To be connected with any board member who doesn’t have a listed email, please reach out to info@amherstwriters.org.
Our Board of Directors has openings! Please go to this link and let us know where your heart lies in terms of furthering AWA’s important work.
Chair: guy howard klopp
– really does write his name in lower case – perhaps it is a core belief he must accomplish great deeds to deserve capitalization. He fell in love with language as a child actor going on to earn his Equity card and performing in classical theater all over the country.
guy has written with AWA groups for over ten years now and was certified as a facilitator in 2018. He facilitated two ongoing AWA groups, one Zoom version through Bread of Life in Sacramento California and a second in-person group. He has been hosting a group for writers working on their novels or memoirs. Finally, he works with two groups with Folsom Prison inmates. He spent twenty years in government social services working in alcohol and drug services, senior and adult services, and finishing with 10 years managing in child protective services.
Vice-Chair: Mary Simmering, Ph.D.
Mary Simmerling is a philosopher, poet, and writing workshop facilitator. She holds graduate degrees in applied psychology and philosophy, and is an active volunteer and advocate with a number of nonprofit organizations that provide direct support and services for sexual assault and domestic violence survivors in the US and Canada.
Mary is passionate about the Amherst Writers and Artists method because of the many ways in which it empowers participants to harness the healing powers of the creative self and provides opportunities for writers to connect not only with their own unique voices and stories, but also with the voices and stories of others. A longtime advocate for victims of sexual assault and violence, in 2022 Mary established an ongoing series of writing workshops through RAINN (Rape and Incest National Network) for sexual assault survivors. In 2023, she created an additional series of workshops for the staff and volunteers who provide care and services to sexual assault survivors through the National Sexual Assault Hotline (operated by RAINN). As one of Mary’s workshop participants recently said, “I love coming to these workshops because they allow me to discover what it is that I have to say.”
Secretary: Sarah Kerr
Sarah Kerr lives near Ottawa, Ontario. After decades of unschooling her own children, Sarah now works with Brave Writer to design, write and teach Language Arts classes to families, middle schoolers, and teens. She also facilitates AWA workshops both online and in her community.
After first experiencing the AWA method for herself a few years ago, Sarah takes deep pleasure in sharing the transformative power of this work with others, which led her to join the board. Sarah is particularly interested in writing about chronic illness, nature, and working with teenagers. In her spare time, you can find Sarah in the woods, foraging for edible and medicinal plants, or surrounded by her rescue animals, a mug of coffee in hand. You can find her writing, and information on upcoming writing sessions at quillandquirewriting.ca.
Treasurer: Andrea Vassallo
Andrea Vassallo joined a weekly AWA group at her local library in 2014 and became a workshop leader in 2018. She lives on the coast of Maine, where she is a writer, nonprofit development director and founder of Damariscotta River Writers. She is a recent graduate of the Stonecoast MFA Program in Creative Writing at The University of Southern Maine. She was nonfiction co-editor for The Stonecoast Review and is a current reader for The Maine Review. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, named a Maine Literary Awards finalist and cited in Best American Essays notable essays. Andrea is passionate about making more room for women’s voices on the page.
Member at Large: Susan Wingert (Ph.D.)
Susan Wingert is a sociologist, editor, researcher, writer, and mom. She received her doctorate in sociology from Western University and bachelor’s and master’s degrees in family studies from the University of Manitoba. She works with the Alan Klass Program in Health and Humanities at the University of Manitoba. As an AWA facilitator, she has worked with health professionals, medical students and residents, cancer patients, caregivers, parents, and middle schoolers. She is a member of the AWA Board of Directors, and the Power of Story, Caregiver Project, and Write Around the World committees. She lives in Winnipeg.
Kimberly Lee
Kimberly Lee left the practice of law some years ago to focus on motherhood, community work, and creative pursuits. A graduate of Stanford University and UC Davis School of Law, she is an Amherst Writers & Artists facilitator and serves on its board of directors. She is also trained and certified by The Center for Journal Therapy, The Center for Intentional Creativity, The Path Meditation, and SoulCollage®. A teaching artist with Hugo House, The Writing Salon, Women On Writing, and The Loft, Kimberly has led workshops at numerous retreats and conferences. Previous collaborations include Creative Mornings, Arts and Healing Initiative, The Expressive Therapies Summit, Zest Wellness, The International Women’s Writing Guild, Story Circle Network, The Transformative Language Arts Network, and Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center. A former editor and regular contributor at Literary Mama, Kimberly has also served on the staffs of Carve and F(r)iction magazines. Kimberly’s writing has appeared in publications and anthologies including Minerva Rising, LA Parent, Words and Whispers, Toyon, The Ekphrastic Review, I Am Woman: Expressions of Black Womanhood in America, and elsewhere. She writes SleepTales for the Better Sleep app. Kimberly trusts in the magic and mystery of miracles and synchronicity, and believes that everyone is creative and has unique gifts to share. She lives in Southern California with her husband and three children.
Consuelo S. Meux, Ph.D.
Dr. Consuelo first experienced the AWA method with Patricia Schneider at the Pacific School of Religion and was later certified as an AWA Facilitator. She has a Ph.D. in Human and Organization Systems, is a Certified Creativity Coach, and a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer (RPCV). She is published with Jossey-Bass, Peregrine Literary Journal, and other sources. During her years as a university business professor, she created AWA writing workshops to encourage diverse students to own their voice and to improve their writing skills.
