About the Team
New York City feeds a powerhouse team of street-smart poets. Intense workshops push these writers to their physical and emotional limits. Writing sessions are held at the Urban Word NYC offices and spill over to public parks and local coffee shops. Mentor and coach Queen God-Is leads these rigorous sessions, some lasting over five hours. What's achieved? Trust and truth.

Founded on the belief that teenagers can and must speak for themselves, Urban Word NYC provides free, safe and uncensored writing workshops to teens year round. Working directly with 15,000 teens per year in New York City alone, Urban Word offers literary arts education and youth development programs in the areas of writing, journalism, college prep, literature and hip hop.

Website: www.urbanwordnyc.org

About the Coach
Queen God Is, the name given to Team New York's coach during her family's traditional renaming ceremony, explains her name's meaning as, "'I'm the queen of myself, I'm the presence of the most high.' As a surname and a foundation it means, 'No matter who, what, when, where, why or how much, God still is.'" Queen has a hopeful outlook she imparts to her poets. "However grim the world is, or [however much] the 10:00 news makes you feel that the world is a sad place," she says, "the power of the word keeps showing itself, that there is something to be hopeful about."