Jean Nastasi Jean Nastasi is a fiction writer residing in Queens. Since graduating from New York University with a degree in English Literature, she has completed a novel and several short stories. At this time she is working on a second novel as well as compiling her stories into a collection. She is currently enrolled in a Masters program for fiction at The City College of New York, where she was selected as part of an elite group of students invited to participate in a writing retreat in December 2009. She organized and runs a writing workshop independent of school where she continues to hone her craft. During her time as a preschool teacher for children with special needs she developed a love of teaching, as well as a passion for providing a nurturing environment to foster the growth and enrichment of young minds. Believing that writing is not only the most important communication tool we have, but also, at times, the most overlooked academically, she plans on combining a strong base of literary knowledge with the fundamentals, as well as the more complex ideas, behind creative writing in the design of her curriculum. Literature is a wonderful gateway for students to understand all types of art, and how art functions as a part of the human experience. Students will come away from her class with the skills necessary not only to comprehend and analyze literature, but to create it. Ms. Nastasi writes an educational blog for patch.com, you can check it out at: http://foresthills.patch.com/search/blog_posts