Dr. Noelle N. Trent – President & CEO

Dr. Noelle N. Trent currently serves as the President & CEO of the Museum of African American History | Boston & Nantucket. Dr. Trent leverages her enthusiasm for history and professional expertise to create meaningful empowering experiences about Black history.

Dr. Trent is an accomplished public historian and highly respected leader in the national museum community serving on committees for the American Alliance of Museums (AAM), American Association of State & Local History (AASLH), and the Association of African American Museums (AAAM). She is the Vice President of the Board of Directors for the Association of African American Museums and serves on the North American Steering Committee for the International Sites of Conscience. Dr. Trent has worked with several noted organizations and projects including: the National Park Service, the Frederick Douglass National Historic Site, and the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture where she contributed to the exhibition Defending Freedom, Defining Freedom: The Era of Segregation 1876 – 1968.

Dr. Trent previously served as the Director of Interpretation, Collections & Education at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, TN. During her seven-year tenure, Dr. Trent developed and implemented strategies for major exhibitions, collection acquisitions, education programming, community outreach, and interpretation. She led collaborations with local and national partners including: Memphis Teacher Residency, Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, Iris Collective, and WWE. She has presented internationally at the European Solidarity Center in Gdansk, Poland, and at high schools in Warsaw and Sopot, Poland. In 2018, she curated an exhibition and planned the commemorative service for the museum’s commemoration of the 50th anniversary of Dr. King’s assassination, MLK50. She has also appeared in print and broadcast outlets around the world including: The New York Times, The Commercial Appeal, The Today Show, CSPAN, and CBS.

Born in Boston, MA, she is a Phi Beta Kappa, Summa Cum Laude graduate from Howard University in Washington, DC where she also earned her doctorate in United States History.