Our Team
Board Members
Molly Wingate, M.A. English
President
Molly has taught writing since 1978 at high schools, colleges, universities, community colleges, libraries, kitchens and so on. She was the Writing Center Director at Colorado College from 1987-2001 and has since had her own writing consulting firm. She has many articles, book chapters, essays and books to her credit, including Slow Parenting Teens. She helped to found the Manitou Springs Education Foundation and served as its president. She served on the Manitou Springs Historic Preservation Commission, 2006 – 2016. She is a member of the Colorado Nonprofit Association and has served the regional Quaker community for many years.
Brian Murphy, J.D.
Secretary
Brian is a business and real estate attorney with a specialty of non-profit law. He keeps us legal. He has served on the board of the Opera Theater of the Rockies for many years including as president, The Business of Arts Center board, and the former Colorado Springs Symphony board. He is also Molly’s husband.
Mentors
Jacki Othon
Poetry Mentor
Jacki Othon moved from San Antonio, Texas to Colorado Springs with her family in 1993. In 2012, she graduated with her Bachelor’s in English from the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, becoming the first member of her family to graduate from college. She joined Poetry Heals in the fall of 2019. Jacki is a local activist and organizer with Colorado Springs DSA and is working to deepen her involvement in social work and social justice advocacy, with a special focus on immigration reform and healing intergenerational trauma in Latinx families, as well as working to solve the affordable housing crisis in the city. She is a proud fur mother of two cats and a pitbull and lives with her long-time partner, Matthew.
Laura Kerwin
Poetry Mentor
Laura moved to Colorado in 2008 from Australia. She studied Zoo Keeping technologies at Pikes Peak State College. She joined Poetry Heals in 2016, but ended up pursuing her career with animals where she worked at the Humane Society as one of their Trap Neuter Return Coordinators.
Laura has a passion for writing and helping people in the community. She enjoys connecting with everyone she meets and has great enthusiasm about Poetry Heals. She is also a Certified Vibrational Sound Therapy Practitioner and Reiki Master. She owns her own business called Prairie Moon Vibrational Wellness. She teaches Yoga to Adults and Children and practices Animal Reiki. She lives out on the Prairie with her husband and menagerie of animals. She loves to travel and is in love with Colorado.
Lindsay Deen
Poetry Mentor
Lindsay Deen is a local tutor, writer, poet, artist, and young IT professional living in Colorado Springs, CO. She believes every day is a chance to make a difference and focuses her work to achieve positive growth for herself and others.
As a private tutor, Lindsay encourages communication and connection for youth as they struggle to define themselves and their life goals. She tutors English, math, and science for ages in middle school through college level students, working to connect coursework to real-life principles. Her work also includes facilitating therapeutic poetry workshop sessions with Poetry Heals.
Lindsay co-founded and contributed many works to the literary e-magazine US Represented. In addition, she has extensive experience in business administration and Information Technology as well as working and volunteering in the nonprofit sector. She loves literature, Dungeons & Dragons, yoga, watching people play video games, life, and long, lovely walks beneath Colorado skies.
Amber Ridenour Walker
Poetry Mentor
Amber Ridenour Walker is the author of Surfacing (Free Lines Press) and I Thought This Would Be Cooler (Bottlecap Press). Her poetry has appeared in such places as The Portland Review, Bombay Gin, Gumball Poetry, Leon Literary Review, Wisdom Body Collective, Word Riot, 580 Split, and Tiny Spoon, and she is a recurring guest on the Sonic Salon podcast. Amber holds an MFA in Writing and Poetics from The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics in Boulder, Colorado. She currently lives in Colorado Springs and works for Pike’s Peak Library District.
Alaska Woods
Poetry Mentor
Alaska is studying communications and women’s and ethnic studies. After college they hope to work in furthering social justice and equity in whichever way life takes them.
Poetry is extremely important to Alaska because it has gotten them through everything life has thrown at them. As such, they hope to teach other people struggling about how poetry heals the heart. They have poetry published in a collection of art put together by the Colorado Children’s Hospital in a book called Sonder.
Alaska grew up in Woodland Park and has lived in Colorado their entire life. They have a talented partner, many kind friends, a wonderful family, and two sweet black cats that all matter incredibly to them. Alaska loves all the people (and animals!) in their life as well as reading and playing video and board games.
Ernest Wingo
Poetry Mentor
As a music admin who has worked in aviation, commercial truck driving, and music licensing, Ernest Wingo has had a diverse and exciting career. Born and raised in a musical family in Colorado Springs, Co, Ernest played sports, played multiple instruments, and started producing and performing in a local music group called “Flo-Logics”.
After obtaining a degree in music business and Audio Engineering in 2020, Ernest realized that the arts and entertainment industry was his calling. With a background working for aircraft and aerospace manufacturers, he found a way to combine his love of music with his skills, licenses, certifications and degrees in his career. He became an?expert in music licensing for PNW Beats, negotiating deals with record labels and independent artists to provide a high-quality audio experience for consumers.
Ernest also taught as a teaching artist at Brazil Centers, in Kent, WA, where he taught young students music production, songwriting and how to succeed as an artist in the industry.
Ernest’s passion for creative self expression brought him to Poetry Heals, where he infuses his talents into workshops.
Sophia Tobin-Freeman
Poetry Mentor
A winner of the 2006 PPLD Jean Ciavonne Poetry Contest, with a poem entitled “Words Flow like Water”, Sophia’s passion for writing as a mechanism for healing began early. Intentionally using writing as a modality of personal healing and processing as a teen lead them to become involved with the Colorado Springs poetry community in 2017. Sophia has worked with a COS local potter throughout the last decade, participating in The Downtown Pop-Up Shops holiday event, and teaching pottery workshops to Seniors in living communities. Sophia is passionate about the arts, the LGBTQIA+ community, and disability/accessibility. A collage and multimedia artist, their work has been shown at the Gallery Below. After an extended health crisis, they feel aligned more strongly than ever with Poetry Heals vision of vulnerable populations accessibility to the arts, health, and safe community spaces for healing and connection.
Andrew Betancourt
Computer Guy
Andrew Betancourt is a veteran of the Army and a Texas native. He came to Poetry Heals through his involvement in arts programs in the Warrior Recovery Unit. He worked as a mentor face-to-face while stationed at Ft. Carson, and now works on our website and in our online workshops. Andrew is currently living in Texas while helping his mom and little sister with their studies. Andrew enjoys RPGs and other video games.