Lab Director

Neisha Terry (Young), PhD

Dr. Neisha Terry is an Assistant Professor of English Education at Stony Brook University. Her research explores the affordances of multiliteracies in supporting the intersectional identities of Black immigrant youth. Neisha has received various recognitions and awards for her work, including the Drexel University School of Education Ann Marie Weil Award (2022) for Ph.D. students whose dissertation research contributes to making a difference through a better understanding of human needs. She has also received a fellowship with Just Education Policy (2022 cohort), the English Language Arts Teacher Education (ELATE) graduate student research award (2022), and the 2024 MAXQDA Black History Month Research for Change grant, in addition to numerous travel grants to present her work both nationally and internationally.

Contact Information: neisha.terryyoung@stonybrook.edu

Affiliates

Tennecia Dacass, PhD

Associate Professor, Central Washington University

Elizabeth Porter

Education Manager, African Family Health Organization (AFAHO)

Elizabeth Porter serves as the Manager of Education Programs at the African Family Health Organization (AFAHO), where she has significantly advanced educational initiatives benefiting African and Caribbean youth, young and older adults in Philadelphia since 2021. Elizabeth earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Drexel University in Teacher Education in (2005) and a Master's degree in Education, specializing in Curriculum and Instruction (ESOL), from Concordia University in Portland, Oregon (2012). In 2025, Elizabeth founded a Certified Early Childhood Education Center dedicated to providing high-quality educational programming to young children in West and Southwest Philadelphia.

Michael J. Haslip, PhD

Associate Professor, Drexel University

Michael Haslip, Ph.D., is a tenured associate professor of early childhood education at Drexel University and director of the McNichol Early Childhood Education Lab, overseeing 50 researchers and practitioners. With 20 years in education, he has worked as a teacher, curriculum developer, program evaluator, consultant, and researcher. His research investigates how to improve education for social, emotional, character, and spiritual development, and how to train teachers to implement education for sustainability and altruism through project-based learning. He teaches child development in the early and elementary education program at Drexel.

Miranda Alexander
Founding President and Strategic Project Director, Caribbean Community in Philadelphia

Uprooted at the young age of 23 years old, Miranda Alexander was thrust into a leadership role as a pastor's wife and migrated from Trinidad to serve the people of Antigua and Barbuda for 6 years and continued in this leadership position for 6 more years after migrating to the United States. She has been the founding president and strategic project director of Caribbean Community in Philadelphia since 2013. She was the past president of the United Nations Association of Greater Philadelphia, a former USCIS Citizenship Ambassador, a 2023 the city of Philadelphia Welcoming Award recipient and awarded the US Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award in 2023.