Ashleigh Brown-Grier, Ph.D.

Founder / Executive Director

Ashleigh has over seven years of experience in international education. Her experience as a two-time Fulbright U.S. Student grantee, in Malaysia and South Africa, influenced her decision to pursue a career as an international scholar-practitioner. Her expertise includes program development, internationalization at Historically Black Institutions (HBIs), community engagement in international exchange programs, and international comparative education.

Brown-Grier received her Ph.D. in Higher Education Leadership and Policy Studies from Howard University. She is a graduate of Talladega College, Morgan State University, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Janine Jackson

Programming and Events Director

Janine is a third-year doctoral student and Research Analyst at the Center for Predictive Analytics at Morgan State University. Her research focuses on developing and validating instruments for measuring teachers' affective characteristics and non-cognitive factors in student success, with an emphasis on measurement fairness in large-scale assessments. Janine is a certified teacher in Maryland and Washington, D.C., and spent six years in Abu Dhabi as a Mentor Teacher and Data Coordinator. She currently works part-time at Educational Testing Service (ETS) and is a 2021-2022 White House HBCU Scholar. Janine serves on various committees, including the National Council on Measurement in Education (NCME) Outreach Committee and the Psychometric Society Graduate Student Committee. She is also the Chair of the Jamaica Diaspora Education Task Force Education Leadership Committee and the Programming and Events Director for the International HBCU Exchange (iHBCUx).

Cydnee Sanders

CFO / Assistant Director

Cydnee is an educator with a passion for international exchange, adult learning, and community engagement. She served as a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant in Cape Town, South Africa, where she taught at a local TVET college, collaborated with the American Corner, and volunteered in the community. Cydnee earned her B.A. in Sociology and Anthropology from Bucknell University and her TEFL certification and Master’s degree in Adult and Continuing Education and Teaching from Hamline University. She is committed to fostering inclusive and dynamic learning environments that empower students of all backgrounds.

Jonathan Freeman

Communications Director

Jonathan Freeman, Ph.D. is a 2016-2017 Fulbright U.S. Student Grantee where he was a Visiting Researcher at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. He is also a Fulbright Alumni Ambassador for the Fulbright U.S. Student Programs.

Dr. Freeman is an experienced higher education leader and partnership strategist having worked in both non-profit and for-profit education and workforce training companies, and most recently a program manager at IBM. He is also a part-time faculty member at the University of Baltimore teaching in the Yale Gordon College of Arts and Sciences. Dr. Freeman received his BA in History from Lane College, MA in African American Studies from the University of California, Los Angeles, and Ph.D. in American Studies from Purdue University.