*Selected credits and experience, updated November 2025. This (somewhat messy) list is (generally) in reverse chronological order.
To see a CV that is organized by type of experience, click here.

2020s:

February 27 – March 1, 2026: visiting presenter of Three Days of August Wilson at the Pure Life Theatre (Raleigh, North Carolina)

January 23, 2026: judge for Region 2 competition in Poetry Out Loud

December 2025: book review of Southern Bred by Charles Ghigna for the Alabama Writers Forum

November 4, 2025: guest speaker for Dr. Madison Clark’s historical research course at Concordia College (Moorhead, Minnesota)

July 2025: book review of Year in Review 2020 by the Out Loud Huntsville for the Alabama Writers Forum

June 2 – 13, 2025: attend the Summer Institute at the Village Writing Project, Auburn University’s site for the National Writing Project

May 10, 2025: presenting writer at the Author’s Expo-sium in Prattville, Alabama

April 2025: book review of More Poems for Hungry Minds by the Highland Avenue Poets for the Alabama Writers Forum

October 2024: “They Come, Growling,” a poem in Boudin (based at McNeese State University)

May 2024: reader in a Nora’s Salon South staged reading of the play They Must Be Women Now! by Nedra Pezold Roberts

February 2024: reader in a Nora’s Salon South staged reading of the play The Backup Planner by Lou Clyde

November 14, 2023: presenting writer for the Montgomery Press & Authors Club

2023: author of Faith. Virtue. Wisdom.: A History of Montgomery Catholic Preparatory School, 1873 – 2023, a commissioned work for the school’s sesquicentennial

October 2023: book review of Versions of May by Jim Murphy for the Alabama Writers Forum

October 2023: featured guest on The Fitzgerald Museum’s “The FitzMuse” podcast, discussing Zelda’s 1918 short story “The Iceberg”

July 2023: book review of Outside from the Inside by Anne Whitehouse for the Alabama Writers Forum

April 18, 2023: presenter in “How to Become a Published Author,” a panel discussion for students and faculty at the Huntingdon College Library

April 2023: book review of Freedom’s Dominion by Jefferson Cowie for the Alabama Writers Forum

Spring 2023 – present: faculty advisor and design/layout for The Prelude, biannually published literary magazine at Huntingdon College

November 1, 2022: “Shedding Light on Injustice: The Whitehurst Case in Montgomery” at the Huntingdon College Library’s annual Mini-Conference

August 2022 – present: Instructor, Literary Magazine Advisor, and Academic Writing Advisor at Huntingdon College
Courses taught: Introduction to College Writing, Writing Across the Disciplines, Survey of Literary Genres, African American Literature, Literature and Music, College Readiness and Vocation, Introduction to Ethics and Vocation, Perspectives in Ethics and Vocation, and Literary Magazine Practicum

August 2022 – December 2022: chair for Faculty Wellness & Fulfillment committee for Montgomery Catholic Preparatory School’s strategic planning

July 16, 2022: session leader on using film adaptations at the Fitzgerald Museum’s Teaching The Great Gatsby Conference at Huntingdon College

May 10, 2022: presenting writer at the “Mindfulness Inspires” reading at Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts

December 14, 2021: presenting writer at the “Lesley Dill: Wilderness Inspires” reading at Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts

April 27, 2021: featured guest on “HBCU Review” with Dr. Jacqueline Trimble on WVAS 90.7 FM, discussing Closed Ranks

March 24, 2021: presenter (on oral histories) at Kress on Dexter’s ClubHouse series

March 5, 2021: featured in an article, “Race is a thorny topic in America. Some say schools must join the conversation.” in Montgomery Advertiser

March 4, 2021: featured author at the Monroeville Literary Festival (for Nobody’s Home)

February 2021: “Mary Elvira Wood” and “Mary A. John Watson” entries in the Online Biographical Dictionary of the Woman Suffrage Movement

March 2020 – July 2023: board member and publications editor for the Alabama Campaign for Adolescent Sex Health

