Dr. Bob Boone has been making believers out of high school students with Young Chicago Authors, a program that consists of a writing scholarship program and neighborhood workshops. YCA also helps students with their ACT, SAT, GED, and general preparation skills. Dr. Boone has been published in Writing, Current, Media, and Sports Illustrated among many other publications.

Dr. Eileen Cherry has since been very active in Chicago?s performance, literary and arts in education communities. Her ethnographic children?s play, ?The People Keep Comin?? was commissioned and produced by Metro Theater Company of St. Louis for their national touring repertoire in 1997. Although their historical and cultural paths and their present situations are quite different, at least one thing differentiates Poland, Russia, and Slovenia from the rest of the Slavic speaking nations: while each of these cultures has produced major prose writers and dramatists, in the 20th century the main focus and strength of their literary production has been in lyric poetry. More important, the lyric tradition in all three of these countries remains extremely strong, despite all of the traumas and shocks accompanying the demise of the communist project. As a way to celebrate the poetic traditions of these lands, the Northwestern University Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures has organized a major conference entitled ?Three Lands, Three Generations: Poetry from Eastern Europe Today? to be held October 27-30, 1999. The three days of the conference will be devoted to scholarly discussions of the questions raised by the readings, less formal presentations by the invited Anglo-American Dr. Bob Boone has been making believers out of high school students with Young Chicago Authors, a program that consists of a writing scholarship program and neighborhood workshops. YCA also helps students with their ACT, SAT, GED, and general preparation skills.

Dr. Boone has been published in Writing, Current, Media, and Sports Illustrated among many other publications.

Jennifer R. Harris is the editor of Jackleg Press, and started the After Hours reading series at The Art Institute. She has twice been published in the New York Quarterly , and in the Art Times. Two of her poems appear in the latest issue of Fish Stories Collective Two. Her poetry has also been featured along with photography in a documentary installation.

Tina Howel was able to learn first-hand from those who would go on to be the stellar personalities of the poetry movement. She has performed on platforms in Chicago such as the African Festival of the Arts, MCA, Taste of Chicago, House of Blues and Hothouse. For five years she hosted the weekly open mic poetry series at Anotha Level @ Lit-X Bookstore. Tina is a vocalist with the band Marvin Tate?s D-Setttlement.

Lauren Mizock is an alumnus and scholarship recipient of Young Chicago Authors. She has been published in Star Wallpaper, the Gallery 37 short story collection, and several YCA literary magazines. Lauren also received the whitewater Creative Writing Festival?s first place and second place awards for short story and poetry respectively and was a finalist in the Pegasus Playwriting Contest. Her themes range from eating disorders to sexuality. Michael Watson is ?a denizen of Murder Metropolis, a city of loaded guns, ultra-violence, ultra-sex, racial tensions, whiplash smiles and dangerous masquerades, where the dark suited serpents in our streets whisper to the uniformed rats under our beds.? Against this backdrop his poetry serves as socioforensic science, questioning the cause of the deaths of romance, civility, passion and uttermost grace.
Michael is co-producer and host of ?WordSlingers? as Sunday night radio show featuring poets on 88.7 FM WLUW.

Cin Salach has been a Loofah, Disgrace, Big Goddess, Diva and one lip of Betty?s Mouth. She has also been a slam champ, cultural ambassador to Prague, and featured poet in the PSA?s Poetry in Motion program. Her first book, Looking for a Soft Place to Land, was published in 1996 by Tia Chucha Press and she is currently collaborating with the poetically percussive musical collaboration Ten Tongues.
Sheila Donohue is a founding member of the performance duo, Betty?s Mouth, where she worked extensively with poet Cin Salach to develop a unique two-voiced poetry form. She was featured in Urban Voices, a multi-ethnic, multi-disciplinary presentation of urban writers directed by Jeff Hegelson. She is author of The Avalanche Expert, a collection of poetry and drawings. Part of the impetus for forming Isotope 217 was the desire to explore improvisation.

Jeff Parker and Rob Mazurek are the group?s most experienced improvisers, but working with bassist Matt Lux, drummer John Herndon and percussionist Dan Bitney was an exciting new application of that skill. The weekly stints at Chicago?s Rainbo Club and the Guild Comples @ Chopin Theater allowed the band to develop their improvisational skill and their compositions as evidenced on Isotope 217?s debut album, ?The Unstable Molecule? (Thrill Jockey). Vibe magazine said??the fun is in the fizz, and Isotope217 knows how to (b)ring the alarm.?

Dzine has exhibited his paintings, constructions and mural installations in galleries and museums in Paris, Italy, England, Spain, Canada, New York, Los Angeles and his hometown of Chicago. He recently received a grant from the City of Chicago?s, International Artist Program to do a four month residency in Nairobi, Kenya, where he exhibited his paintings at the Maison Francaise- French Cultural Centre and worked with local artists on developing murals dealing with the AIDS epidemic. He painted a five story mural at the House of Blues (Chicago). He currently has a catalog of his new work published. The foreword is written by Carlo McCormick, Senior Editor for Paper magazine.