Carmella Van Vleet is a former kindergarten teacher who now writes full-time. She’s the author of over a dozen books including the award-winning middle-grade novel Eliza Bing Is (Not) A Big, Fat Quitter and the picture book To the Stars! The First American Woman to Walk in Space (co-authored with astronaut Kathy Sullivan). Carmella lives in Columbus, Ohio.
Chiquita Mullins Lee is an Arts Learning coordinator at the Ohio Arts Council (OAC) where she manages Ohio’s Poetry Out Loud and Arts Partnership programs. She is a former teaching artist in creative writing on the OAC teaching artist roster, hosted the Emmy-award winning program Traditions: Ohio Heritage Fellows, and has served on the Arts Education review panel for the National Endowment for the Arts.
Jennifer Mack-Watkins is a printmaker whose work investigates power through the complexities of themes like womanhood, beauty, body image, and gender roles. Her solo exhibition "Children of the Sun" at Brattleboro Museum has been featured in the New York Times, Vogue, and Essence Magazine. Read more about her work at mackjennifer.com.