2020: Literary Arts Fellowship from the Alabama State Council on the Arts
*July 2020 – present: founding editor and writer of lesson plans for Nobody’s Home: Modern Southern Folklore

June 2020: “Pearl Still (Nowlin)” entry in the Online Biographical Dictionary of the Woman Suffrage Movement

March 2020 – December 2023, editor of level:deepsouth— for Generation X

2021 – 2022: facilitator for Alabama State Department of Education’s ACCESS distance-learning program

July 2020: interview with The Alabama Writers Cooperative’s Alina Stefanescu, talking about current projects

2020 – 2021: Sketches of Newtown, a student-written monograph about the Newtown community, which is a follow-up project to the 2019 oral history collection

2020: Education grant from the Alabama Bicentennial Commission to continue/expand project in Newtown

February 7, 2020: “Normandale: Where Everybody Knew Your Name,” a sketch for the Montgomery Advertiser‘s “Love Letters to Montgomery” series, in partnership with the City of Montgomery

February 1, 2020: “Artists and Writers Will Love This Quiet Mountaintop Retreat” for It’s a Southern Thing (Red Clay Media)

2010s

November 21, 2019: guest on Community Forum with Carolyn Hutcheson on WTSU 89.9 FM in Montgomery, talking about the Library of Congress’s StoryCorps program

July 31, 2019: session leader for Sprouts School Garden Workshop, a teacher institute by EAT South

July 6, 2019: guest on Real Talk with Herschel on WCKG radio 99.1 FM in Dothan, discussing Closed Ranks

June 18–19, 2019: master teacher for Alabama Humanities Foundation SUPER Institute “Reflecting on Our Justice System,” a teacher institute with Equal Justice Initiative

May 7, 2019: guest on Community Forum with Carolyn Hutcheson on WTSU 89.9 FM in Montgomery, talking about Closed Ranks

April 22, 2019: subject of an article, “Two MPS teachers selected to attend sustainability academy” in Montgomery Advertiser

February 15, 2019: session leader on using local history for English and Social Studies departments at The Randolph School in Huntsville, AL

2019: invited participant for planning/input meetings for expansion of the Freedom Rides Museum in Montgomery, AL

2019: writer of curriculum guide for Emily Blejwas’ The Story of Alabama in Fourteen Foods, published by the University of Alabama Press

2018 – 2019: oral history collection in Newtown community, a historically black neighborhood in northern Montgomery, a partnership with The Gathering Year

2018: Honorable mention education grant from the Alabama Bicentennial Commission for oral histories project in Newtown

December 2, 2018: featured guest on the Alabama News Network’s “In the Community” program, talking about Closed Ranks

November 2, 2018: subject of an article, “Police shootings, justice and Montgomery itself at the heart of new book about the Whitehurst killing” in Montgomery Advertiser

November 1, 2018: segment on 10:00 Report on WSFA about release of Closed Ranks

October 31, 2018: guest on Kevin Elkins radio show on WLWI 1440 AM, to discuss Closed Ranks

August – December 2018: interim communications director for the Episcopal Church of the Ascension in Montgomery, AL

August 18, 2018: interviewed for “‘A sad day’: Teachers share what was lost in BTW fire” in Montgomery Advertiser

2018: author of Closed Ranks: The Whitehurst Case in Post-Civil Rights Montgomery, a long-form work of history/crime published by NewSouth Books

2018: writer of lesson plans for pre-field trip curriculum packet for the Freedom Rides Museum in Montgomery, AL

January 11, 2018:  session leader for “Using Oral History in the Creative Writing Classroom” for Alabama Bicentennial Commission workshop on writing and research

October 2017: “Andrew Lytle” entry for Auburn University’s Encyclopedia of Alabama

2017: partner/interviewer for The Gathering Year, a public history program to collect stories and photographs from Montgomery County during its bicentennial year

June 26 – 29, 2017: master teacher for Alabama Humanities Foundation SUPER Institute “Sense of Place: Stories of Alabama in History and Fiction,” a teacher institute on state culture

