Ben is a queer, black, educator, writer, and dad living in Campton, NH. He taught Humanities at Waterville Valley Academy for 19 years, wrote for Concord Monitor’s 3-Minute Civics column, and is the proud parent of three kids. Most recently, his writing has been featured in NH Magazine, 603 Diversity Magazine, and by outdoor gear company,Cotopaxi. He is deeply engaged with young people through his work and strives to create a space in which they can learn to think critically and to develop their own voices. From North Carolina, he moved here to attend Plymouth State University, where he earned his BA. In 2019, he graduated again from Southern New Hampshire University with an MA in English. Then, in the spring of 2020, after the murder of George Floyd, he followed his eldest child onto the town common to protest; this inspired the founding of NH PANTHERs. He hopes to help create widespread, systemic change by engaging his community at the local level and following the lead of today’s youth.

You can connect with Ben on IG @nhpanthers or by email at bbacote@gowva.org

Elizabeth is a queer writer and multidisciplinary artist living with chronic illness. Before returning to New Hampshire in 2018, she was based in Oregon and Montana, where she worked with Seeds of Peace Collective (www.seedsofpeacecollective.org), providing logistical support to environmental and social justice movements and campaigns, and Buffalo Field Campaign (www.buffalofieldcampaign.org), where she helped advocate for wild bison. Her experience with art, food, and the environmental justice movement, combined with her love for and knowledge of the natural world, are some of the strengths she brings to the NH PANTHER team. She uses an intersectional, anti-capitalist lens to approach organizing, and operates under the belief that, as bell hooks said, “what we cannot imagine cannot come into being.” She is passionate about redistributing wealth and unrestricted giving.

Connect with her on instagram (@hermitpower) or by email (elizuhbethr@gmail.com)

Rebekah is a graduate of Plymouth State University, now working towards her Masters in Social Work at UNH. She is interested in trauma recovery and working to improve the foster care system. She spends her time reading books and looking for something new to learn about the world around her. Rebekah is a strong advocate of equity and equality, for people of color, the LGBTQ+ community, and women’s rights.

Connect with Rebekah on:

IG @nhpanthers

email: rebekahbreann@gmail.com

Diannely Antigua is a Dominican American poet and educator, born and raised in Massachusetts. Her debut collection Ugly Music (YesYes Books, 2019) was the winner of the Pamet River Prize and a 2020 Whiting Award. Her second poetry collection Good Monster is forthcoming with Copper Canyon Press in 2024. She received her B.A. in English from the University of Massachusetts Lowell where she won the Jack Kerouac Creative Writing Scholarship; and received her MFA at NYU where she was awarded a Global Research Initiative Fellowship to Florence, Italy. She is the recipient of additional fellowships from CantoMundo, Community of Writers, Fine Arts Work Center Summer Program, and was a finalist for the 2021 Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowship. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and chosen for the Best of the Net Anthology. Her poems can be found in Poem-a-Day, Poetry Magazine, The American Poetry Review, Washington Square Review, The Adroit Journal, and elsewhere. She hosts the podcast Bread & Poetry and is currently the Poet Laureate of Portsmouth, NH, the youngest and first person of color to receive that title. She collaborates with NH PANTHERs to bring you, “Love & Resistance: A Poetry & Conversation Series.”

diannelyantigua.com

Instagram @nellfell13