Expertise

-Housing Equity
-Environmental Hazards
-Climate Adaptation
-Economic Mobility
-Emergency Management

Keandra Davis, born and raised in Miami, FL, is a doctoral student at the L. Douglas Wilder School of Public Administration and Policy with a Concentration in Urban Policy at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU).

She is an Affiliate Faculty for the African American Studies Department at VCU and an Inaugural Community Outreach and Rental Housing Policy-Programmatic Fellow for Virginia Housing. In her role, Keandra serves to establish equitable development frameworks to address the housing needs of historically underserved communities, determining programmatic success outcomes for the Housing Choice Voucher Program, conducting program evaluation and policy analysis to evaluate risk factors, housing, and legal mitigators for Rental Housing Divisions, and works to establish innovative practices to support resident services, housing programs, and policies to create and sustain affordable housing across Virginia.

Keandra previously served as Graduate Research Assistant at the Research Institute for Social Equity, where she served as the Student Project Coordinator for a community convening focused on fostering wealth and sustainability for growing minority entrepreneurship in Virginia. She also conducted research on the intersections between racism and public health in cities and states across the United States. She conducted research and analyzed data to identify trends in COVID-19, Excessive Death Rates in Virginia, and the FEMA 3+ Region. She also performed environmental scans to evaluate all U.S. social equity centers and contributed to developing a Virginia language access plan framework.

Prior to pursuing her doctoral studies, Keandra served under the leadership of legislative offices for the Florida House of Representatives, the County Administrators Office, as well as for agencies and nonprofits whose missions were to advance social and racial equity and provide critical resources to support vulnerable populations in Tallahassee, FL. She has served as a guest lecturer at Florida International University. She has also written a profile on the mitigation efforts of gentrification in Miami, Florida, and during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, co-authored a publication highlighting the effects of COVID-19 on the racial/ethnic and school populations of all Florida counties to inform local governments of how to best address their needs.

Keandra is currently a Speaker on Affordable Housing for the Women’s Club of Florida Speakers Bureau and served as a Research Scholar for the Street Philosophy Institute in partnership with Boston University’s Center for Antiracist Research. Keandra was selected as an Inaugural Fellow of the Kilolo Kijakazi Fellowship in collaboration with the Office of Social Insurance in Washington, DC., and named an Inaugural Fellow for the Journal of Social Equity in Public Administration (JSEPA). Keandra is also a recipient of the Congressional Black Caucus Education Scholarship.