March 18, 2017: presenting author at the Baldwin Writers Group in Daphne, AL

April 4, 2017: session leader of “Intersections of the Humanities & the Local,” a writing-centered session on using local history in humanities courses, for the Alabama Humanities Foundation

2016 – 2017: facilitator for Alabama State Department of Education’s ACCESS distance-learning program

2016: writer of curriculum guide for traveling educational exhibit on Judge Frank M. Johnson, Jr. and the 1961 Freedom Riders, a project of the Freedom Rides Museum

October 27, 2016, session leader of “Start by Listening: Ethnographic Experiential Learning in the Local Community” at the Arts Schools Network conference in Dallas, TX

September 2016 – April 2017: fifth and sixth grade Sunday school teacher at St. Bede the Venerable Catholic Church

February 20, 2016: interviewed for “Alabama educators reflect on impact of Harper Lee’s works” for WSFA TV in Montgomery

January 4, 2016: session leader on “Peer Reviewing within a Writing Process” for English Language Arts teachers in Elmore County, AL

September 2015 – April 2016: third grade Sunday school teacher at St. Bede the Venerable Catholic Church

December 4, 2015: featured in “Montgomery erects second marker honoring Bernard Whitehurst” in Montgomery Advertiser

2015 – 2016: invited participant for Montgomery Public Schools’ Magnet Equity Committee

2015: Community Legacy Project grant from the Boston Arts Academy

2015: Distinguished Alumnus, Carver Creative and Performing Arts Center/Booker T. Washington Magnet High School

May 9, 2015: presenting reader in “Southern Voices” at the Cloverdale Playhouse in Montgomery, AL

2014 – 2015: planning committee and curriculum writer for a school-centered traveling exhibit on Frank M. Johnson, Jr. and the Freedom Riders, a project of the Freedom Rides Museum in Montgomery, AL

2014 – 2015: program designer and selection committee for Montgomery Children’s Walk 2015 mini-grants program

2014: Literature grants review panel member for Alabama State Council on the Arts

2014: poll watcher at Huntingdon College precinct (101) for the Montgomery Election Center

February 27, 2014: guest lecturer on “The Bernard Whitehurst Case” for Auburn University at Montgomery’s School of Liberal Arts lecture series

November 2013: participant in the Alabama Education Association’s Minority Leadership Training

Fall semester 2013: adjunct instructor at Auburn University at Montgomery
Course taught: ENG 0100/0101: Basic English and the Writing Lab

June 2013: participant in the Alabama Education Association’s Emerging Leaders program

Spring 2013: “Cultural Criticism,” a poem in Steel Toe Review

2012: Distinguished Alumnus, Auburn University at Montgomery Department of Liberal Arts

Fall semester 2012: adjunct instructor at Auburn University at Montgomery
Course taught: ENG 0100/0101: Basic English and the Writing Lab

Summer and Fall 2012: steering committee member for Community-Based Tourism Wealth Creation Initiative (curriculum/training development for Black Belt region), organized by Sustainable Rural Regenerative Enterprises for Families (SURREF)

Summer 2012: book review of The South That Wasn’t There by Michael Kreyling in Callaloo: A Journal of the African Diaspora

June 19, 2012: guest speaker on Civil Rights history for Montgomery Chamber of Commerce’s Leadership Montgomery program

April 2012: featured author (for Children of the Changing South) at Alabama Book Festival in Montgomery, AL

February 10, 2012: reading of “You Can’t Know Where You’re Going (When There’s Something in your I)” included at Auburn University at Montgomery Liberal Arts Conference (AUMLAC), with Southern Studies theme, in Montgomery, AL

December 11, 2011: subject of an article, “Teacher’s book looks at Changing South” in Montgomery Advertiser

Fall semester 2011: adjunct instructor at Auburn University at Montgomery
Course taught: ENG 0100/0101: Basic English and the Writing Lab

2011: editor of Children of the Changing South: Accounts of Growing Up During and After Integration, a collection of memoirs published by McFarland & Co.

