About Casa Libre

| Mission & Name | Concept & Origin | Casa's Keepers |
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Casa's Keepers

Kristen E. Nelson
Co-Founder/ Executive Director
casakeepers@casalibre.org
Kristen was born and grew up in Mount Vernon, New York 20 minutes north of Manhattan. She earned a B.A. in English with a minor in Marine Science/Biology from the University of Tampa in 2000. Kristen worked for The Village Voice in NYC, The Weekly Planet in Tampa, and for two years as a full-time staff reporter for the Rivertowns Enterprise in Hastings, New York. She was also a freelance reporter for other newspapers and magazines for four years until relocating to Tucson in April 2003. She works as the editor of the Institute for the Study of Planet Earth at The University of Arizona from 2003–2009. In July 2003 Kristen co-founded Casa Libre. She is currently earning her MFA in creative writing from Goddard College. Kristen is a writer of short fiction and prose poetry. She has recently published or has work forthcoming in Taurpaulin Sky, Cranky Literary Journal, Quarter After Eight, In Posse Review, and you are here.

TC Tolbert
Assistant Director
tctolbert@casalibre.org
TC Tolbert was born and raised in Chattanooga, Tennessee, where he grew up a scrappy Southern girl enjoying, as s/he told Ms. Marsha of local television fame, “eating dirt and getting dirty.” (The more things change…) TC earned a B.A. in English with a minor in History from The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga in 1998. S/he then went on to thru-hike the Appalachian Trail in 2001 where he found the name he’d been searching for: TigerCakes. New name and little white dog (Isabella) in tow, s/he moved to Tucson and earned his MFA in Creative Writing in 2005 from The University of Arizona.

As a genderqueer feminist, photographer, thinker, and poet committed to social justice, TC has been a part of several artistic collaborations including Boys R Us, Transgender Awareness Week, and Invisible City. S/he began volunteering with Casa Libre en la Solana in 2005. S/he worked with Eon, the queer youth center, from 2004-2008, first as a volunteer, then as Youth Outreach Specialist, and finally as Prism Project Coordinator. S/he has taught writing for youth (mostly creatively) at all grade levels and is currently an Adjunct Instructor at Pima Community College. Since 2007, s/he has regularly collaborated with Movement Salon – a group of movement artists, writers, and a musician who practice and perform the art of improvisation. S/he has also spent his last six summers leading wilderness trips for Outward Bound in Maine and Colorado.

In 2004, TC’s sonnet crown, “Beg Approval,” was chosen by Matthea Harvey for the University of Arizona /Academy of American Poets Award. In 2006, selections from Reconstruction of a Bird were chosen as the runner up in the Arizona Statewide Poetry Competition by Olga Broumas. In 2009, his manuscript, Gephyromania, was a finalist for the Sawtooth Poetry Prize from Ahsahta Press. TC’s poems can be found, or are forthcoming, in The Drunken Boat, The Pinch, Shampoo, Volt, A Trunk of Delirium, and jubilat. S/he is grateful that you are even mildly interested in reading all of this.

Bo McGuire
Intern
bmcguire@casalibre.org
Bo's real name is Ashley. He hails from Hokes Bluff, Alabama and is currently a Rogers' Fellow at The University Of Arizona. Bo loves Dolly Parton. End of story.

Casa Libre's Board of Directors

Sama Raena Alshaibi - salshaibi (at) casalibre.org
Marvin Gladney - mgladney (at) casalibre.org
President Rebecca Seiferle - rseiferle (at) casalibre.org
Maggie Golston - mgolston (at) casalibre.org

Founders

Ann M. Fine - Co-Founder
Ann grew up in Prescott, Arizona and returned to Tucson from New York in 2002. She holds a B.A. from the University of Tampa in English and Writing and an M.F.A. from Bennington College (VT) in Writing/Poetry. Ann left life working as an EMT/PCA in the medical field nine years ago to pursue her love for writing and literature. During college she worked simultaneously at an independent bookstore, as Assistant Director of Writer’s Voice in Tampa, as a first reader for the Tampa Review, as a poetry tutor at UT, and served as the editor of the college’s creative writing magazine, Quilt. After college Ann moved to Mount Vernon, NY and worked at the Bronxville Montessori school, then as the A & E editor for the Scarsdale Inquirer, and finally as the Assistant to the Dean of Graduate Studies at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville. Her poetry has appeared in Diner, Nocturnes Review of Literary Arts, For the Gathering, Sonora Review,The Drunken Boat, NoTell Motel, and elsewhere. Ann worked as the Events Coordinator for the University of Arizona Poetry Center for a year, before quitting to become Casa Libre's full-time director. In 2007 Ann resigned from Casa Libre and was hired as executive director for the community writing center Inktank World Headquarters in Cincinnati, Ohio. If you would like to contact Ann you can email her at ann(at)inktank.org. Visit Inktank's web site at http://inktank.blogharbor.com/.