Karen Bell is a professional circus clown with a 36-year career, notably as the only female clown with a ring gag on Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, where she also created material as a "Producing" Clown. Since 2005, she has been the Outreach and Education Manager for the Circus Arts Conservatory, expanding their Humor Therapy program and developing circus arts curriculum for schools, including Sarasota High School's Circus Arts Magnet program. Bell also coaches clowns for the Sailor Circus Academy.

Rashida Forman-Bey, a Certified Nonprofit Professional and Baltimore native, is a founding artistic director of WombWork Productions. Known as "Mama Rashida," she is a director, actress, visual artist, and author who has worked as a teaching artist and facilitator for over 30 years, traveling internationally to share the power of arts. A recipient of numerous awards, she holds degrees from Coppin State University and Maryland Institute College of Art.

Brazilian-born artist and educator Maria has extensive experience in theater, music, arts integration, and literacy, studying with Augusto Boal. A National Arts Integration Consultant and award recipient, she has worked with the Harvard Art Museums, Any Given Child Sarasota, and is a certified Chopra meditation teacher and Ayurvedic Health Counselor. Maria holds a Masters from Lesley University.

Andrew Morton is an award-winning playwright and theatre-maker with plays featured and produced nationally and internationally, including at the Blue Elephant and Hampstead Theatres in London. Formerly a playwriting professor at the University of Michigan-Flint and Region III Chair for the KCACTF National Playwriting Program, he received the KCACTF Gold Medallion Award for his contributions to theatre education. Based in Detroit, he is a program manager for TimeSlips and a teaching artist with various organizations, recently named a Kresge Artist Fellow.

Runako S. Robinson is a performer and educator with over 20 years of experience integrating arts into her curriculum. With a Master of Science in Counseling from National Louis University and a Bachelor of Science in Education from Alabama State University with a focus on Language Arts incorporating theater, she creates engaging, arts-based lessons. Her teaching philosophy centers on fostering growth and development in every child through music, dance, poetry, and art.

Clifford Sykes is a musician and educator with 40 years of experience in Missouri and Michigan public schools, where he has served as band director, department head, and curriculum developer, leading his bands to numerous awards. Beyond music, he is an experienced thespian, appearing in stage plays and films, and is active in community organizations, including the New McCree Theater Repertory Group and ASALH. Sykes holds degrees from Lincoln University of Missouri and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, with extensive doctoral work in ethnomusicology.

Kate Walsh has been involved with Florida Studio Theatre for over six years, starting as a student and intern. A graduate of Flagler College's Theatre Arts program, where she acted and directed, she has also served as a Teaching Artist at the Tony Award-winning Alliance Theatre in Atlanta. Her focus as a Teaching Artist is to foster self-worth, creative independence, and curiosity through interdisciplinary theatre lessons.

As a first-generation graduate student and Afro-Latino, I have a long vested interest to work with first-generation students, low-income students, multicultural education and programming, and affirmative action affairs. I am also interested in topics surrounding college access, retention and affordability. Due to my educational and professional experiences, I am confident that I am prepared to act as a mentor, recruiter, facilitator and leader for both students and college administrative offices. I am highly qualified in the areas of multicultural and programming practices, budgeting, recruitment, and leadership development. After I earn my Masters in Higher Education, I hope to continue my educational journey by pursuing a PhD in Performance Studies. As a PhD candidate, I wish study the reminisces of African heritage and traditions that still exist within Caribbean cultures (specifically Dominican Republic, Cuba, and Brazil). In the meantime, I am in search of the next step in my career that will lead me to ultimate goal and allow me to work with students from diverse backgrounds.

Artistically, I am playwright, poet, actor, designer, educator and director. My goal is to create art that will inspire, mobilize and educate multicultural communities. I am highly motivated on serving and bridging gaps between traditionally and non-traditionally served communities through different performing arts programs and events and sustained dialogue. I seek to act as a voice for underrepresented communities, Afro-Caribbean people, Afro-Latinos, and Afro-women by finding lost and untold stories that I will subsequently weave into expressive pieces of Art through the blending of historical and present events and experiences. I aspire to be a power house that creates new and innovative ways to tell our stories through plays, poetry, multi-media, and design.