Teachers

Holly Day has worked as a freelance writer for over 30 years, with over 7,000 articles, poems, and short stories published internationally, including in Analog SF, Harvard Review, and Maintenant. She has had several dozen books and chapbooks published by both major and independent publishers, most recently, the nonfiction books, Music Theory for Dummies, Music Composition for Dummies, Tattoo FAQ, and History Lover’s Guide to Minneapolis; and the poetry books, A Book of Beasts, The Tooth is the Largest Organ in the Human Body, Bound in Ice, and Cross-Referencing a Book of Summer. Her writing has been nominated for a National Magazine Award, a 49th Parallel Prize, an Isaac Asimov Award, multiple Pushcart awards, and a Rhysling Award, and she has received two Midwest Writer’s Grants, a Plainsongs Award, the Sam Ragan Prize for Poetry, and the Dwarf Star Award from the Science Fiction Poetry Association.

Describe your teaching style.

My goal is for students to feel comfortable exploring the process of writing and making themselves happy with their writing, and not worry about making _me_ or anyone else happy with their writing. I try to help students find their own voice during the writing process.

Tamara Dean is passionate about helping writers tell their stories. Her work has appeared in The American Scholar, Creative Nonfiction, The Guardian, Orion, Seneca Review, The Southern Review, and elsewhere. She's also the author of The Human-Powered Home. More at www.tamaradean.media

Nicola DeRobertis-Theye’s debut novel The Vietri Project will be published in March 2021 by Harper. She was an Emerging Writing Fellow at the New York Center for Fiction, and her work has been published in Agni, Electric Literature, and LitHub. A graduate of UC Berkeley, she received an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, where she was the fiction editor of its literary magazine Ecotone. She has taught creative writing at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington and the South Carolina Governor's School for the Arts. A native of Oakland, CA, she now lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Cara Diaconoff is the author of Unmarriageable Daughters: Stories and a novel, I’ll Be a Stranger to You. Her fiction has appeared in Indiana Review, The Adirondack Review, and elsewhere. She teaches writing and literature at Bellevue College. For more information check out Cara's LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/caradiaconoff/.

Cass Donish is author of the poetry collections Your Dazzling Death (Knopf, 2024), The Year of the Femme (University of Iowa Press, 2019), and Beautyberry (Slope Editions, 2018); and a nonfiction chapbook, On the Mezzanine (Gold Line Press, 2019).

Anna Dorn is an author, editor, and teacher living in Los Angeles. She has published three books: Exalted (Unnamed Press, 2022), Bad Lawyer (Hachette, 2021), and Vagablonde (Unnamed Press, 2020).

Mark Doty is the author of nine books of poetry, including Deep Lane (April 2015), Fire to Fire: New and Selected Poems, which won the 2008 National Book Award, and My Alexandria, winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the T.S. Eliot Prize in the UK. He is also the author of four memoirs: the New York Times-bestselling What Is the Grass, Dog Years, Firebird, and Heaven’s Coast, as well as a book about craft and criticism, The Art of Description: World Into Word. Doty has received two NEA fellowships, Guggenheim and Rockefeller Foundation Fellowships, a Lila Wallace/Readers Digest Award, and the Witter Byner Prize.

Scott Driscoll is an award-winning instructor (UW, Educational Outreach Award for Excellence in Teaching in the Arts and Humanities 2006), and his debut novel, Better You Go Home, was selected as the Foreword Reviews First Book Contest winner. He was the 1989 winner of the University of Washington’s Milliman Award for Fiction.

Describe your teaching style!

We start by reading examples of the discussion subject for that day, then I go over that element of craft and we discuss it some more and look at further examples. This will usually be followed by a writing prompt or two for practice. Some classes will finish with workshopping and peer review for those who volunteer to submit.

Cassidy Dyce is a writer currently living in Seattle, Washington. After graduating from Christopher Newport University with a BA degree in English, she worked as the writer's assistant for Kwame Alexander, Author, and Recipient of the Newbery Medal. Her work is featured in NPR's Morning Edition and ABC's miniseries, WordPlay. In her first year of moving to Seattle, Cassidy was accepted into the Hugo House Fellowship Program, where she completed the first draft of her WIP Caricatures. Recently, she joined Seattle Arts and Lecture's Writers-in-Schools (WITS) residency, where she has the privilege to venture into Public Schools and partner with Teachers to reintroduce the love of literature and creative writing to students. Her graphic novel series, Brainstormers, Co-authored with Kwame Alexander, will hit shelves in 2025.

