​Jen Benka

Jen Benka is the President and Executive Director of the Academy of American Poets, the producer of Poets.org, Poem-a-Day, National Poetry Month, American Poets Magazine, and the American Poets Prizes, and coordinator of the Poetry Coalition. In her position she advocates for American poets and poetry and speaks frequently on panels and to media. She previously served as National Development and Marketing Director for the San Francisco-based youth writing organization 826 National and, for nearly a decade, as the Managing Director of Poets & Writers, where she helped expand a multi-city grantmaking program supporting poetry readings and workshops and launch a new prize for poets. She is the author of two collections of poetry, A Box of Longing With Fifty Drawers (Soft Skull Press) and Pinko (Hanging Loose Press) and received her MFA in Poetry from the New School University.