatment Center, the Sol Goldman Y, P.S. 165 and at Gilda's Club. She served as Program Director of NYWC from August 2002 until September 2004. 

Beth Friedland has leds a NYWC workshop for cancer patients and survivors at The Creative Center. She's also led workshops for NYWC at the Rose Kennedy Family Center. She is currently writing a book of short erotic fiction and lives on the Lower East Side.

Yvonne Garrett has a B.A. in English from Smith College. She's been published in several music magazines, had stories in THEMA, BARDSONG, COMPASS ROSE and poetry in poeticdiversity, ROUX, SPIRE, SubtleTea and the BALTIMORE REVIEW. She is the Associate Prose Editor at LIT, assistant to the Editors at Barrow Street and is currently in the midst of her 2nd year in the MFA program at the New School. She lives in the East Village.

Madeleine George has led NYWC workshops for seniors in Fort Greene Park and for women at Hopper House, an alternative-to-incarceration program operated by the Women's Prison Association.  Her plays have been staged and developed at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center, New York Theatre Workshop, and the Public Theater, among other places, and she is a founding member of the Obie-Award-winning playwrights' collective 13P (Thirteen Playwrights, Inc.).  Her novel for teenagers, Looks, is forthcoming from Viking.  During the day Madeleine directs the Bard College campus at Bayview Correctional Facility for Women in Chelsea.

Jackie Glasthal has led NYWC's writing workshop at The Blossom Program For Girls. She is also an instructor at Gotham Writers. She is a fiction writer as well as a freelance writer and editor, specializing in books and articles for young people and educators. She's written for National Geographic for Kids, Sesame Street Parent, Instructor, The New York Times Learning Network, Teaching Tolerance, SPACE.com, and Time for Kids On-line, among others. She is the author of American History Math Problems (Scholastic), History Comes Alive: The American Revolution (Scholastic), Quick Math Guide (Sterling), and History Comes Alive: The Age of Exploration (Scholastic). Jackie holds a B.A. from NYU.

Diane Goettel is the Editor of The Adirondack Review and Managing Editor of Black Lawrence Press. Her fiction has appeared in 42 Opus, failbetter, and Lichen, among other journals. In addition to leading workshops for NYWC, Diane is currently a Dzanc Books writer-in-residence at The High School for Telecommunication Arts and Technology and teaches students pursuing their GEDs at Touro College. Diane completed her undergraduate work at Sarah Lawrence College and is currently pursuing a Master's in English at Brooklyn College.

Sheryl Gordon leads NYWC's workshop for women living at the Downtown Brooklyn YWCA. She was born and raised in South Florida, and grew up thinking that buildings only came in shades of pink, peach, or teal. Now she lives in the East Village on that stretch of St. Marks Place, where if you're not careful, you'll get pierced or tattooed on your walk to her apartment.

Kaitlyn Greenidge leads a NYWC workshop at The Blossom Program for Girls. She lives in Brooklyn, NY and works as a researcher for a local history museum. She has previously taught creative writing with the Writers' Express, Inc. in Boston, MA.

Suzanne Guillette is a writer, teacher, and editor. Her work has been seen in numerous publications, including Tin House, SELF, and other national periodicals. An occasional performer with SpeakyEasy: Stories from the Back Room, Suzanne holds a Bachelor's in Philosophy and a Master's of Fine Arts in Creative Non-fiction. As a volunteer facilitator for the New York Writer's Coalition, Suzanne leads a weekly writing workshop for formerly incarcerated women in Bedford-Stuyvesant. Her first book, MUCH TO YOUR CHAGRIN, is forthcoming from Atria.

Born in Santiago, Dominincan Republic and raised in East New York, Henry Guzmán has written numerous plays for the theater including PILGRIM, CALIBAN, INKARRI’’S RETURN, DINNER WITH JOBITA AND LA CHACHA, FLYIN’ HIGH, ANTHROPOPHAGUS (“A Cannabalist Manifesto”), BLACK BOX. He was a Van Lier Playwriting Fellow at the New York Theater Workshop where he wrote CONFESSIONS OF A P.K.* ("Preacher’’s Kid). A graduate of NYU’s Dramatic Writing program, Henry also directs and occasionally performs his own theatrical monologues.

Amie Hartman leads a workshop at  the Aguilar Center for reading and writing at the East Harlem public library, where she works with a diverse group of Adult Basic Ed and English language learners. She is a graduate of the MFA program at Brooklyn College in playwriting, and her work has been seen and heard in various downtown venues. She teaches writing in the General Studies program and in the School of Continuing and Professional studies at NYU.

Rob Darnell Hollinsed has led NYWC's writing workshops at The St. John's Recreational Center in Crown Heights, Bailey House Community House, the Fortune Society and Grand Street Settlement. Rob has written freelance articles for Theatre Resources Unlimited and coordinates the editing of the NYWC e-zine, Plum Biscuit. He credits the NYWC workshop method in helping him finish writing a novel The Folk Song Soliloquies. Rob is also composer and writer of the funk opera The Pen is Mightier Than The Sword.

