Aysha Upchurch, the Dancing Diplomat, is an award-winning artist, passionate educator, and sought-after consultant who creates, facilitates, and designs for radical change. She holds an M.A. in International Peace and Conflict Resolution from American University and an Ed.M from Harvard University. Aysha is a Lecturer on Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education where she has pioneered courses and initiatives to elevate Hip Hop and movement as necessary tools of transformative education. She is the founder and director of HipHopEX, a lab project that explores the power of Hip Hop in education through intergenerational programming.
As a dancer/choreographer, Aysha considers herself a storyteller who leans on African diasporic movement to create stories of joy, connection, and liberation on the stage that seek to stir up that which is stagnant in order to bring performers and audiences into closer dialogue with each other and themselves. She has shared her experience and expertise about artfully designing equitable and culturally relevant classrooms, the importance of dance and movement in education, and embracing Hip Hop as a powerful literacy and lens in schooling at national conferences and most recently at TedxUConn. Endeavoring never to separate her identity as artist and educator, her work on the stage and in the classroom braids together social justice and youth advocacy and provides the foundation for her media and merchandise project D.O.P.E. - dismantling oppression and pushing education.
