We are always looking for enthusiastic individuals to help with the festival. AIPF is currently seeking new board members. No poetry or writing experience required. Send all inquiries to aipfinfo@aipf.org.

Deb Akers worked with special children for over thirty years. She has been a long time volunteer with AIPF. Over the years, she has been published in a variety of newspapers, magazines and journals as well as reading her poetry on AUSTIN NOW and at local Austin venues. She now focuses her attention on the promotion of poetry in all its forms, faces and incarnations by serving on the AIPF board as volunteer organizer, registrar and editor of the AIPF Youth Anthology, Diverse Youth. She is on the board of directors for BORDERLANDS: Texas Poetry Review where she serves as mail manager and editorial assistant.

Lynn Wheeler-Brandstetter works for the State of Texas and is a loving wife, Mother and Grandma. Here's a little message about herself in her own words, "I was born and raised in the rocky mountains of Beautiful British Columbia. I loved to write poetry as young girl in Canada. I moved to Brownsville, Texas in 1980 where I lived until I made my way up to the Hills in Central Texas. Yes, and what beautiful hills they are! In 1987 I made Austin, Texas my home. I've always loved to write poems from as far back as I can remember. The love I have for writing I have also felt while building sand castles by the Ocean. I've continued to write poetry through out my life. Some poems I've kept close to me; a few I've shared with close friends. There are some that have washed away like forever changing sand castles near the ocean's tide. I have known so many poems but only a few have made a permanent imprint in my life that will always be with me. Very unique, always changing, one is never the same."

Barbara Youngblood Carr - Native-born Texan; poet, humorist, storyteller, musician, editor; author of eleven books of poetry/prose and short stories about Native American Cherokee heritage & Texas/Southern upbringing (five funded by City of Austin Arts Commission); host of Borders-On-The-Word poetry venue & Board member of Austin Poets International, Inc. for fifteen years; Editor for A Galaxy of Verse & DreamersThree Press; published on three continents; appointed National Poet Laureate for the Military Order of the Purple Heart for 2005, 2006 and 2007. Contact info: bcarr2@austin.rr.com.

Ashley Steakley Kim (aka, Ash Kim) is seventh-generation Texan and Austin native: the last-born of a West Texas U.T. football star and an uptown Houston ballet teacher. Paramour of passionflowers, dark chocolate, swans, dictionaries, elephants, mangoes, owls and oceans, she is a professional nanny by morning and a poet by night — a 'Maya Poppins’ of sorts. An avid family and marriage advocate, she writes and works for Texas Family Magazine in the afternoon. Her poetry first debuted in di-verse-city 2006, devastating a life-long attempt at poetic reclusivity. Ash Kim is a loving Catholic wife and a loving Baptist daughter (leaving her delightfully 'Captist'!), and is the proud mother of two very precocious felines, Cura and Serendipity.

Susan Stockton is a poet, web-designer, student and preschool teacher in Austin. Susan made her debut at AIPF 2005. Since then, her work has been featured in The Chronicle, Round Top Anthology, The Rio Review, Inks Lake Magazine and other publications including di-verse-city 2006. Susan is a creative writing student at Austin Community College where she served as president of the creative writing club and student editor for its literary journal The Rio Review. Susan is an active member of Bat City Salon writers group. Susan is happily married to Eric Stockton and enjoys raising their three children Saxon, Victoria and Phyllis.