Leo Williams is a writer, educator, and artist who received his Master in Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the University of New Mexico (UNM). While a graduate student, Leo taught Intro to Creative Writing in the English department, as well as two sections of first-year writing courses, both Composition I and II. In his Intro to Creative Writing course, he focused on teaching craft elements such as imagery in text, dialogue, point of view, setting, character, and theme across genres.
In addition to teaching, Leo was UNM’s Creative Writing Program’s administration assistant, where he was responsible for bi-weekly newsletters focused on creative writing professional opportunities, organizing the Spring and Fall reading series, designing and distributing flyers for events, generating branding materials for the department’s identity, managing all social media accounts, and representing the program at The Association of Writers and Writing Programs conference in Seattle and Kansas City.
Beyond teaching, Leo also has a healthy, ongoing writing practice that has resulted in publication in two notable American Literary Magazines: both Sinking City and The Florida Review. Leo believes the key to maintaining a thriving writing practice is a devoted teaching practice, one where he can actively connect with burgeoning writers. In order to write, one needs to inspire others to listen and learn from their unique writing voices.
Damla Isik is Professor of Anthropology at Regis University’s Department of Anthropology, Sociology and Criminal Justice. She has numerous publications on the politics of charitable giving, aid distribution and volunteerism in Turkey and the Middle East. She also publishes on issues concerning women’s rights and gender in Turkey and the Middle East. She she is working on a new project that studies women’s agricultural cooperatives and their local/national effects in Turkey. In 2018, she was a Fulbright Scholar in Croatia at the University of Zadar where she advised students on their graduate writing projects, gave several lectures on her research and taught a graduate lecture course on women and gender in the Middle East. She received her Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of Arizona with a minor in Rhetoric and a Graduate Certificate in Women and Gender Studies. She also has an undergraduate degree in English Language and Literature.