Erin Hopkins is a writer, educator, and choreographer. A creative writing workshop leader since 2004, she has led NY Writers Coalition workshops for diverse groups, including homeless women and gifted public school kids. Erin writes fiction and  non-fiction, sometimes dabbling in poetry. Her work has been presented at The Construction Company's "Sunday Series," and NYWC's  Writing Aloud Series. When not writing she she can be found directing Push Cart New York, her granny cart drill team, on the lawns of Prospect Park. She currently resides in Brooklyn.

Jay House has led writing workshops at The Aurora, and has served on NYWC's Strategic Planning Committee. She has also facilitated works-in-progress workshops, artists' residencies and arts management workshops for The Field. Her poetry has been published in Pitchfork and Long Island Quarterly, and has also served as producer, company manager, stage manager and costumer for several artists in NYC. She currently works at the Arts & Business Council as the National Programs Coordinator. Jay graduated from Hampshire College with a BA in American Cultural Studies.

Debra Kirschner leads an NYWC workshop at Emmanuel Baptist Church for “Prime Time” Senior women.  She also leads a creative writing workshop at the Hoboken Shelter for homeless adults.  Debra wrote, directed and independently produced the feature film The Tollbooth, which stars Marla Sokoloff (The Practice, Big Day, Desperate Housewives), Rob McElhenney (It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia), Idina Menzel (Wicked, Rent) and Tovah Feldshuh (Law and Order, Kissing Jessica Stein).  The Tollbooth played festivals throughout the world and is being distributed by Peace Arch and Castle Hill Productions, who played it theatrically in New York, Long Island and Florida and plan to release the DVD in the US and Canada on April 8, 2008.   She earned her degree in Playwriting and Women’s Studies at Rutgers University where she wrote and directed several plays and is a graduate of New York University’s Film Intensive Program.  She has a screenplay in development called Pippi Was Here and a television project in development that is still untitled.  She is a member of New York Women in Film and Television.  For more information on The Tollbooth please see www.thetollboothmovie.com.

Courtney Knowlton is the Director of Placement at CitySquash, an after school program in the Bronx. On Sundays, she leads a NYWC  workshop for people who work in the non-profits. She lives in Manhattan and is currently working on a collection of short stories.

Ann Lewinson's fiction and poetry have appeared in Agni, Eclipse, Glass Tesseract, Karamu, Out of Line, Pangolin Papers and P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center's Special Projects Writers' Series. She is currently a film critic for the Fairfield Weekly and the New Haven Advocate. Ann leads NYWC's workshop at Urban Pathways' Ivan Shapiro House.

Margaret Lubalin has been a copywriter and advertising Creative Director for over 20 years. She is also a poet, book artist and general life observer. Margaret has taught writing and book-making classes at the Society of Scribes, The Ink Pad and in the Reading Program at P.S. 96. For the past two years she's lead a NYWC writing workshop at Inwood House, a residence for pregnant teens. She also leads a NYWC writing workshop in the Gramercy Park Area. Margaret studied creative writing at The New School, in a variety of writers groups and at the New York Writers Coalition. She has authored and self-published two books of poetry, "Openings" and "Harvest" and has had several of her poems published by Plum Biscuit, the NYWC online literary magazine. She also has the rare distinction of inventing the "poem mobile."

Andrea Maywhort has led NYWC's writing workshop at The Times Square and currently leads a workshop for 3rd and 4th Graders in public housing at the I Have A Dream Foundation. She has written numerous short stories and scripts, including the film adaptation of Lost and Found (currently in pre-production). Before moving to New York in 2002, she worked on several television shows, including the teen drama Felicity. Andrea has an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College and is currently writing her first novel.

Mary McGrail volunteers as Communications and Events Manager at NYWC. In addition to extensive professional experience, Mary has had short fiction published in The Portland Review, Melic Review and The Brooklyn Rail, and she co-edited a literary anthology called Too Darn Hot: Writing About Sex Since Kinsey (Persea Books).

Julia Morris is a storyteller and Creative Arts Specialist in the public schools. She lives now in Brooklyn and is from St. Louis, Missouri. Her father, John Morris, was a poet and she has tried her own hand at the craft. This past October, she had a poem published in the Teaching Artist Journal. She's led a NYWC workshop with high school girls in the Blossom Program For Girls.

Melanie O'Harra has led NYWC's writing workshop at The Aurora and is currently leading a workshop with the World Trade Center Survivors Network.

Angeli Rasbury currently leads workshops for children and teens at Brooklyn Public Library's New Lots and Eastern Parkway branches and has led NYWC workshop at The Blossom Program For Girls and workshop at the Fort Greene Park Summer Literary Festival.  She has written articles for such publications as Essence, The Source, and American Legacy.  She received an award from the National Council on Crime and Delinquency for her article looking at the struggle of formerly incarcerated women who seek custody of their children.  She has taught creative writing at Molloy College and performed her poetry in Diary of a Mad Black Feminist.  A former attorney with The Legal Aid Society, she lives in Brooklyn, is a photographer and loves to travel.    

