Dr. Pierre-Valery Njenji Tchetgen is an Assistant Professor at Northeastern University’s College of Arts, Media & Design, jointly appointed in the Music and Art+Design departments. He works at the intersection of music, education and experience design. He focuses on three primary areas related to these disciplines: drummologie and music-based interventions, culturally-relevant pedagogy and cultural computing. Dr. Tchetgen studies how culturally grounded early literacy and STEAM experiences affect children’s learning and development, and how transforming the ecology and pedagogy of early childhood education can improve these experiences, particularly for underserved children. These areas are integrated through applied research by using co-design methods to promote children's human, cognitive and socio-emotional development.

Dr. Tchetgen is also a faculty affiliate with Africana Studies and the Center for Spirituality, Dialogue and Service. He is a former Bridges Fellow with the Center for Design and World Making/World Building Fellow with the Center for Humanities (2023-24) at Northeastern University.

Nikita Saner is a UX designer and researcher serving as the Design Evaluation Research Assistant for the Urban Griot Project at Northeastern University. I help co-design and assess innovative, culturally responsive learning experiences for young children. I’m passionate about using design and research to empower communities and create inclusive educational environments.

Joythish Evuri is a Master’s student in Computer Science at Northeastern University with over two years of software development experience and a passion for building meaningful, culturally grounded digital experiences. At UGP, he contributes as a front-end developer, helping design engaging, rhythm-based learning environments for children.

Ashish Shethia is a software developer with a strong background in full-stack development, cloud infrastructure, and data-driven applications. He holds a Master’s degree in Information Systems from Northeastern University and is passionate about building impactful technology for education and community empowerment.

Allwin Williams is an interaction designer currently based in Bengaluru, India. His academic background includes a Master’s in Interaction Design from the National Institute of Design (NID), Bengaluru, following an undergraduate degree in Information Technology from Coimbatore Institute of Technology. As an active member of the Urban Griots Collaborative, he contributes to the conceptualization, design and evaluation of core aspects of the UGP web infrastructure.