Vanessa Adel is a committed educator with over two decades of teaching experience in a range of settings including the college classroom; art workshops with children; diversity trainings in organizations; and climate education in academic and non-profit settings. She writes regularly with Gallery of Readers in Northampton and has performed her work at the Futuring Lab at UMASS and at the Mothers Institute for Collaboration and Art. She is the recipient of a climate justice award for her poem, “Yes We Must” from the virtual symposium, Creative Women Leading Climate Action; and was privileged to participate in Pauline Production’s solo theater festival, First Person Fresh, where she wrote and performed a play about parenting in a time of crisis, called Holding Space. She lives in Northampton with her partner and their adult children.

Gail Thomas is the author of six books, and her poems have been widely published in journals and anthologies including CALYX, Beloit Poetry Journal, North American Review, and Ms. Among her awards are the Seven Kitchens Press A.V. Christie Award for Trail of Roots, the Charlotte Mew Prize from Headmistress Press for Odd Mercy, the Narrative Poetry Prize from Naugatuck River Review, the Massachusetts Center for the Book’s “Must Read” for Waving Back, and the Quartet Review’s Editor’s Choice Prize. She has been a fellow at the MacDowell Colony and Ucross, and several poems have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. She teaches poetry with Pioneer Valley Writers’ Workshops, visits schools and libraries with her therapy dog Sunny, and supports immigrant and refugee families in Western Massachusetts. www.gailthomaspoet.com

Deb Lohmeyer, a self-taught photographer, has lived in Pioneer Valley for 40 years. She began taking photos in 1979 with a Pentax K1000 in Southwest Missouri where she was raised, read photography books, and began experimenting with different techniques. In 2017, with a new digital camera, she renewed her passion by taking classes at Hill Institute in Florence and The Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA. In 2019 she formed a peer-to-peer group for women photographers which is ongoing. Her work has been exhibited at libraries, galleries and community centers. On January 1, 2022, she began taking at least one photo a day and posting on Instagram. This practice continues with more than 1,500 photos posted to date. www.deblohmeyer.com