Staff: Laura Perna
Communications Director
Laura began her work at CTD with a stint as an Americorps VISTA in 2009 and joined the full time staff in 2012. She draws upon her background in languages and composition to manage CTD's member communications, website, and social media; write and report on grants; and manage and support various projects and events. She founded and currently co-coordinates CTD's Pen 2 Paper Creative Writing Competition, and once a month, she co-hosts the Lion & Pirate inclusive open mic with Art Spark Texas and local book-seller Malvern Books. She also assists every year with the Cinema Touching Disability Film Festival.
A Dallas native, Laura received her BA from the University of Texas at Austin and her MA from New York University. She joined Austin's non-profit community in 2009 as an administrative assistant and project coordinator at the Central Texas Library System. Her work there included the development and implementation of the Digital Literacy Corps, a program that paired technology trainers with 31 small libraries in Central Texas in order to offer basic computer training classes to library patrons.
When she's not hard at work at CTD, Laura and her partner Geoff are listening to their record collection in alphabetical order or lounging about with their dogs.
