Dr. Christina Marrocco is a professor at ECC where she teaches creative writing and other courses to a diverse population. Her writing deals with working class concerns and the Italian American diaspora. Christina has recently published poetry in the Laurel Review and Silver Birch Press.

Rabi'a Hakima is an assistant professor of English at Elgin Community College in Illinois where she teaches composition and multicultural literature. She received her PhD in English from Auburn University. Her major areas of research are feminist theory and American women’s writing.

Tony Ardizzone is the author of eight books of fiction, including the novels The Whale Chaser and By the Fountain of the Four Rivers. His work has received the Flannery O'Connor Award, the Milkweed National Fiction Prize, the Pushcart Prize, and two NEA Fellowships.

Daniel Shank Cruz has published articles, personal essays, and reviews on a variety of contemporary American and Canadian authors in journals such as Crítica Hispánica, Rhubarb, Mennonite Quarterly Review, and the Journal of the Center for Mennonite Writing. He teaches at Utica College.

Carl Fuerst is an instructor of English and composition at Kishwaukee College. He is head editor of the Breakroom Stories, an audio journal of strange tales, and his fiction has appeared in numerous print and online publications.