Omar El Akkad is an award-winning journalist and author whose debut novel, American War, was listed as one of the best books of the year by The New York Times, The Washington Post, GQ, NPR, Esquire, and was selected by the BBC as one of a hundred novels that changed our world. His second novel, What Strange Paradise, won the Giller Prize and the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Award.

Allison Ellis’ writing has been published in The New York Times, The Ploughshares blog, Assay: A Journal of Nonfiction Studies, Amazon Original Stories, SELF, Marie Claire, Redbook, and The Washington Post. In 2016, her essay, “Hold On” won the Pacific Northwest Writers Association Literary Award in the short nonfiction category, and her forthcoming memoir, Ready About is the 2021 recipient of the First Pages Prize/Sandra Carpenter Prize for Creative Nonfiction. She holds an MFA from Bennington Writing Seminars (2021) and a BA from Smith College in American Studies. Read more of her work at allisonellis.com

Jonathan Escoffery is the author of If I Survive You, a debut collection of linked stories forthcoming in September 2022 from MCDxFSG, as well as the forthcoming novel, Play Stone Kill Bird. Both books will be published in the UK and Commonwealth by 4th Estate Books, in Canada by McClelland and Stewart, and will be published in translation in France by Albin Michel and in Germany by Piper Verlag.

Escoffery is the winner of The Paris Review’s 2020 Plimpton Prize for Fiction and is the recipient of a 2020 National Endowment for the Arts (Prose) Literature Fellowship. His story “Under the Ackee Tree” was among the trio that won the Paris Review the 2020 ASME Award for Fiction from the American Society of Magazine Editors, and was subsequently included in The Best American Magazine Writing 2020. His most recent stories have appeared in The Paris Review, Electric Literature’s Recommended Reading, Zyzzyva and American Short Fiction.

 Escoffery has taught creative writing and seminars on the writer’s life at Stanford University, the University of Minnesota, the Center for Fiction, Tin House, Writers in Progress, and at GrubStreet in Boston, where, as former staff, he founded the Boston Writers of Color Group, which currently has more than 2,000 members. He has received support and honors from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation of New Mexico, Aspen Words, Kimbilio Fiction, the Anderson Center, and elsewhere. 

 For Writers of the World, Jonathan reflected on his love of the short story form: “I first fell in love with story’s ability to transport, to expand the borders of my reality. I recall crouching beneath my parents’ kitchen counter as a child, losing Sunday afternoons reading. That words printed between book covers could take me to far off worlds, on journeys that left me forever changed, was, to me, nothing short of magic. I also sensed perfection in the economy of these world-altering journeys; their being beautifully bound to fit in my palms. Later, I came to understand that great literature does not simply transport, but that it also helps me understand myself, and that—at its best—it helps me to better articulate my experiences and helps me further understand those of others.”

 He is a graduate of the University of Minnesota’s Creative Writing MFA Program (Fiction) and attends the University of Southern California’s Ph.D. in Creative Writing and Literature Program as a Provost Fellow. He is a 2021-2023 Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University.

Melanie Figg is a poet and essayist, currently working on a hybrid memoir. Her award-winning poetry collection, Trace, was named one of the year’s "Best Indie Books" by Kirkus Reviews. She's received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Maryland State Arts Council, and others, and has had work published in dozens of literary journals, including The Iowa Review, Nimrod, The Rumpus, Hippocampus, and the American Journal of Poetry. As a certified professional coach, Melanie offers women’s writing retreats and works remotely with writers on their manuscripts as well as their creative process.

Website: melaniefigg.net

Karen Finneyfrock is a poet and novelist. She is the author of two young adult novels: The Sweet Revenge of Celia Door and Starbird Murphy and the World Outside, both published by Viking Children’s Books. She is one of the editors of the anthology Courage: Daring Poems for Gutsy Girls, and the author of Ceremony for the Choking Ghost, both released on Write Bloody press. She is a former Writer-in Residence at Hugo House. Learn more on her website: http://www.karenfinneyfrock.com.

Marissa Flaxbart is a writer, filmmaker, and podcaster based in Los Angeles. She holds a BA in Cinema and Media Studies from the University of Chicago and an MFA in Screenwriting from Chapman University. Early in her professional life, she produced and directed a feature-length documentary, SHOW/CHOIR, while leading a team of technology lecturers at one of the first flagship Apple stores. Since relocating to Los Angeles, she has worked as a writer and developer for film and television. She is the host of the culture podcast Sweet Valley Diaries and a writer/producer for Twenty Thousand Hertz. Her first narrative feature will be released in 2021.

