Meet Our College Essay Team
Gabi Lieberman-Miller
Vice President of Operations
With a history of successfully leading teams at educational organizations and a passion for improving writing outcomes, Gabi Lieberman-Miller directs all operations at Write the World. At the Harvard Graduate School of Education: Language & Literacy Program, she connected academic research to classroom practice by developing a comprehensive educator's resource to improve socioemotional and perspective-taking skills. She has since supported students one-on-one in crafting engaging and effective narratives, and has held directorial positions at several ed-tech organizations. Through these roles, she has optimized training and service quality to help hundreds of students gain acceptance to their dream college. She looks forward to the opportunity to help you and your family succeed with the college essay and beyond!
Liza Cochran
Community Outreach Director
Liza Cochran stewards the education vision at Write the World, working with community members to develop innovative writing curriculum and programming. An educator and writer, Liza has designed and implemented writing curriculum in high schools, colleges, and community centers across the US, including the Colorado Rocky Mountain School, Emerson College, and Grub Street Writing Center. Since 2016, Liza has served as a Teaching Fellow at Harvard's Graduate School of Education. She holds a Bachelor’s degree from Brown University and a Masters in Fine Arts degree from Emerson College. Liza loves helping young writers find their authentic voice on the page, as they take this exciting step toward their college career.
Janelle Milanes
Program Manager - College Essay & Workshops
Janelle is an educator and writer whose novels have been featured in the New York Times book review and listed as part of Bank Street College's Best Children's Books. Originally from Miami, Florida, she received her BA in English Literature at Davidson College. Her passion for writing led her to New York City to work at Simon & Schuster, where she gained experience in editing and educational marketing. After publishing, Janelle pursued a Masters degree in Special Education and taught in K-12 schools for ten years. She has since hosted writing workshops and mentored hundreds of students to help them achieve postsecondary success. Her experience in education and in narrative writing has equipped her to guide young writers through the college essay process and empower them to share their stories in the best light possible.
Sarah Garfinkel
Expert Advisor
Sarah is a writer, editor, and educator, and has written for multiple publications including The New Yorker and McSweeney's. She holds a Bachelor's degree in Spanish from the University of California, Davis and a Master’s of Education in Language and Literacy from Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE). She is now a Teaching Fellow at HGSE where she teaches personal narrative and opinion writing, learning development, and facilitation. She has developed curriculum and enjoyed teaching in K-12, higher education, and nonprofit settings. Previously, she led college access programming for teens in New York City, and is currently doing research that focuses on metapragmatics and irony comprehension. She loves helping writers craft compelling college essays that feature their wonderful talents and strengths.
Rumiko Inoue
Expert Advisor
Rumiko (Rumi) Inoue graduated from Columbia University with a major in Philosophy and a Concentration in East Asian Studies. Rumi hails from a multilingual background, being Japanese and having grown up in the beautiful tropical country of Costa Rica. Her experience has spurred her to explore different cultures around the world. As a Princeton in Asia Fellow in 2019-2020, she worked in Laos in an INGO alongside local staff to promote inclusive and quality education in rural Laos. Rumi has also worked at an Education Consulting company in Beijing, China, where she provided one-on-one support to various high school students on the daunting US college application process. She is currently a certified-CELTA English teacher and enjoys working with students from all over the world. Rumi is thrilled to join Write the World as an Expert Advisor and help young writers in a critical stage of their lives!
Helen Grant
Expert Advisor
Helen Grant first joined Write the World as a young writer, around the time when she herself was starting to think about college applications. Her experience on the site gave her the inspiration and confidence to express herself academically, and she is thrilled to be back serving as an Expert Advisor and Workshop Mentor. Helen is now in the final year of study for her BA in History and Modern Languages at the University of Cambridge, having spent time working abroad as an editorial assistant at Hermès in Paris. She is a senior editor of The Cambridge Journal of Issues in Law, Politics and Art and Deputy Art Editor of The Mays, an anthology of creative work from students at the Universities of Cambridge and Oxford. She is passionate about culture and education and thinks good sentences and enthusiasm can get you pretty much anywhere.
Chris Feeney
Expert Advisor
Chris is a graduate of Middlebury College, holding a BA in English Literature and Creative Writing. At Middlebury, he studied in a variety of workshops, ranging from poetry to playwriting to fiction, and spent a semester assisting high school students with writing their first full-length play as part of Vermont’s Young Writers’ Project. In addition to writing his own fiction, which has been shortlisted in CRAFT Literary magazine, Chris reads submissions for the New England Review. Previously a writer on Write the World, Chris now works as an Expert Advisor and Workshop Mentor where he seeks to bring out the best in a young person’s writing and to cultivate an enduring love for the craft. As an emerging writer and former college applicant, Chris understands how daunting it can be to put new words on a new page, and he loves to make this process enjoyable, enlightening, and a little bit easier.
