Ali Oliver-Krueger is a teaching artist, director, performer and playwright/composer of plays for young audiences. Her most recent play has been performed for nearly 30,000 children and adults last season. As a professional artist educator, Ali has worked with school systems, arts organizations, and community partners in Maryland, throughout the region, and across the country. She is a Master Teaching Artist with The Wolf Trap Institute for Early Learning and presents residencies through the Arts and the John F.
Regie Cabico is a spoken word pioneer who won the Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam. Mr. Cabico was a featured poet at the 2022 Whitney Biennial and received the 2006 Writers for Writers Award from Poets & Writers. Television credits include The Poet Speaks, HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, TEDx & NPR’s Snap Judgement. He is a teaching artist at the Kennedy Center for the Arts and one of the inaugural recipients of the 2023 James Baldwin Fellowship from La Maison Baldwin, Paris, France. His work appears in over 50 anthologies, including Aloud: Voices from the Nuyorican Poets Cafe.
Meg Eden Kuyatt received her MFA in creative writing from the University of Maryland College Park. She teaches creative writing courses and has taught at a range of places, including Anne Arundel Community College, Southern New Hampshire University online, University of Maryland College Park, MTSU Write, Eckleburg Workshops, and The Writer's Center in Bethesda since 2013.
Erica Rae Smith is the Founder and Artistic Director of Raediant Movement LLC. A Philadelphia native, she holds a BFA in Modern Dance from The University of the Arts. Her training spans traditional South African, Jamaican Dancehall, Caribbean Folk, Ballet, Modern, Jazz, Horton, and Umfundalai techniques. Erica has performed professionally with companies such as Mahogany Dance Theater, Tania Isaac Dance, Valerie Branch Dance Ensemble, and Lesole’s Dance Project.
Meredith Meer is a teaching artist, illustrator, and arts educator dedicated to empowering students through creative exploration. She believes art is more than technical skill—it’s a way of thinking, observing, and expressing ideas. Inspired by the Studio Thinking framework, she creates classroom environments that function like real-world studios, where students experiment, make creative choices, and develop their unique voices.
Uasuf Gueye, of Washington, DC, is a nationally acclaimed musician and artist. He belongs to a family of Nguewel/Diali, or oral historians and musicians. He began his study and performance of Manding and Wolof music at a very young age.
Uasuf is a dynamic djembe and dundun drummer as well as a skilled instrument craftsman. He also plays the 21-key Bala, which he learned from master artists of the Manding tradition of West Africa.
Anabel Milton (she/her/hers) is a Silver Spring-based actor, singer, and teaching artist who believes strongly in the power of the arts and storytelling to foster connection, community, and empathy among human beings. Anabel has been involved in theater and music since childhood, and her early experiences sparked a love of the arts and lifelong learning.
Diane Y. Macklin has dedicated over two decades to the narrative arts. As a performer, teaching artist, and writer, she invests fully in the transformative nature of storytelling to explore the unique, yet universal, elements of humanity.
Terry Leonino & Greg Artzner, a.k.a. 'Magpie,' have played music together professionally for over 50 years, and have performed in countless schools all over the state of Maryland and beyond for most of those years. Their broad and deep repertoire includes numerous songs that comprise uplifting and upbeat programs on topics of history and the environment. From the Underground Railroad and the Civil War to The Great Depression and the Nineteen Sixties, history comes alive in the songs the people sang.
I am a musical performer who plays the guitar with interactive songs about many topics my favorite being songs about the Earth. I am also an Author of a story called Grandmother Moon Tells a Tale-How the Moon Got Up in the Sky. My programs are fun and educational and I can adapt to any age groups. I love the little ones and the elders and am a Wolftrap Artist as well as an Arts for Learning Teaching Artist. I have been on this adventure for over 25 years!!