Renée Watson is the New York Times bestselling, Newbery Honor Book, and Coretta Scott King Award-winning author of Piecing Me Together, This Side of Home, What Momma Left Me, and Betty Before X, co-written with Ilyasah Shabazz, as well as two acclaimed picture books: A Place Where Hurricanes Happen and Harlem's Little Blackbird, which was nominated for an NAACP Image Award. She is the founder of I, Too, Arts Collective, a nonprofit committed to nurturing underrepresented voices in the creative arts, and currently lives in New York City.
www.reneewatson.net; @reneewauthor

Coe Booth was born and raised in the Bronx of New York City. She is the author of Tyrell, Kendra, Bronxwood, and Kinda like Brothers. She currently lives in the Bronx, working as a full-time writer and a part-time writing teacher at Vermont College of Fine Arts. Booth also volunteers for the NAACP ACT-SO program where she mentors teen writers.

Brandy Colbert is the critically acclaimed author of the novels Pointe, The Voting Booth, Finding Yvonne, The Revolution of Birdie Randolph, The Only Black Girls in Town, and the Stonewall Award winner Little & Lion. A trained journalist, she also worked with boundary-breaking ballet dancer Misty Copeland to adapt her memoir into the bestselling book Life in Motion: Young Readers Edition. Born and raised in Springfield, Missouri, Brandy now lives and writes in Los Angeles and is on the faculty at Hamline University's MFA program for writing for children and young adults. You can find her online at www.brandycolbert.com.

Jay Coles is a graduate of Vincennes University and Ball State University. When he's not writing diverse books, he's advocating for them, teaching middle school students, and composing for various music publishers.

Nic Stone is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the William C. Morris Award finalist Dear Martin, Dear Justyce, Odd One Out, Jackpot, and Clean Getaway, and the Shuri novel series with Marvel Comics.

Rita Williams-Garcia is the author of the Newbery Honor-winning novel One Crazy Summer, which was also a winner of the Coretta Scott King Award, a National Book Award finalist, and winner of the Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction. She is also the author of six distinguished novels for young adults: Jumped, a National Book Award finalist; No Laughter Here; Every Time a Rainbow Dies (a Publishers Weekly Best Children's Book); Fast Talk on a Slow Track (all ALA Best Books for Young Adults); Blue Tights; and Like Sisters on the Homefront, a Coretta Scott King Honor Book. She is on the faculty at the Vermont College of Fine Arts in the Writing for Children & Young Adults Program.

Ibi Zoboi holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. Her novel American Street was a National Book Award finalist and a New York Times Notable Book. She is also the author of Pride and My Life as an Ice Cream Sandwich, a New York Times bestseller. She is the editor of the anthology Black Enough. Born in Haiti and raised in New York City, she now lives in New Jersey with her husband and their three children. You can find her online at www.ibizoboi.net.