May 2011: invited committee member for Montgomery Public Schools Magnet Committee (for planning the proposed Lanier Magnet Center)

February 10, 2011: subject of an article, “BTW teacher Dickson wins first Smith Foundation Award” in Montgomery Independent

2011: Writer-in-Service Residency from the Lillian E. Smith Foundation

February 18, 2011: panelist in “Voices of the South: Fiction and Poetry” panel at Auburn University at Montgomery Liberal Arts Conference (AUMLAC), with Southern Studies theme, in Montgomery, AL

August 2, 2010: interviewed for “Mobile in Black and White: Race Relations in the 21st Century,” a documentary on race relations (Released in 2014)

2010 – 2011: policy advocate for National Council of the Teacher of English (NCTE), assigned to Sen. Richard Shelby

June 20, 2010: guest speaker (on school desegregation and re-segregation) at One Montgomery

May 2010: bronzed hands included in the “Hands Uplifted for Freedom and Justice” permanent exhibit at the Troy University Rosa Parks Museum

April 2010 – present: author blog, originally titled Pack Mule for the New School, currently Deep Southern, Diversified & Re-Imagined

April 2010: featured author (for The Life and Poetry of John Beecher) at Alabama Book Festival in Montgomery, AL

March 26, 2010: panelist at Auburn University at Montgomery Liberal Arts Conference (AUMLAC), presented paper on using creative writing as an alternative assignment in college literature course in Montgomery, AL

February 28, 2010: interviewed about “Patchwork” project on the “Dr. Rock and Captain Fantasy Show” on WEGL radio in Auburn, AL

February 10, 2010: session leader on using Treasuring Alabama’s Black Belt curriculum guide at Black Belt Treasures in Camden, AL

2000s

November 2009: chair for “SAMLA Creative Nonfiction Writers” at South Atlantic MLA Conference – theme: “Human Rights and the Humanities” – in Atlanta, GA

October 2009: featured author (for three books on Alabama subjects: I Just Make People Up, The Life and Poetry of John Beecher, and Treasuring Alabama’s Black Belt) at the Ottawa International Writers Festival in Ottawa, Ontario (Canada)

July 2009: panelist on “Student Publication Opportunities in Writing and Rhetoric” and “Spotlight On: The National Conversation on Writing in Local Contexts” at the Council of Writing Programs Administrators conference in Minneapolis, MN

April 2009: featured author (for I Just Make People Up) at Alabama Book Festival in Montgomery, AL

2009 – 2010: Secondary Teacher of the Year for the Alabama (state) PTA

2009 – 2010: book reviewer for Multicultural Review

Winter 2009: “Bringing Poetry Back Home,” an article on teaching poetry to working-class and low-income students, in Multicultural Review

September 21, 2009: featured in “New Book explores Black Belt Region” in Montgomery Advertiser

2009: general editor for Treasuring Alabama’s Black Belt: Multidisciplinary Approaches to Teaching Place, published by Auburn University at Montgomery and the Alabama Humanities Foundation

2009: author of The Life and Poetry of John Beecher, 1904 – 1980: Advocate of Poetry As A Spoken Art, a biography with literary criticism published by Edwin Mellen Press

July 19, 2009: featured guest on the Alabama State Council on the Arts’ “Alabama Arts Radio Series” series for “Patchwork” project and the Arts Teacher Fellowship from the Surdna Foundation

August 2010 – April 2011: Cast Your Bucket Down, a student-written blogging project on the subjects of food and farming, follow-up to “Patchwork”

2009 – 2010: guitar introductions for “Patchwork” podcast and videos

July 9, 2009: subject of an article, “Taking Teaching to Another Level,” in Montgomery Independent newspaper

June 2009: subject of an Art Beat article, “The Art of the Word,” in Montgomery Living magazine

April 16, 2009: featured (with students) in an article, “Local Students are Honored in Literary Arts competition,” in Montgomery Independent newspaper

