Board of Directors:
Chairman: Barry Kramer
Director: Michael K. Carbone, D.C.
Director: Mark Risher

Advisory Committee:
Chair: Lisa Wood
Member: Avery Sommers
Member: Jennifer Kramer

Historian: Carmen Magri

Executive Director/Director of Finance:
Donna M. Carbone

Our Teachers

DONNA M. CARBONE
Donna M. Carbone is all things to all people at the Palm Beach Institute. She is the Executive Director, Managing Director, Director of Finance and Director of Marketing. Donna is the creative writing teacher, helping budding authors actually get to see their names on the covers of their books. She writes and produces most of the original concept plays that are performed before eager audiences. She is creator and moderator of Tongues a’Wagging, the Institute’s popular quarterly community storytelling project.

Donna is a freelance writer and contributor to numerous news services. Her monthly opinion column, The View from My Pedestal, appeared in The Beacon Magazine for five years. She was a regular contributor to the Jupiter Courier before it ceased publication. Her poetry and short stories have been featured in recognized publications. She is the creator/moderator of A Novel Approach to Literacy - local author meet and greet events held with the intention to increase literacy awareness and introduce new writers to their communities.

Donna is the author of the Cat Leigh and Marci Welles crime novel series set in Palm Beach County. Through Thick and Thin, Silk Suit/Stone Heart, and Total Submission use the true account of her daughter's kidnapping and rape in 2007 to focus a spotlight on crimes against women. So miraculous was Jessica's survival that the story has been featured on both Surviving Evil (History Channel) and I Survived (Investigation Discovery). Donna and Jessica appeared on the Katie Couric Show and on numerous radio programs where they discussed safety awareness with the audience.

Donna also published Private Hell, a separate crime novel which focuses a spotlight on domestic abuse - a topic she can speak to from personal experience. As with all of her writing, keeping women safe in an ever increasingly dangerous world is her goal.

In January 2017, Donna was contracted to write the true crime novel, Bread and Bullets - the Rosario Liotta Story. Rosario Liotta was imprisoned for 12 years on a manslaughter charge that was eventually proven to be self-defense. The story involves the contract killing of Gus Boulis, founder of Miami Subs and the SunCruz Casino Line, by professional hit man John Gurino. The murder trial began in South Florida with evidence going all the way to the White House.

In 2019, Donna published Charlie’s Molasses, a story which provides a historical look into Florida’s colorful and unsavory sugar industry. Set in Pahokee, a once-thriving sugar town in the Everglades of Florida, Charlie’s Molasses takes the reader on an unforgettable trip back in time. From the very first page, you will shiver with anticipation and grit your teeth for the horrors yet to come.

Fear Sells, Donna's one man show about negative advertising, was commissioned as the closing offering at the TEDxJupiter conference in November 2013. She was a Scenemaker of the Week in the Palm Beach Post. Donna holds a Victim's Advocate Designation from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

Donna is a recognized playwright. Her play, Shell of a Man, was produced at the Dallas Convention Center in 2015. In 2022, her play honoring Rosa Parks - Intersection of Lincoln and Parks, was contracted by the Raymond F. Kravis Center for the Performing Arts and performed in the Rinker Playhouse. Her newest play, Women Wisdom and Wine - a play by a woman, about women, and for women - was produced at the Institute in June 2023. Teaching - not preaching - is at the center of all of her writing.

To learn more about her projects, visit: www.writeforyoullc.com