We are thrilled to announce that our 2027 conference The Big Easy: Where Poetry Sings of Resistance, Healing, Joy, and Renewal will be held Wednesday, April 7 - Sunday, April 11, 2027 in New Orleans! Joining us as our Keynote Poet will be the Louisiana Poet Laureate Gina Ferrara. Jenna Robinson will give our Keynote Address. Skye Jackson will be featured as our Opening Event. In addition, there will be a wide range of workshops to bring us all together again!
Call for Proposals: Our Call for Proposals is now open. The deadline for proposals is Tuesday, September 15, 2026. Please read all the information on our Call for Proposals Page on our website prior to submitting your application.
IMPORTANT LINKS:
Click here to book your rooms at the Embassy Suites by Hilton New Orleans at the discounted NAPT group rate. The rate advertised is the average nightly rate. To view the nightly rate for each date, they can click "Show Price Details" on the “Payment & Guest Details” page. The rate will be available until March 16, 2027. We ask you to use this link to book your rooms as booking outside the group or with third parties results in NAPT paying extra fees. If you have any problems reserving your rooms, you may call Embassy Suites by Hilton New Orleans at (504) 525-1993.
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.