April 2009: “The Brotherhood of Man,” a poem in Birmingham Arts Journal

March 2009: “John Beecher” entry for Auburn University’s Encyclopedia of Alabama

2009: author of I Just Make People Up: Ramblings with Clark Walker, an artist’s biography and full-color retrospective published by NewSouth Books

2008 – 2009: More Than A Century Later: 21st Century Student Perspectives on Alabama’s 1901 Constitution, a joint project of the Creative Writing magnet, Law magnet, and Social Studies department that involved classroom lessons, readings, and guest speakers, and culminated in a student-written anthology of responsive writings about the state’s controversial constitution

December 2008: completed Master of Liberal Arts degree, emphasis in English at Auburn University at Montgomery,

November 2008: panelist on “SAMLA Creative Nonfiction Writers” at South Atlantic MLA Conference in Louisville, KY

September 2008: “Mary Ward Brown” entry for Auburn University’s  Encyclopedia of Alabama

2008: Literature grants review panel member for Alabama State Council on the Arts

February 2008: featured in Southern Poverty Law Center “Teaching Tolerance” video series: Selecting Diverse Texts and Authors  •  Initiating Contact  •  Using Plain Terms

2007 – 2008: contributing writer for Montgomery Living (now River Region Living)

Spring semesters 2007 and 2008: teacher for Alabama State Department of Education’s ACCESS distance-learning program
Course taught: Creative Writing

2007 – 2008: Gannett Foundation grant for newsprung.com

November 2007: “Murder Ballad,” a poem in Cherry Bleeds

August 16, 2007: featured in WAKA (CBS) segment “What’s Right With Our Schools” for Our Hope

August 15, 2007: featured in Montgomery Advertiser for the release of Our Hope book

2007: Literature grants review panel member for Alabama State Council on the Arts

2007: organizing committee for “Using the Past to Reshape the Future: A Civil Rights Education Summit” at the Troy University Rosa Parks Library and Museum.

April 2007: featured in Montgomery Living for being named Montgomery’s Secondary Teacher of the Year

February 10, 2007: featured in Montgomery Advertiser Editorial section: a Rave in “Rants and Raves”

February 2, 2007: featured in Montgomery Advertiser, “District teachers earn top honors”

January 2007: “Writing is Activism,” an essay in NPR’s “This I Believe” project.

2007: Discretionary grant from Sen. Quinton Ross for Our Hope project

2007: design/layout, Alabama Listening in the Cold War Era by Susan Shehane, Coosa River Books

2006 – 2007: Teaching Tolerance grant from Southern Poverty Law Center for Our Hope

2006 – 2007: local organizer for Independent Lens, a PBS/ITVS film series on social justice issues. Local screenings were held at Equality Alabama.

2006 – 2007: Secondary Teacher of the Year for the Montgomery County Board of Education

2006 – 2007: Secondary Teacher of the Year for the Montgomery County Council of PTAs

October 30, 2006: featured in Montgomery Advertiser’s FYI Teacher Profile

October 8, 2006: featured in the Montgomery Advertiser for the “Power Educator” award

October 2006: featured in “Around Alabama” section of Southern Living for Taking the Time book

September 2006: Alabama Power “Power Educator” Award

August 2006: featured in “381: A Documentary of the Montgomery Bus Boycott”

October 2006: “Recipe,” a poem in Alabama State Poetry Society’s Sampler

2006 – 2007: Our Hope: Writings and Photographs by Teenagers on Tolerance and Equality, a student-written literary anthology on tolerance and equality themes was compiled and published by BTWMHS Creative Writing students

Summer 2006: teacher for Auburn University at Montgomery’s Summer Youth College
Course taught: Creative Writing

July 2006: “Four Haiku about One Simple Thing,” a poem in anthology Celebrate! Poets Speak Out

June 2006: “On Hearing Li-Young Lee Read His Poetry,” a poem in Antithesis Common, issue #4

