Our 2027 Keynotes & Special Events

New Orleans native Gina Ferrara is the author of six poetry collections: The Rooted and Recurrent (The University of Louisiana at Lafayette Press, 2026); Amiss (Dos Madres Press, 2023); Weight of the Ripened (Dos Madres Press, 2020), an Eyelands Poetry Prize Finalist, ; Fitting the Sixth Finger: Poems Inspired by the Paintings of Marc Chagall (Kelsay Books, 2017); Amber Porch Light (Word Tech Books, 2013); and Ethereal Avalanche (Trembling Pillow Press, 2009). Her work has appeared in numerous journals including Callaloo, The Poetry Ireland Review, Tar River, and The Southern Review and was nominated for a Best of the Net and a Pushcart in 2024.

Receiving her MFA from the University of New Orleans, Gina has been deeply involved in the New Orleans poetry scene for decades. Since 2007, she has curated The Poetry Buffet, a monthly reading series in New Orleans. She is editor of The New Orleans Poetry Journal Press and is an associate professor of English at Delgado Community College. In 2025, Gina was appointed the Poet Laureate of Louisiana. She lives near Bayou St. John with her husband, Jonathan Kline, and their bulldog.

Jenna Robinson, MA, LMFT, PTR, is a multi-racial, Bay Area-based poetry therapist, professor, and performance poet informed by a narrative worldview. A two-time Hawaiʻi Slam champion and 2015 National Poetry Slam finalist, she has facilitated multimodal poetry therapy workshops with youth, adults, and families across California and Hawaiʻi. Through her master’s program and clinical training in family violence and poetry therapy, Jenna has developed a therapy approach melding narrative therapy, liberation psychology, expressive arts, spoken word poetry, and collective practices. She values working alongside people responding to trauma, those navigating family violence, and youth impacted by systems in her private practice, while also directing Bay Area Creative’s therapeutic writing program, Revisions. She teaches as an assistant professor in the Expressive Arts Therapy concentration of the MA in Counseling Psychology at the California Institute of Integral Studies and contributes to the field through her service on the board of the National Association for Poetry Therapy as Vice President.

Skye Jackson’s work has appeared in RHINO, Palette Poetry, The Southern Review and elsewhere. She has been a finalist for the Iowa Review Poetry Award, the RATTLE Poetry Prize and was the recipient of the AWP Intro Journals Award. She currently serves as a Visiting Writer at Xavier University of Louisiana and was appointed Writer-in-Residence of the Jack Kerouac House. Her debut poetry collection, Libre, was published by Regalo Press and nationally distributed by Simon & Schuster. Libre was also selected as the One Book One New Orleans chosen book for 2026.

When Saxophonist Gordon Towell’s not teaching jazz in a Loyola University classroom, he’s likely to be performing with many national acts. Towell, who holds a BEd in music education from the University of Alberta, an MM in jazz studies from Indiana University and a DME with a cognate in jazz studies from the College Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati, has shared his expertise with students at the University of Cincinnati, Morehead State University, Indiana University, Keyano College, Grant MacEwan College, and numerous public schools. As Coordinator of jazz studies at Loyola University, New Orleans, Towell directs jazz band I and jazz combos, teaches jazz history, arranging/composition, and improvisation. He also finds time to adjudicate, guest solo and perform with national and international artists, and conduct throughout Canada and the U.S. His saxophone performance can be heard on Outlier, Sketch Pad, Ask Me Now, Blue Duck Suit, and Still Friends, which are all available through cdbaby.com, and have been featured on NPR, CBC, and CKUA radio.