Consuelo provides workshops on nonprofit diversity, equity, and inclusiveness (DEI) issues and partners with a nonprofit consulting firm to provide strategic planning and board governance trainings for national and international nonprofits. Her AWA workshops include an affinity group for African American/Black women writers. She also uses the AWA method to support web writers with various forms of online content creation.
Raquel Ruiz
Raquel Ruiz has been an independent multimedia journalist, content creator and marketing expert for more than 30 years. She has received awards for her journalism, including the Jose Marti National Silver Award in Education and Immigration, for her articles in Viva Colorado, and (on numerous occasions) “best story of the week” for the Associated Press.
Her articles have been published on assorted journalism platforms in Germany, Spain, Canada, Colombia, Argentina, London, and in other countries. The Guardian, in the UK, hired Raquel to tweet about boxing during the 2012 Olympic Games in London. She is a women’s boxing writer pioneer; recently the Colombian Institutional Channel made a 30-minute show about her life.
Dr. Meadow Jones, Ph.D.
Meadow Jones received her doctorate from the University of Illinois. Her dissertation, <em>Archiving the Trauma Diaspora: Affective Artifacts in the Higher Education Arts Classroom,</em> is an interdisciplinary investigation and extended case study into the role of material and artistic practices in the redress of trauma. She has participated in and facilitated arts and writing practices and groups in both formal and informal education environments and has worked with undergraduates, artists, activists, teachers, teenagers, trauma survivors, prisoners, physicians and friends. Her words have been published in literary journals, peer reviewed research journals, and poetry anthologies and chapbooks. She became and AWA certified affiliate in 2011. She writes with others because she must. Some work doesn’t happen unless others are close.
Katie Marshall Flaherty
Kate Marshall Flaherty’s sixth book of poetry, “Radiant,” launched in 2019 with Inanna Press. She was shortlisted for Arc’s Poem of the Year 2019, and for Exile’s Gwendolyn MacEwen Poetry Prize 2018, and won the 2018 King Foundation Georgian Bay Project Award for her nature poetry. She has been published in numerous Canadian and International Journals and Anthologies, such as Vallum, Malahat Review, CV2, Grain, Saranac Review, and was shortlisted for Descant’s Best Canadian Poem, the Pablo Neruda Poetry Prize, the Thomas Merton Poetry of the Sacred Prize, the Robert Frost Poetry Award and others. She was in-house editor for Quattro Books and edited Best New Poets in Canada 2018. She was Toronto Rep. for the League of Canadian Poets 2012 -2018, and inaugurated Toronto’s “Poetry in Union” in 2018, and “Poetry and Healing” for Sick Kids in 2019. She guides StillPoint Writing Workshops and Editing Circles in the AWA Method in schools, youth shelters, universities and hospitals. She was on the Canadian Team of AWA Trainers in 2017 and 2018. See her performance poetry to music on her website.
Jill Golick
Jill Golick is a Canadian screenwriter, showrunner, and digital creator known for her commitment to nurturing creative talent and telling compelling stories. Along with her numerous episodic television credits, Jill is the creator of the internationally acclaimed digital series Ruby Skye P.I.. She is currently writing a book about her brain. As a screenwriting teacher and coach and as a writer herself, Jill has seen the damage that relentlessly negative feedback can do to a writer. In her own work with writers, she has long championed an approach that focuses on what is good in the writing. She was thrilled to discover the AWA Method with its supportive, strength based approach. After a career working as writer-for-hire, AWA has helped Jill to recover her love writing and to discover her own unique voice.
Matthew Curlewis
Matthew’s AWA involvement began in 199x (numbers are not his forté) when a friend invited him to try Aaron Zimmerman’s Manhattan Writers, NYC. There was no turning back. In 2004 Matthew had the privilege of taking his workshop leadership course with Pat Schneider, at her house in Amherst, during a blizzard. In 2005 he began leading workshops in Amsterdam, Netherlands, for wordsinhere, and then in 2008 launched his workshop Writers’ Stretch & Tone, under his own banner: Amsterdam Writers.
Since co-founding and running Pastels, a sell-out cabaret café in the heart of Sydney, at the age of 17, Matthew Curlewis has worked in creative industries — as a dancer / performer; as a print & digital designer / producer / creative director; and as a screenwriter, script editor / tutor, and copywriter — all of the above variously in Australia, Japan, Europe and the United States. Matthew’s qualifications include Certificates in Screenwriting and Script Editing from Amsterdam’s Binger Filmlab, a Bachelor’s in Cultural Criticism, Performance Studies & Interactive Technologies from New York University, and a Certificate in Performance: Dance from Australia’s Centre for Performing Arts. His words can be found in publications including The Guardian, Wordpeace, Blume Illustrated and RemoRandom, and at his Substack: Bright Side Writings. And he is thrilled to be an AWA board member as of January, 2025!
Past Chair: Sue Reynolds
Sue Reynolds is a psychotherapist, a writer and a writing facilitator passionate about the Amherst Writers and Artists method. She is both past president of the Writers Community of Durham Region and past vice-president of the national Canadian Creative Writers and Writing Programs (Canada’s version of the AWP). She has served on the board of AWA since 2014.