Stacie Evans
Stacie Evans, President
Stacie Evans lives in Brooklyn, NY. She is a four-time VONA alum. Her work has appeared in New South, After Ferguson, Bitch Magazine, The Rumpus, and Bellingham Review. Stacie directs the Language and Literacy Programs department at the City University of New York, overseeing basic education, high school equivalency, language acquisition, and language immersion program development and support across the University system. She is an anti-racist organizer, a knitter, and a lover of Detroit’s monument to Joe Louis.
“I joined the board to support VONA’s move into its next phase. VONA has been critical to my development as a writer and a creator/holder of community, and I am committed to helping VONA grow, change, and continue the important work of nurturing writers of color.”
Jubi Arriola-Headley
Jubi Arriola-Headley,
Vice President
Jubi Arriola-Headley (he/him) is a Black queer poet, storyteller, first-generation United Statesian, and author of two poetry collections: Original Kink (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2020), recipient of the 2021 Housatonic Book Award, and Bound (Persea Books, 2024). Jubi’s work poems have been featured in Literary Hub, Kweli Journal, & Southern Humanities Review, on PBS NewsHour’s Brief But Spectacular, & elsewhere. He is currently at work on a memoir in essays, an excerpt of which received the 2023 First Pages Prize. A VONA alum, Jubi lives with his husband in South Florida, on ancestral Tequesta, Miccosukee, and Seminole lands.
“I like to say that I write in, with, and toward community. Before I found VONA, or VONA found me, I don’t think I really understood how important community can be to a writer. It’s our lifeline. It holds us as we do the critical work of storytelling, of documentary and speculation, of world building. VONA’s effectively my writing home.”
Christine Hyung-Oak Lee
Christine
Hyung-Oak Lee,
Secretary
Christine Hyung-Oak Lee is a writer and the author of a memoir published by Ecco / HarperCollins, Tell Me Everything You Don’t Remember, which was featured in Self Magazine, Time, The New York Times, and NPR’s Weekend Edition with Scott Simon. Her memoir was also the first illness memoir written by a BIPOC writer published by one of the "Big 5" publishers. Her short stories and essays have appeared in ZYZZYVA, BuzzFeed, Guernica, and The New York Times. She is a VONA Alum. Christine's pronouns are they/she.
“VONA is where I learned that I am not alone. Where I learned purpose behind my writing. And to build a ladder behind me.”
Diana Diaz
Diana Diaz, Treasurer
Diana Diaz is a native LES Nuyorican writer whose creative nonfiction appears in Latina Outsiders: Remaking Latina Identity, Boricua en la Luna, Red Wheel Barrow and in A Cup of Comfort for Mothers To Be among others. Diana is a certified yoga teacher, and facilitates writing and yoga workshops throughout the United States. She earned a BFA in Dramatic Writing from NYU, and an MA in English Literature from la Universidad de Puerto Rico, recinto Rio Piedras. Diana is currently a staff writer for Hispanecdotes, a foodie, and mom to a Millenial daughter and a Gen Z son.