About

Juhanna Rogers, PhD. is a motivational speaker, commentator, artist, education activist, and Host of the WCNY/PBS television series “Behind the Woman”, a show which airs across 19 counties in upstate New York and is in its third season. She is a founder and contributor to the “4Mics” podcast out of her hometown of Newark, New Jersey. Currently residing in Central New York, Dr. Rogers is committed to social justice, education, and the arts. She is a critical race scholar and builds platforms for critical conversations on race, justice, and equity.

Dr. Rogers works globally to address equity in higher education, exploring ways through which underrepresented populations specifically people of African descent can improve their lives and communities. Her passion lies in bringing out narratives of the people she has met along the way, using their stories as tools for empowering students in urban communities. Dr. Rogers is also the Vice President of Racial Equity and Social Impact of CenterState CEO, an economic development strategist, and chamber of commerce located in Syracuse, NY. In this role, Dr. Rogers helps develop and deploy DEI strategies that achieve more equitable outcomes both internally and across the organization’s portfolio of work.

Dr. Rogers holds a degree in Integrative Arts from Penn State University, a master’s degree in Higher Education and Student Affairs, and a Ph.D. in Higher Education with a focus on Race and Equity from Indiana University. She and seven other colleagues made history at Indiana University as the largest group of Black women to graduate with PH.D. degrees, simultaneously, in the School of Education. This group of women—deemed “The Great Eight”— gained national attention and were selected as honorees for the 2016 Ebony Magazine’s Power 100 list.

Today, Dr. Rogers is a playwright, director, actress, and business executive. Dr. Rogers’ work expands the presence of BIPOC performance artists on the stage and on television. She recently served as a visiting artist at the Stone Quarry Hill Art Park located in Cazenovia, NY working on a new play titled Queendom. Her poetry was published in the Divine Feminist (anthology), and she makes regular appearances on the BronxNet and The Today Show speaking on the Black experience.

Dr. Rogers also appeared in, “For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf” at Auburn Public Theater. She was invited as an artist to speak about the intersections of race and gender in theater at Syracuse Stage and appeared in the 2021 Poetry and Play series at Syracuse Stage. In 2020 her play, A Gatherin’ Place, opened at Syracuse Stage. The play, done virtually, was reviewed by critics as, “... powerful… proves you don’t need to physically be inside the Archbold theater to have an engaging theatrical experience.” In 2024, she earned her MFA in playwriting from Goddard College.