Our Team
Almeda Wright, Ph.D.
Program Director
Dr. Wright is an Associate Professor of Religious Education at Yale Divinity School. As the Director of Communitas, Dr. Wright is the grant’s principal investigator and responsible for the intellectual and logical direction of the program. Professor Wright’s research focuses on African American religion, Womanist spirituality, adolescent spiritual development, and the intersections of religion and public life.
Prior to her arrival at Yale, Dr. Wright served for four years as assistant professor of religion and youth ministry at Pfeiffer University, and as a visiting faculty member and teaching assistant at the Candler School of Theology at Emory University where she also served as program director of the Wisdom of Youth Project and in various positions with the Youth Theological Initiative. She has served as a consultant to the Women’s Theological Center in Boston and has taught at several schools in the Greater Boston area, including Shady Hill School, the Young Achievers Science and Math Academy, and the Martin Luther King, Jr. Open School.
Professor Wright’s publications include The Spiritual Lives of Young African Americans, a coedited book with Mary Elizabeth Moore entitled Children, Youth, and Spirituality in a Troubling World, in addition to various articles in scholarly journals and contributions to edited volumes.
Professor Wright is an ordained minister of the American Baptist Churches and has served on the ministerial staff of various churches, including Union Baptist Church (Cambridge, Massachusetts) and Victory United Church of Christ (Stone Mountain, Georgia).
Cami King, M.Div.
Assistant Director
As the Assistant Director of Communitas, Cami is responsible for the administration of the program, including overall direction and support of the mission, program development and management, public relations and marketing, supervision and administration.
Before moving to New Haven, Cami was an assistant pastor and church-planter over the course of ten years in Boston, MA, Durham, NC, and New York City. She has served as an equity consultant to numerous congregations and faith-based organizations across the country. As a former public-school educator, Cami also works in equity advocacy around public education. She received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania and her master’s degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.