May 2006: “February 22, 2005,” a poemin anthology Celebrate! Poets Speak Out

March 2006: “Going Back in Time for Now’s Sake,” a poem in Pemmican

March 2006: “Domesticity,” a poem in remark

October 2005: interviewed by Adrian Harewood on “Saturday Morning Live,” radio show on CKLN radio (Toronto, Ontario)

September 2005: “The Wallet” in Crush, Volume 3, Issue 4

Fall 2005: “Hasidic Prayer,” in Snow Monkey

Summer 2005: teacher for Auburn University at Montgomery’s Summer Youth College
Course taught: Creative Writing

Summer 2005: teacher for Auburn University’s Alabama Prison Arts + Education Project
Course taught: Creative Writing

August 2005: “Hailstone Gumbo,” in Churches, Banks & Bars, issue #4

June 2005: “Haiku” in Poor Mojo’s Almanac #221

June 2005: “An Interview with Ron Whitehead” in Evergreen Review issue #110

June 2005: “Coming Down off the Cumberland” and “Wrecking Ball” in Stick Your Neck Out

May 2005: “Firecracker,” in The SiNK [sic] Volume 2, Issue 2

May 2005: “The House of Crosses,” an article in Weird Alabama issue #2

April 2005: “Highway 50” in Southern Cross Review, Number 40

March 2005: “Lightning Bug,” in Poor Mojo’s Almanac #217

March 2005: “Thanksgiving Eve” in My Favorite Bullet, Volume 6, issue 2

March 2005: guest guitarist on “500 Miles” on Sarah Elizabeth Whitehead’s Play It For Me CD

December 2004: interviewed by Adrian Harewood on “Saturday Morning Live,” radio show on CKLN radio (Toronto, Ontario)

2004 – 2005: Alabama State University, secondary-education teaching certificate coursework

2004 – 2005: Taking the Time: Young Writers and Old Stories, a Civil Rights history book written by BTW Creative Writing students during the anniversary year of the Montgomery Bus Boycott and Selma-to-Montgomery March, was based on interviews with participants in and on-lookers to the movement.

2005: curriculum development chairman/organizing committee for The Montgomery Children’s Walk, an event on December 1, 2005  to involve school children in commemorating the 50th anniversary of Rosa Parks’ arrest.

December 2004: “I Hope You Don’t Know Me,” a poem in Zygote in my Coffee, issue #30

December 2004: “Those Who Don’t Amount to Much,” a poem on Insomniacathon ’04 event website

2004 – 2005: Gannett Foundation grant for Taking the Time: Young Writers and Old Stories

2004 – 2005: Teaching Tolerance grant from Southern Poverty Law Center for Taking the Time

July 2004: “Ain’t No Tellin’ What’ll Become of Me,” a poem in Churches, Banks & Bars, issue #3

May 2004: “A Blank Sheet of Paper” & “Muddy Boots: A Sonnet,” two poems in Red River Review

April 2004: panelist representing NewSouth Books at Eugene Walter Literary Festival, Mobile, AL

February 2004: “Clamor at the Table,” a poem in Zygote in my Coffee, issue #4

November 2003: reading poet, 10th annual Insomniacathon in Louisville, KY

Fall 2003: “Oct 12, 2002,” “From the Backside of the Bar,” and “Sept. 26, 2002,” three poems in Filibuster

September 2003 – May 2022: teacher at Booker T. Washington Magnet High School
Courses taught: Creative Writing levels 1, 2, 3, and 4; Creative Writing elective; English 12

July 2003 – December 2005: founding editor of honeydü: the sweetest thing, literary magazine and poetry broadsides

May 2003: “The Irony of John Beecher,” an article on Literary Kicks

April 2003: panelist representing NewSouth Books at Gulf Coast Creative Writers & Teachers Conference in Fairhope, AL

Spring 2003: excerpt from Continuum and “August 26, 2002” in Filibuster

2003: editorial assistant on Weren’t No Good Times, Alabama slave narratives edited by Randall Williams and published by John F. Blair, Publisher

September 2002: panelist representing NewSouth Books at Lost State Writers Conference in Greeneville, TN

