Alicia M. Straughter is the Managing Director of Athletes Against Drugs (AAD) a non-for-profit organization founded by Stedman Graham. AAD focuses on educating youth in areas of education, health, and sports.

Alicia’s professional background includes 12 years experience in the non-for-profit industry. She is very instrumental in raising thousands of dollars to support AAD. She successfully negotiates business contracts and maintains business alliances from start to end. Alicia continues to restructure and customize AAD’s in-school programs, extensive event planning and management, program and project development, marketing and strategic planning, organization development, executive and advisory board development and preparation, and operations. Her current development is the AAD Scholarship Program for youth at the Daniel Webster Elementary School located in a very low-income area on Chicago’s Westside.

Her Sports Event Marketing and Planning include several years of Celebrity Golf Events, Sports Industry Luncheon, Athlete Achievement Awards Dinners and Tennis Tournaments. Alicia coordinates private Celebrity and Corporate VIP events as well. In addition, she coordinated sports clinics for the youth that include basketball, tennis and golf.

Straughter is committed to providing positive alternative programming and activities for young people. Her commitment and dedication is shown through her continuous recruitment and networking effort for corporate donations, celebrities, volunteers and business partnerships to support the organization’s mission.

She continues to focus her efforts in the educational arena. She is an adjunct professor at Dominican University and lectures on Marketing Concepts for Organizations, a required course in the Institute for Adult Learning Program. Straughter taught a weekly Success Club class at the Chicago Job Corps; a youth leadership program founded by Stedman Graham. In addition, Alicia assists with the formulation and sustainability of the program to provide effective leadership for the Job Corps youth.

Alicia earned a Bachelor of Arts in Communication and a Master of Science in Organization Development from Loyola University.

Straughter is a member of the Women in Sports and Entertainment organization. She volunteers her time at Living Word Christian Center working on special projects. Alicia was born and raised on the Westside of Chicago. She resides in Westchester, IL.