Mercy Quaye

Adjunct Professor (SPP) and Founder and Principal of The Narrative Project Public Relations Agency

School of Public Policy

Mercy is an anti-racist storyteller, an award-winning public relations entrepreneur, a culture and politics commentator, and a relentless social & racial justice advocate. She has built a storied career in journalism, communications, and public relations for nearly two decades across the region.

After leaving a formal career in journalism covering breaking news, education, and crime & justice, Mercy began working in mission-driven communications in both the non-profit and public sectors focusing on education advocacy, undocumented students’ rights, and more.

In 2015, she launched The Narrative Project as a conversation and anti-racist training platform to support organizations in integrating their values with their daily goals. From those origins, Mercy doubled down by developing a first-of-its-kind model for public relations and launched The Narrative Project as Connecticut’s first anti-racist public relations agency.

The RAISED Model of Anti-Racist Public Relations has since supported dozens of advocacy organizations throughout the nation.

At the core of everything she does is a deeply seeded desire to effect positive societal change through collaboration and highlighting lesser-discussed aspects of the Black and American experiences. The granddaughter of the first mayor of Accra, Ghana, on one side and a product of the Great Migration on the other, Mercy’s relationship to justice is the result of being raised by a combination of foreign diplomats and American sharecroppers — a juxtaposition that tethers her to a global perspective.

A self-proclaimed ‘inner-city kid who went to college,’ Mercy’s perspective on life has been shaped through a number of converging experiences, including converting from Christianity to Islam to agnosticism, joining a historically Black sorority at a predominately white university, section hiking the Appalachian Trail, and being in an interracial marriage with a former Wyomingite from a conservative family.

She’s a professor of digital journalism at Southern Connecticut State University, a professor of public relations and branding at Quinnipiac University, a board member of the Connecticut Society of Professional Journalists, a board member of the Public Relations Society of America-Connecticut, and a former columnist with both Hearst Connecticut Media and the Connecticut Mirror.

She was the first Black and youngest named Director of Communications for New Haven Public Schools, Connecticut Magazine 40 Under 40 Class of 2019, Urban Professionals Network 40 Under 40 Class of 2020, recipient of the 2022 Sharon Clemons Equity & Inclusive Opportunity Award, an inaugural Quinnipiac University MLK Dream Awardee in 2023, and a recipient of the 2024 Quinnipiac Chamber of Commerce’s Excellence in Advocacy Award. She earned a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism and a Masters in Public Relations from Quinnipiac University.