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For over twenty years, Peter Kahn has been fortunate to employ the power of poetry to help give voice to those previously unheard. He has been a high school teacher at Oak Park/River Forest High School in Chicago since 1994 and has recently also taught at Roosevelt University. Peter was commended in the National Poetry Competition 2009 and 2017. His new book, Respect The Mic, is an expansive, moving poetry anthology representing 20 years of poetry from students and alumni of Chicago’s Oak Park River Forest High School Spoken Word Club.
Natalie Rose Richardson was born in New York City to a long line of border-crossers and proud people of blended heritage. Natalie is a graduate of the University of Chicago (BA), and the Litowitz Creative Writing Program (in poetry) at Northwestern University. She is a current non-fiction MFA candidate at NYU.
Rich Robbins is a rapper, songwriter, producer, and educator. But more than anything, the Oak Park-born, Chicago-based artist is a world-builder. Rich’s early years as a college student in Madison, Wisconsin’s First Wave hip-hop scholarship program jumpstarted his artistry. He recorded wide-reaching tracks like “Dreams” feat. Mick Jenkins, along with records with Saba, Mother Nature, and more. He has performed at historic venues like the Apollo Theater in New York, and has done everything from music festivals, to working at Hot 97 as an intern, to teaching classrooms of high school students how to read and write poetry/songs.
Poet t.l. sanders is a modern-day renaissance man who lives to build minds and loves to body build. He speaks French. He plays bass. He is a cage-fighting martial artist. He educates. Give him a stage, he articulates. Lend him an ear, he motivates. As a performance professional based in Kansas City, MO, Poet has performed at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts (in the 2019 Lyric Opera of Kansas City production of Bizet's Pearl Fishers), at the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art, and—serendipitously—he has performed at several venues located in Kansas City's Historic Jazz District, 18th and Vine: the American Jazz Museum, at the Gem Theater, and in the Blue Room (which is the setting of his book, kNew: The POETICscreenPLAY). As a Prairie Lands Writing Project Teacher-Consultant, a Missouri Writing Project Network Teacher-Consultant, a current curriculum director, and former elementary, middle, and high school English teacher turned filmmaker, Poet embraces the value of our shared stories. In 2021, Poet delivered The kNew-Born, an art house film that explores the human side of drug addiction. |