Erik Rhey has led NYWC workshops at Serendipity and Serendipity II, residence facilities run by New York Therapeutic Community for the formerly incarcerated seeking substance abuse treatment. He is a fiction writer as well as a staff editor at PC Magazine. His short stories have appeared in The Copperfield Review and The Melic Review. His nonfiction has appeared in Milwaukee Magazine, The Metro Detroit Visitors Guide, and The First Line.

Mary Ellen Sanger is currently leading a workshop for adults at the New York Public Library in Inwood. She lived for 17 years in Mexico, and has published short stories and poems in Spanish and English in several Mexican journals, including Luna Zeta and Zocalo. She has also published poetry, essays, and stories in online venues, including Poets Against the War, Travelers' Tales, Mexconnect, Hack Writers, Delirium Journal, and Mexico Files. Her essay “A Grammar of Place” was anthologized in Mexico, a Love Story. She is currently writing a collection of short stories inspired by the women of Ixcotel State Penitentiary in Oaxaca, Mexico where she spent thirty-three days and nights falsely imprisoned in the fall of 2003.

Julia Schaffer has led NYWC's workshops at the 59th Recreation Center, The Arrow Recreation Center and The Queens Public Library, the Ali Forney Center and the Fort Greene Park Summer Literary Festival.  Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Cargoes, Hanging Loose, Melic Review, Poetry Motel, Plum Biscuit (the New York Writers Coalition ezine!), and The Saint Ann's Review. Her plays, Hold the Floor and The Immaculate Basketball Game, have been performed at tiny venues in Rhode Island, and New York.

Susanna Schrobsdorff led NYWC's writing workshop at The Blossom Program For Girls for about 3 years. She has written for TIME magazine, Parents, Child, Family PC, and American Baby magazine among others. Her fiction and essays have been selected for the Wordsmith Reading series at Brooklyn's Halcyon Cafe and BKLN.com. She was a Newsdesk Editor for TIME Magazine in New York, Paris and Brussels. She holds a B.A. in English from Barnard College. Susanna lives in Brooklyn with her husband and two daughters.

Jesse Sweet is a documentary film maker who most recently produced and directed the third hour of the critically acclaimed PBS series "African American Lives 2", hosted by Henry Louis Gates, Jr., which pieced together the family histories of 12 African Americans (including Don Cheadle, Morgan Freeman, Maya Angelou, Chris Rock and Tina Turner) during the slave era. Previously he wrote and produced the A&E documentary "The American Brew", which explored the history and contemporary culture of beer in America; "African American Lives 1" which traced the family histories of 8 guests including Oprah Winfrey and Whoopi Goldberg. The New York Times called this series, "The most exciting documentary on this or any other topic in quite some time." Additional credits include writing, producing and directing the A&E Biography on Leo Tolstoy; writing, producing and directing the A&E Biography on Fyodor Dostoevksy, associate producer on ABC's "Peter Jennings Reports: Beyond Conspiracy, the 40th Anniversary of the Kennedy Assassincation"; field producer on HBO's "Autopsy 8"; field producer on HBO's "The Iceman Confesses Secrets of a Mafia Hitman"; and associate producer on PBS' American Masters: "Clint Eastwood: Out of the Shadows."

Jesse's short story "The Age of Heroes and Greatness" was published in Dirt Press in the Spring of 2007. He writes film reviews for "The L Magazine." He leads a NYWC creative writing workshop for formerly incarcerated people with the Fortune Society. Jesse graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Dartmouth College in 1998 with a double honors major in Film Studies and Philosophy.

Mary E. Smith leads a workshop in Queens at the Broadway Community Library.  She is a Children's Librarian who enjoys writing and sharing in the creative endeavors of her community.

Sean Tanner leads a NYWC workshop for returned Peace Corps volunteers. A native of the west coast, he spent two and a half years living, studying and working in Latin America before coming to New York. After a semester of intensive Spanish study in Queretaro, Mexico, he attended the Catolica University in Quito, Ecuador for one year and then worked as a Human Rights monitor in Guatemala for another year. He currently lives in Brooklyn and works as a manager of four Farmers Markets throughout NYC for the Greenmarket Organization.

Melanie Votaw has led an NYWC workshop for adults at Barrier-Free Living. She is the author of seven non-fiction books, including 52 Weeks of Passionate Sex and Hummingbirds: Jewels On Air. She has published fiction in book anthologies and more than 50 poems in the literary magazines of six countries, including American Writing and Folio. She has also written magazine articles for such publications as Woman's Day and Travel Savvy and is a member of the Authors Guild and the American Society of Journalists and Authors. A speaker and teacher of both seminars and online courses, Melanie has produced a lecture/meditation CD entitled The Creative Impulse.

Raina Wallens leads a NYWC workshop at the Incarcerated Mothers Program, for teens with incarcerated parents. Raina received a BA from Cornell University and has written several young adult books under various pseudonyms; Raina has also ghostwritten several books. She is currently writing a novel.

Ivy Weiskopf has led NYWC workshop at The Blossom Program For Girls and for residents of supportive housing at Community House in Brooklyn. She currently co-leads NYWC's teen workshop at the Fort Greene Park Summer Literary Festival.  Her poetry has appeared in Salonika Quarterly and Poetry Motel and she was co-editor of the Summer 2002 edition of Blossom Review.