Azia Armstead (she/her) is a poet from Richmond, Virginia. She holds an MFA in Poetry from New York University where she received the Goldwater Fellowship. In 2019, Azia was a finalist for the Furious Flower Poetry Prize judged by A. Van Jordan and honorable mention for the Arts Club of Washington’s Scholarship Award for Poetry. Azia was chosen as a finalist for the 2023 Nine Syllables Press Chapbook Contest. Her work has appeared in Boston Review, The Quarry, Obsidian, Rattle and elsewhere. She currently lives in Brooklyn.

For 27 years Nan worked at the Borough of Manhattan Community College, CUNY, teaching developmental writing, composition, and women’s literature. She then became Academic Director of the CUNY Baccalaureate for Unique and Interdisciplinary Studies for nine years. After retiring, she was part-time Director of Special Projects at John Jay College and consultant for the City University of New York and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation documenting the development of The Stella and Charles Guttman Community College, CUNY. She volunteers at The Whitney Museum, and has edited or coedited seven books. Her family consists of four children and 12 grandchildren.

Annaya Baynes (she/they) is excited to join the Girls Write Now team as a Fellow after being a mentee. They recently graduated from Spelman College with a Bachelor of Arts in English and French. As an undergraduate, she worked on Spelman’s social justice podcast, The Blue Record, and the reproductive justice-oriented podcast Black Feminist Rants. Annaya has interned at various publishing houses, including Penguin Random House, Macmillan, and The Feminist Press. They have a deep love for literature and film. In her free time, she enjoys baking.

Audrey is a grant writer in her professional life and enjoys writing fiction and poetry about causes she is passionate about, including animal welfare. She tends to write poetry and short stories with fantasy and/or horror elements. She graduated in May of 2024 as an English major with a minor in Creative writing. Some authors who have inspired her are Margaret Atwood, Ellen Hopkins, and Suzanne Collins.

Anne (AN-ee) Caceres-Gonzalez is a first generation Caribbean Latina, born in New York and raised in the Bronx, whose intersectional lived experience has led her to advocate and create space for traditionally underrepresented communities in the workplace. Anne’s experience in people work extends across performance management, coaching, recruitment and learning and development, through the lens of diversity, equity and inclusion, connecting people, and advocating personal + professional growth. The love Anne holds for her own identity and deep, profound respect she has for others’, are constantly working together to create a space where underrepresented groups feel safe and seen. Anne’s life ambition is to continue to center the voices of underrepresented people, as it’s key in order to decolonize and redefine those narratives. Anne is currently the Director of People and Culture at Mischief, a creative advertising agency in Brooklyn, NY and has previously held roles at other creative agencies like BBDO, 72andSunny and FCB. Anne holds a Bachelor of Arts in Corporate Communications with a minor in English from Baruch College, is a member and has served on the National Executive Board of Lambda Pi Upsilon Sorority, Latinas Poderosas Unidas, Inc, where she has mentored and empowered young women to find their voice.

Andrea Cepeda is an English major with a concentration in Creative Writing. She reads and writes romance, but is open to exploring any and all genres; genres that she loves to read, besides romance, are historical fiction, fantasy, sci-fi/dystopian. In her free time, she reads and writes, rewatches her comfort shows, and romanticizes her life.

Martina Clark is a professor and the award-winning author and narrator of My Unexpected Life: An International Memoir of Two Pandemics, HIV and COVID-19. She writes memoir, personal essays, and travel narratives. Before teaching, she worked for the United Nations system (UNAIDS, UNICEF, Peacekeeping) for decades. She has been living with HIV for more than half her life – 31 years and counting – and survived COVID-19, original recipe. Martina has traveled to more than 90 countries and conducted condom demonstrations in at least 50 of them. She’s traveled by boat, bus, and plane, but never by elephant or camel.

Comly is a senior majoring in communication and media studies with a minor in English at Montclair University. She most often writes short, finding that there’s something special to conveying larger ideas and emotions in flash and microfiction. In her free time she loves being outdoors, baking, and running. She can almost always be found in the middle of a sitcom and, true to New Jersey stereotypes, is always in the mood for a bacon, egg and cheese bagel.

Mariah Dwyer is a Girls Write Now mentee alum and a member co-chair of the Editorial Committee for the Print Anthology. She previously worked as a Publicist at Little, Brown and Company and Fortier Public Relations.

Sally Familia (they/them) is a queer poet and freelance editor. Born in the Dominican Republic and raised in Washington Heights, Familia has a rooted passion for their community. They spent a year serving as senior editor for La Galería Magazine, a Dominican-based magazine for the Dominican diaspora in Washington Heights. They hold a B.A. in creative writing with a focus on poetry from SUNY Oswego. Most recently, Sally’s passions have shifted; now incorporating a strong desire to work with and for the youth. Sally hopes to merge their love for literature, Queer and BIPOC communities, and the youth as they continue to navigate the artist/ professional dichotomy. Sally has been awarded the Academy of American Poets Prize for the poem, “The Trouble with Reminiscing” (2019). They were also nominated for a Pushcart Prize by Brooklyn Poets for the poem, “Esperanza, Republica Dominicana”. Sally is currently working on their first poetry collection.

Amy Fusselman is the author of five books. Her latest, The Means, is her first novel. Fusselman’s previous four books, all nonfiction, have been translated into several languages. Her articles and essays have appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The Believer, McSweeney’s, and many other outlets. Her nonfiction has been nominated for The Believer Book Award and the University of Iowa’s Krause Essay Prize. She has taught creative writing at New York University and been a guest speaker at Carnegie Mellon University and Franklin & Marshall College, among many others. She volunteers for Girls Write Now and lives in New York City with her family.