TESSA FONTAINE

University of California, Santa Barbara, B.A., Global Studies and Dramatic Arts; The University of Alabama, M.F.A, Creative Writing; University of Utah, Ph.D., Creative Writing (candidate)

Tessa graduated magna cum laude from the University of California at Santa Barbara, got her M.F.A. in Creative Writing from The University of Alabama, and is currently a Ph.D. student in Creative Writing at the University of Utah. She has won awards in fiction, nonfiction, and poetry, The University of Alabama’s National Alumni Fellowship, Boone Fellowship, Truman Capote Award, First-Year Teaching Award, and is now a Robert Snow Fellow at the University of Utah. Tessa has performed her one-woman plays in theatres from New York to San Francisco. She spent the 2013 season performing with the last traveling circus sideshow, the World of Wonders, where she learned to eat fire, charm snakes, and dance with four legs. Her book about that adventure is forthcoming. For four years, Tessa has been teaching creative writing and performance inside prisons in Alabama and Utah. She is currently managing editor of Western Humanities Review, and has led Putney’s Writing in the American South program.

NATHAN MCNAMARA

Vassar College, B.A., English, B.A., Psychology; Johns Hopkins University, M.F.A., Fiction

While at Vassar, Nate was a teaching and research assistant for the English department and interned at the Poughkeepsie Farm Project as a community fellow. Nate currently teaches Creative Nonfiction, Fiction, and Poetry at Johns Hopkins University, and is writing a novel. In 2013, he was a finalist for the Johns Hopkins award for Excellence in Teaching. Nate is also the recipient of the 2014 Benjamin Sankey Award for his writing at Johns Hopkins, and the 2010 Anne E. Imbrie Prize for Excellence in Fiction Writing at Vassar College. Nate has published fiction and nonfiction in The Hopkins Review, The Carolina Quarterly, The Rumpus, Electric Literature, The Millions, Vox, and more. He is proficient in Spanish. Nate has led Putney’s Middle School Costa Rica, Writing in Ireland, and Writing in Prague programs.