Anna Gibbs
Expert Advisor
A former writer on Write the World, Anna Gibbs now serves as an Expert Advisor and Workshop Mentor on the site. Anna graduated from Harvard College with a BA degree in English. While at school, she studied under renowned writers and worked as a fellow at the Bok Center for Teaching and Learning at Harvard, where she collaborated with teachers to develop curriculum for college students. She has written articles for Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Earth Island Journal. Her interest in literary journalism has sharpened her eye for the use of common storytelling techniques — such as voice, theme, and characters — within the setting of nonfiction writing. She looks forward to helping writers feel confident about these elements of their college essay.
Sara Polsky
Expert Advisor
Sara is a writer and editor based in New York City. She has a bachelor's degree in medieval history and literature from Harvard College and a master's in education degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, where she has also served as a Teaching Fellow. She writes young adult fiction and has worked as a journalist, editor, and college admissions application reader. She loves helping people tell stories about their experiences, and looks forward to working with your family.
Anna O'Connor
Expert Advisor
Anna is currently a student at University College Cork studying for a BA in English. She earned a Quercus scholarship to the university for her work as a writer and activist. Anna is extremely passionate about children’s and young adult literature and published her first children’s picture book in 2020. As a former Write the World writer and community ambassador, she is extremely excited to help students perfect their college essays.
David Keohane
Expert Advisor
David serves as an Expert Reviewer, Advisor, and Site Moderator at Write the World. He is a Theatre Arts graduate from Boston University, where he studied acting, directing, playwriting, and theater management. Currently based in the Mid-Hudson Valley region of New York, he freelances as a creative storytelling teacher and mentor, specializing in Shakespeare, dreamwork, and nature studies. David joins the College Essay team with an enthusiasm for in-depth critical feedback and encouraging a sense of personal play for young writers across the globe.
Veda Kanamarlapudi
Expert Advisor
Veda is currently a student at Stanford University studying Linguistics and Economics. Having worked as a literary and academic translator, she is passionate about cross-linguistic and cross-cultural education. Veda is engaged in semantics research and is perpetually studying language structures and evolution (currently exploring Turkish literature). She has a keen eye for language mechanics and is excited to help students bring out their own distinctive language and voice in their writing.
Varvara Bordyug
Expert Advisor
Varvara is a former young writer and intern at Write the World. She is a graduate of ‘Between the Lines: Peace and the Writing Experience’ program hosted by the International Writing Program at The University of Iowa in 2021. Her writing journey originates from the school years during which she had a role of the journalist and news reporter for her class. As the war broke out in 2022, Varvara contributed greatly to the Ukraine Special Dispatch, an issue of Write the World Review dedicated to the war in Ukraine. Her piece ‘refugee’ got a wide recognition: it was featured on Seventeen magazine and republished by the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute. Having personally navigated the application process for over ten American colleges, Varvara possesses extensive experience when it comes to college essays. She is excited to assist you in creating a strong piece that will not only impress but also resonate deeply with the admissions committee!
Peter Klapes
Expert Advisor
Peter first began with Write the World as a member of WtW's inaugural Student Advisory Board when he was in high school and Write the World was in its nascent stages. A native of Boston, Peter studied philosophy at Boston College, where his main philosophical interests include psychoanalysis, the philosophy of literature, hermeneutics, and contemporary continental philosophy. Peter has previously served as Editor-in-Chief of Dianoia, an international journal of philosophy housed at Boston College and currently serves as Executive Manager of The Guestbook Project (guestbookproject.org). His writing has appeared in a number of journals, and he has greatly enjoyed tutoring students in writing over the years. He looks back fondly on his days of applying to college and writing college essays—it’s certainly an exciting time in one’s life! He looks forward to helping college-bound students gain admission to their dream schools and begin their next chapter.
Angelina Nguyen
Expert Advisor
Angelina was a former young writer on Write the World, where she discovered her passion for reviewing student writing and won Best Peer Review twice. As one of the first Alumni Ambassadors for Write the World, she established the Senior Peer Reviewers program which brought other former writers back on the site to provide further peer reviews. Angelina completed a Bachelors in Music Education with Honours at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. As a student, she actively contributed to the University of Sydney's Honi Soit Newspaper by writing creative, perspective and culture articles. Angelina has also created a variety of educational resources, ranging from a poetry analysis guide with ATARNotes to Trials examinations for high school students. She currently works as a middle and high school music teacher and is excited to support college applicants and help realize their creative visions.
Sasindie Subasinghe
Expert Advisor
Sasindie is a former young writer and community ambassador at Write the World. She is the poetry winner of the Climate Awards hosted by Write the World in partnership with Seventh Generation. Sasindie first discovered her love for language when she was a student at the Wendy Whatmore Academy of Speech and Drama. In school, she studied English literature and served as a writer and editor for the literary journal of Musaeus College. As a poet and editor, she understands how an authentic voice paired with the right language can tell the most compelling stories, and she looks forward to helping you craft an unforgettable essay.