Gail Folkins often writes about her deep roots in the American West. She is the author of two creative nonfiction books from Texas Tech University Press: a Pacific Northwest memoir titled Light in the Trees (2016), and Texas Dance Halls: A Two-Step Circuit (2007), which was a popular culture finalist in ForeWord Review’s 2007 Book of the Year Awards. Folkins’ essay “A Palouse Horse” was a Notable Essay in The Best American Essays 2010. Her essays and poetry have appeared in publications such as River Teeth Journal – Beautiful Things, North Dakota Quarterly, Wisconsin Life, Texas Highways, and Wildflower Magazine. She has taught at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, St. Edward’s University (Austin), and Austin Community College. Teaching philosophy: My goal is to further understanding of craft while also encouraging expression of students’ unique voices. Students have praised my workshop format and student-centered approach. Students learn to not only share a narrative, but to also explore their experiences and discoveries. I encourage students to read as writers, meaning focusing on elements of craft in addition to literary themes. Writers I return to: Edward Abbey, Julia Alvarez, Margaret Atwood, Kim Barnes, Rick Bass, Dennis Covington, Louise Erdrich, Ernest Hemingway, Pico Iyer, and Jhumpa Lahiri. Favorite writing advice: Find the extraordinary in the everyday.

Teré Fowler-Chapman (he/they) is a poet, cultural worker, and youth advocate whose work focuses on mental health and their experience as a black, transgendered man. He is a Marsha P. Johnson Fellow, National Arts Strategies’ Creative Community Fellow, and Rocky Mountain Regional Emmy Award nominee. His first full-length poetry book, "M O O N S H i N E," was released by R&R Press in October. You can find Teré’s work in the Huffington Post, the University of Arizona’s VOCA, TEDxTucson, Tucson Weekly, Arizona Public Media’s PBS & NPR, AutoStraddle, and more. Website: terethepoet.com | Photo Credit: Zach Oren.

Describe your teaching style.

Relaxed and approachable.

Gabriela Denise Frank is a Pacific Northwest writer, editor, and creative writing instructor. Her essays, interviews, and fiction, explore identity, feminism, aging, belonging, creative practice, and ancestors. Her work appears in True Story, HAD, Poetry Northwest, Pembroke, DIAGRAM, Hunger Mountain, Bayou, Baltimore Review, The Normal School, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. Her essay “BAD DATE” was named a Notable Essay of 2020 by Best American Essays. Gabriela’s work is supported by grants, fellowships, and residencies from 4Culture, Artist Trust, The Civita Institute, Centrum, Invoking the Pause, Jack Straw Cultural Center, Marble House, Mineral School, Vermont Studio Center, and Willapa Bay. In 2009, she enrolled in her first Hugo House class, which reignited her writing life. Off the page, her literary art installations and performances transform stories into multisensory experiences. Her writing is rooted in place and landscape, a result of her career in architecture and urban design in the western United States. An advocate for public arts and artists, she serves as an arts commissioner for the City of Burien, on the arts advisory committee of 4Culture, and as creative nonfiction editor for Crab Creek Review. For more information go to gabrieladenisefrank.com.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/civitaveritas/  

Twitter: https://twitter.com/CivitaVeritas

Describe your teaching style.

I center each class meeting on a theme matched with a constraint, a prompt, or a form. (Oftentimes, we'll do two or three writes per session.) As a prose writer of essays and creative nonfiction, I often draw poetry and poetic approaches into my classes because I believe the granular focus on language and form helps us craft stronger prose.

Camellia Han Freeman is a Seattle-based writer and community educator. Past honors include notable mention in Best American Essays, Image’s Milton Postgraduate Fellowship, Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award, and a summer residency in Provincetown.

Leora Fridman is author of My Fault, in addition to other books of prose, poetry, and translation. Work appears in the New York Times, the Rumpus, and the Believer, among others. She is currently faculty associate in the Narrative Medicine program at Columbia University, and Curator in Residence at the Jewish Museum of Maryland. For more information check out Leora's website: www.leorafridman.com

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Kate Gale is the co-founder and Managing Editor of Red Hen Press. She is the author of several books of poetry and of the libretto Rio de Sangre which was performed at the Florentine Opera.