2002: editor for I Dared to Try, a memoir by Thomas Bobo, former Montgomery Public Schools superintendent, published by Court Street Press

2002: author of Kindling Not Yet Split, a poetry chapbook (out of print), published by Court Street Press

2002: assisted in research, development, and collection of images for the Lowndes Interpretive Center on the Selma-to-Montgomery National Historical Trail, during employment with NewSouth Books

Aug 2001 – Feb 2004: staff writer/book reviewer for King Kudzu

May 2001 – June 2006: staff book reviewer for Foreword Reviews

Fall 2001: seminar speaker on self-publishing, University of Alabama-Birmingham Continuing Education

March – April 2001: site reviewer for The Webby Awards

Feb 2001 – September 2003: production manager/editor/bookstore manager at NewSouth Books
*2001 – 2003: founder/coordinator, The Writers’ Group at the NewSouth Books & the Dropping the Hammer Poetry Contest

1990s

1996: Auburn University at Montgomery, Bachelor of Arts in English, minor in Theater

1992: Saint James School, High School Diploma with Thespian Honors

1990 – 1992: Carver Creative and Performing Arts Center’s Technical Theater component

Community Theater (and Film), 1987 – 1993

*available on request

Long-Term, Multi-Year Projects at BTW Magnet High School

2003 – 2022: Graphophobia, annually published student literary magazine that has received awards from the Iowa High School Press Association and Alabama Writers Forum

2008 – 2017: “Speaking for the Dead,” a collaborative project with Alabama Department of Archives & History (ADAH) and Montgomery’s historic Oakwood Cemetery

October 2015 – May 2019: newsprung: art & writing in the deep south, a revised/updated online media project that includes student-written posts about community events, competitions, and other arts and literary news

August 2009 – May 2014: newsprung, an online media project featured student-written articles about the the Kentuck Festival of Arts and ekphrastic writings based on artworks at the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts.

2007 – 2014: workshop with University of Alabama Book Arts MFA Program, an annual one-day workshop on letterpress printing and fine-art bookmaking

2007 – 2009: writingourhope.org, a two-year follow-up project to the Our Hope book consisted of a student-edited e-zine, also on tolerance and equality themes, which accepted submissions from students nationwide.

2004 – 2007: hy-coo.com, an online media project to publish student-written haiku.

Long-Term, Multi-Year Community Involvement or Cultural Work

August 2019 – July 2023: board member for the Alabama Campaign for Adolescent Sexual Health

2018 – 2020: featured author (for Closed Ranks) at History Museum of Mobile, Alabama Book Festival, Alabama Department of Archives & History, One Montgomery, as well as book clubs, churches, and prayer groups in central Alabama

March 2017 – March 2024: board member of The F. Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald Museum in Montgomery, AL
2018 – 2024: Literary Contest and Zelda Award competition coordinator

2015 – 2021: volunteer at the Old Cloverdale Association Community Garden

2014 – 2017: representative to the Montgomery County Council of PTAs for Forest Avenue Academic Magnet School PTA

2014 – 2019, 2022 – 2023: presenting writer at the annual In The Arts: A Career Event for Teens at the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts
*This event was held not held during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021

2013 – 2022: reader/judge in Literature category for statewide Reflections competition, Alabama PTA (in February each year)

2008 – 2015: planning committee for the Alabama Book Festival in Montgomery, AL
Committees: Education/Outreach, Nonfiction Book/Author Selection

Early work experience, 1990 – 2000 (selected)

1999 – 2000: kitchen manager/cook, Derk’s Filet & Vine

1998 – 1999: bartender/server then general manger, The Pub

1997 – 1998: inventory clerk, Beepers Unlimited

1997: barback then bartender, 1048 Jazz & Blues

1992 – 1997: veterinary assistant, Brown & Sternenberg Animal Hospital

1992: landscape crew, Montgomery Landscaping Company

1991 – 1992: freelance theater tech, BLP Lighting and/or the Davis Theatre