Meet the AWP Staff

David Fenza, Executive Director
David Fenza received an MA degree from Writing Seminars of Johns Hopkins University and an MFA degree from Writers' Workshop of the University of Iowa. He has taught creative writing, literature, and composition at Johns Hopkins University, Old Dominion University, Essex Community College, and Goucher College, and he has served as editor for numerous literary magazines. He has served on the boards of Share Our Strength and the Fall for the Book Literary Festival. Fenza joined the AWP staff in 1988 as Publications Manager. He is the author of a book-length poem, The Interlude. He was awarded a Fellowship in Poetry from the National Endowment for the Arts for his work on a novel in verse. Fenza became Executive Director of AWP in 1995.

Matt Burriesci, Director of Development & Advancement
Matt Burriesci's fiction has appeared in several literary journals recently, including Black Warrior Review, Crucible, and The Beacon Street Review. He studied Shakespeare at Oxford and received his MFA from George Mason University in 2002. Three of his plays have been professionally produced, and he was awarded the Shattuck Award for Excellence in Playwriting in 1996. From 1997-1999, he served as Marketing Manager for Chicago Shakespeare Theater on Navy Pier.

Supriya Bhatnagar, Director of Publications
Supriya Bhatnagar has a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Rajasthan, Jaipur, India, and a BA in Nonfiction Writing & Editing and an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from George Mason University. Her short stories have appeared in Femina and 4Indianwoman.com. Her memoir and then there were three... is forthcoming from Serving House Books. Essays from this book have appeared in Perigee and forthcoming in Artful Dodge.

Terry Ryan, Director of Membership Services
Terry Ryan received an MFA in Creative Writing (concentration: fiction) from American University. Prior to joining AWP, he worked as a media assistant and technical writer for nonprofit environmental and visual arts organizations in Washington, DC. He joined AWP in the spring of 2001 to work on the Palm Springs Conference and has been working with Membership Services since the fall of 2001.

Christian Teresi, Director of Conferences
Christian Teresi's poems and interviews have appeared in several literary journals including The American Poetry Review, Nimrod, Notre Dame Review, and The Writer's Chronicle. He received a MFA from George Mason University in 2006 and a BA in English and Creative Writing from Binghamton University in 2001. He has taught both high school and college and has been involved with AWP since the spring of 2003.

Roberto Perales, Accounting Manager
Roberto Perales was born in the land of the Incas (Peru) where he studied Computer Systems Engineering at Saint Martin University. He moved to Northern Virginia in 2002 where he worked in the hospitality industry for eight years in various positions. He joined the corporate world as an Accounting Manager four years ago. To continue his education in the accounting field, he graduated from Northern Virginia Community College and is now pursuing a bachelor's degree from George Mason University.

Kate McDevitt, Webmaster/Administrator
Kate McDevitt received her BS in Computer Science (with minors in Creative Writing: fiction and Mathematics) from Virginia Tech in 2002. Also at Virginia Tech, she worked on her MS in Computer Science (concentration: human-computer interaction). She has done internet and intranet design & development for many educational, governmental, and commercial organizations. Kate joined AWP in late June of 2006.

Kristin Lane, Associate Editor
Kristin Lane is an MFA candidate in Creative Nonfiction at George Mason University, where, in 2006, she earned her BA in English: Nonfiction Writing & Editing. She lives in Falls Church, Virginia, with her husband and their two tabby cats. Kristin joined AWP in June 2006. 

Sara Flood, Assistant Editor
Sara Flood is an MFA candidate in fiction at George Mason University. Originally from Wisconsin, she received a BA in English (Creative Writing) and Interdisciplinary Visual Art from the University of Washington, and she worked in Seattle as a graphic artist for five years.

Lucy Biederman, Membership Coordinator
Lucy Biederman received her MFA (concentration: poetry) from George Mason University and her BA from Washington University. She won second place in Smartish Pace's Beulah Rose Poetry Prize in 2008. Her poetry has appeared in many journals, including Gargoyle, Typo, and The Cimarron Review and is forthcoming in No Tell Motel, The Apalachee Review, and PMSpoemmemoirstory. She has worked at AWP since in 2008.

Tricia Gonzales, Bookfair & Exhibits Manager
Tricia C. Gonzales lives with her husband in Fairfax, Virginia, where she is an MFA in Creative Writing candidate (concentration: fiction) at George Mason University. She worked part time in AWP's Membership Services department before becoming the Conference Assistant in July of 2008.

Shanley Jacobs, Conference Coordinator
Shanley Jacobs studied English and creative writing at Drake University and St. Catherine’s College, Oxford. She received her MFA in poetry from Virginia Commonwealth University in 2009. She has a book review forthcoming in Blackbird and her poetry has appeared in the Helen Burns Poetry Anthology: New Voices from the Academy of American Poets’ University and College Prizes, 1999-2008, and Gulf Coast.

Ronald Goldfarb, Legal Council
Ronald Goldfarb is a lawyer, author, and literary agent based in Washington, DC. His firm specializes is legal matters pertaining to writers and publishing. The General Counsel of AWP, he is the author of ten nonfiction books, including Perfect Villains, Imperfect Heroes: Robert F. Kennedy's War Against Organized Crime. He served in the Justice Department of the Kennedy Administration from 1961 to 1964.

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