Chris James, a man who is truly on a journey to impact and changes lives in his community and the world. Chris James is a national award winning spoken word poet, TED Talks speaker, Life Coach, Mental Health First-Aider, playwright, educator and 4x published author. He recently served as the keynote speaker at the United States Capitol for the 39th Annual Congressional Arts Competition. He is the author of Joe Got Flow, Black Boy Blues and The Odds Against US. Chris is the creator of stage plays, Dear Black People and The Odds Against US., AETN/PBS will be releasing a short documentary about the life of Chris James. In 2016 he was featured on the front cover of Arkansas Times Newspaper for being one of Arkansas' top visionaries. Chris is a member of Foreign Tongues poetry slam team whom ranked 2nd place in the worlds second largest poetry competition in 2014. He is the founder of Arkansas' only poetry venue and second black owned gallery, The House of Art. As a teacher artist, Chris develops and facilitates art integrated poetry writing and performance workshops for K-12 across the country. Through his work, he educates on racial barriers and socio-economic challenges and how we can overcome. He is very passionate about the awareness of mental health.