Luisa Cicero, MA, MFA, is the Executive Director and Spanish Program Coordinator of NAMI KDK (Kane-south, DeKalb, and Kendall Counties).

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Luisa has over sixteen years of experience in marketing communications, change management, corporate communications, leadership development, performance consulting, and consultancy for excellence. More than four thousand leaders and employees in Latin America, the United States, and Europe were part of her training sessions.

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Luisa has served as a medical interpreter during travel missions, supporting “Corazones por Honduras,” a non-profit organization.

 

Experiences

 

Outside of her work with NAMI KDK, Luisa writes under the pen name of Fermina Ponce. 

Social communicator and journalist with a Master’s degree in Organizational Communication Management from Universidad de La Sabana, Colombia, and a Master’s degree in Creative Writing from the University of Salamanca, Spain. Her poetry collections Al desnudo and Mar de (L)una received honorable mentions at the ILBA Awards in 2018 and 2019, respectively. Her book Se llamará piedra—received an honorable mention at the ILBA 2022 Awards as the Best Single-Author Poetry Book, winning the Juan Felipe Herrera Award.

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Luisa explores universal themes, delving into human nature, its dualities, eroticism, and mental illness, as seen in her work Sin nombre. In 2020, Luisa was named Laureate Poet Deputy of the city of Aurora, Illinois.

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Her poetry has been published in French for La Piraña magazine in Mexico and OUPOLI (Ouvroir de Poésie Libre) in France. Her work has been translated into English, French, Italian, and Arabic.

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In 2024, she ventured into non-fiction with her book Todo este silencio: relatos sobre mi trastorno bipolar, in which she shares her mental journey with bipolar disorder.

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In her free time, Luisa enjoys spending time with her husband and children, traveling, writing, crocheting and reading.