Todd Davis, winner of the Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry Prize, teaches creative writing, environmental studies, and American literature at Penn State University’s Altoona College. His poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and have appeared in such journals and magazines as "Shenandoah", "The North American Review", "Iowa Review", "Indiana Review", "Gettysburg Review", "The Christian Science Monitor", "5 AM", "West Branch", "River Styx", "Arts & Letters", "Quarterly West", "Green Mountains Review", "Poetry East", "Orion", "Epoch", "Rattle", "Nebraska Review", "and Image." He is the author of three books of poetry - "The Least of These" (Michigan State University Press, 2010), "Some Heaven" (Michigan State University Press, 2007) and "Ripe" (Bottom Dog Press, 2002) - one chapbook, "Household of Water, Moon, and Snow: The Thoreau Poems" (Seven Kitchens Press, 2010), and co-editor of the anthology, "Making Poems: 40 Poems with Commentary by the Poets" (State University of New York Press, 2010). His poems have been featured on the radio by Garrison Keillor on "The Writer’s Almanac" and by Marion Roach on "The Naturalist’s Datebook," as well as by Ted Kooser in his syndicated newspaper column "American Life in Poetry." In addition to his creative work, Davis is the author or editor of six scholarly books, including "Kurt Vonnegut’s Crusade, or How a Postmodern Harlequin Preached a New Kind of Humanism" (State University of New York Press, 2006) and "Mapping the Ethical Turn: A Reader in Ethics, Culture, and Literary Theory" (University Press of Virginia, 2001).

Erin Murphy, associate professor of English and creative writing, is the author of four collections of poetry: "Word Problems" (Word Press, 2011), winner of the 2012 Paterson Prize for Literary Excellence; "Dislocation and Other Theories" (Word Press, 2008), winner of the 2009 Paterson Prize for Literary Excellence; "Too Much of This World" (Mammoth Books, 2008), winner of the Anthony Piccione Poetry Prize; and "Science of Desire" (Word Press, 2004), a finalist for the Paterson Poetry Prize for the best poetry book of 2004. With Todd Davis, she is co-editor of "Making Poems: 40 Poems with Commentary by the Poets" (State University of New York Press, 2010). Her awards include a $5,000 Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Prize, the Foley Poetry Award, the National Writers' Union Poetry Award judged by Donald Hall, the Normal School Poetry Prize judged by Nick Flynn, the WISE Women Tribute Award in Arts & Letters, and fellowships from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, the Maryland State Arts Council, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Institute for Arts and Humanities. Her work has been featured on Garrison Keillor�s "The Writer�s Almanac," and her poems and creative nonfiction essays have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, including "180 More: Extraordinary Poems for Every Day," edited by Billy Collins (Random House), "The Art of Losing," edited by Kevin Young (Bloomsbury), and the "2009 Best of the Net" anthology, judged by Patricia Smith. She is the recipient of the Athleen J. Stere Teaching Award, the Grace D. Long Faculty Excellence Award, and the university-wide Alumni Award for Excellence in Teaching.

Steven Sherrill teaches creative writing and integrative arts courses at Penn State Altoona. After receiving a Welding Diploma from Mitchell Community College (and the passing of a considerable amount of time) he went on to earn an MFA in Poetry from the Iowa Writers' Workshop. He is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship for Fiction in 2002. His first novel, "The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break," has been published in eight languages. His second novel, "Visits From the Drowned Girl," published by Random House, US and Canongate, UK, was released in June of 2004, and was nominated by Random House for the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction. His third novel, "The Locktender's House," was released by Random House in April 2008. And November of 2010 saw the publication of "Ersatz Anatomy", a collection of poems. In his dream life, Steve is a ukulele busker.

Patricia Jabbeh Wesley is an Associate Professor of English. She is the author of four books of poetry: “Where the Road Turns,” (Autumn House Press, 2010), "The River is Rising" (Autumn House Press, 2007), "Becoming Ebony," (SIU Press, 2003) and "Before the Palm Could Bloom: Poems of Africa" (New Issues Press, 1998). She has won several awards and grants, including the 2011 President Barack Obama Award from the Blair County NAACP, the 2010 Liberian Award for her poetry, a Penn State University AESEDA Collaborative Grant for her research on Liberian Women's Trauma stories, a 2002 Crab Orchard Award for her second book of poems, "Becoming Ebony," a 2006 College of West Africa Alumni Association Award for Literary Excellence, an Irving S. Gilmore Emerging Artist Grant from the Kalamazoo Foundation, a World Bank Fellowship, among others. Dr. Wesley has a Ph.D. in Creative Writing and English from Western Michigan University, a MS in Eng. Education from Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, and a BA in English from the University of Liberia, Monrovia, Liberia. She is a regular, featured Poet/Study Abroad faculty and speaker both in the US and internationally, and her poetry has been critically acclaimed by many reviewers and scholarly publications worldwide. She has also published dozens of individual poems and memoir articles in many US and international journals and anthologies, including the "New Orleans Review," "Crab Orchard Review," "English Academy Review of South Africa," "The Prometeo Magazine," Bedford St. Martin’s "Approaching Literature: Writing, Reading, Thinking," among others. Her interests include creative writing, poetry, African, African Diaspora literature and the Liberian civil war. She is presently working on a memoir of her Liberian civil war experience.

Lee Peterson received her MFA from Sarah Lawrence College in creative writing and her BA from Oberlin College in women's studies and English literature. Her poetic, research, and community interests center around issues of human rights, the experiences of women and girls in wartime, and trauma and recovery. She has published and presented her work widely and taught at the graduate, undergraduate and community college level. In 2004, Peterson held the position of Emerging Writer in Residence at Penn State Altoona, where she is now Instructor of English, teaching in the areas of academic, creative writing, literature, and women's studies. She also tutors students individually as the campus Writing Specialist.