Terri L Bailey is a native of Gainesville, FL’s oldest historically Black neighborhood, the Pleasant Street District. She holds a BS in Elementary Education from Bethune-Cookman University, an MA in English and Creative Writing from Southern New Hampshire University, and an MA in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and Research from the University of Florida. Terri is a writer, poet, and the first runner-up for Alachua County’s inaugural Poet Laureate. She often incorporates her triumphs and her beloved African spirituality into her writing. Bailey supports other creatives by sponsoring annual poetry events, Writing to Heal, and art instruction workshops. Terri is the 2023-24 recipient of the Randy Martin Spirit Award from Imagining America for her scholarship, artistry, pedagogy, mentorship, and institutional leadership and administration. In 2024, she was awarded a scholarship by the University of Florida’s Arts in Health Intensive Arts in Medicine program (College of the Arts) to develop her Writing to Heal Facilitators Training, which will be used as a tool for healing and entrepreneurship for artists, life coaches and community educators.

Bailey is a certified Master Coach and offers life, body image, creative, spiritual, accountability, and empowerment coaching services through her LLC, Terri Bailey Creative, Healing and Alternative Services (Terri Bailey CHATs). Through her program, the Queens Room Women’s Empowerment Group, she encourages women to be their authentic selves, value their narratives, and recognize their worth. She founded the Bailey Learning and Arts Collective, Inc. (BLAAC), a nonprofit organization dedicated to cultivating socially responsible communities and leaders. BLAAC achieves this through grassroots organizing, community education, collaboration and advocacy, and the arts. This commitment to community involvement and advocacy was recognized when BLAAC became the proud recipient of the City of Gainesville’s 2023 Business Arts Award.

Terri won one of nine community arts grants from the Mellon Foundation, University of Florida Centers for Arts In Medicine and Arts, Migration and Entrepreneurship, and SPARC352 to create a coffee table book entitled Gainesville Proper: A Collection Of Poems, Stories, Photos, and Illustrations Celebrating Gainesville, Florida’s Historically Black Communities Before Gentrification and the 2025 Telly Award winning mini documentary series celebrating Black music in Gainesville, Florida called When the Music Was Cheap and Damn Near Free.