Panel A
Terina-Jasmine (TJ) Alladin
Terina-Jasmine (TJ) Alladin is a multifaceted cultural executive and strategic consultant with experience spanning performing arts, sports, and technology. Her career began as a contemporary dancer in London before transitioning to global leadership roles. Currently, she serves as a Consultant for Cannonball Festival in Philadelphia, supporting growth and operations. TJ’s previous positions include Managing Director at the International Association of Performing Arts for Youth (IPAY) and Program Manager at Boston Ballet. In the tech sector, she has worked as a Senior Consultant with the National Center for Women and IT for 9 years. TJ holds an MBA from Universidad Europea and has worked with Real Madrid FC in Spain and NBA’s Basketball Africa League across West Africa. Throughout her career, TJ has served on numerous grant panels, leveraging her expertise to facilitate adjudication processes and guide funding decisions for various organizations. Originally from Brooklyn with Guyanese heritage, TJ enjoys traveling, circus arts, padel, and modern dance.
Alicia Díaz’
As a Puerto Rican contemporary dance artist in the diaspora, Alicia Díaz’s work speaks to issues of memory, colonialism, and the legacy of slavery. She holds an MFA in Dance from George Washington University and serves as associate professor of dance in the Department of Theater and Dance at the University of Richmond in Virginia. She teaches courses in contemporary dance, improvisation, choreography, and community engaged courses centered on dance for social change. Alicia is deeply engaged in interdisciplinary collaborations that harness the arts in the urgent fight for climate justice.
Ashley Malafronte
Ashley Malafronte is a director, dramaturg, educator, and editor who is utterly obsessed with stories and the people who tell them. Credits include Eurydice (Signature Theatre, assistant director, upcoming), A View from the Bridge (Long Wharf Theatre, dramaturg & assistant director), Mad Forest (Waterwell/PPAS, director), The Emancipation of Sugar & Baby (The Brick, director), Private Lives (Arizona Theatre Company, SDCF Noël Coward Fellow/associate director), and Roe (Waterwell/PPAS, dramaturg). Ashley has made site-specific theatre in Inis Mór, Ireland; New Haven, CT; and in Austin, TX/her kitchen/cyberspace. She also produces the work of CAROL Performance Group and Senior Editor for HowlRound Theatre Commons, a platform that amplifies progressive and disruptive ideas about theatre.
Panel B
Ersian François
A creative solution seeker and arts advocate with an international arts management background, Ersian’s experience as an artist and arts professional spans from Baroque opera to contemporary theatre. At The Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics, Ersian leads the daily financial and administrative operations, and manages a wide range of artistic projects at the intersection of arts and politics. She has served on the Civic Practice grant committee for Opera America; collaborated with The Folger Shakespeare Library, The Avalon Theatre, and the Bowie Center for Performing Arts to create community-centric events;and is the co-creator of the acclaimed family program Opera Starts with Oh! Online. While living in Paris, Ersian worked with the Choir and Orchestra of Sorbonne Universities, Jérémie Rhorer’s Le Cercle de l’Harmonie, Raphaël Pichon’s Pygmalion, and co-founded the Karaïb Festival in Île-de-France. She holds an MA in Music Administration and Management from Sorbonne Université in Paris and was born and raised in Trinidad and Tobago.
Courtney Mealy
Courtney Mealy is an experienced arts administrator dedicated to supporting artists and fostering community engagement. As the Associate Director of the Cattaraugus County Arts Council, she oversaw grant administration for NYSCA, NYFA, and private funding programs, helping to expand resources for regional artists and organizations. She developed arts educational offering and curated several gallery opportunities in rural WNY. Now serving as the Director of Arts Programming at the University of Pittsburgh at Bradford and Interim Director of the Marilyn Horne Museum & Exhibit Center, she curates exhibitions, organizes cultural events, performances, programs and develops creative opportunities for students and the community. Passionate about arts accessibility, Courtney continues to advocate for meaningful cultural experiences that inspire and connect.
Michelle J. “Micha” Rodriguez
Michelle J. “Micha” Rodriguez (she/her) writes and performs in the worlds of music and theater. Raised in the Pacific Northwest and Kentucky by Puerto Rican parents, Michelle’s work explores kids-of-immigrants stories, divinity, queerness, intuition, joy-as-resistance, healing and spaces in-between. Michelle is a 2024-2025 Tow Playwright-in-Residence at the Bushwick Starr, a 2023-2034 Vision Resident at Ars Nova, the winner of the 2022 Helen Merrill Award for playwriting and the recipient of a 2022 grant from NYC Women’s Fund for Media, Music and Theater. Resident artist at BAM. BA Williams College.