Kuae Noel Kelch

National President

Kuae Noel Kelch is an Emmy-nominated journalist with more than 30 years of experience in print, broadcast and online media. Currently, she is Vice President of Media Relations at the high-stakes global public affairs firm Mercury. Previously, she was an Editorial Producer for CNN on the award-winning three-hour live national morning show ‘New Day’ with John Berman and Brianna Keilar, where she pitched and developed news segments, booked high profile guests and covered breaking news, politics and the top stories of the day. She is a former producer for the award-winning newsmagazine Dateline NBC, as well as Headliners and Legends with Matt Lauer on MSNBC. While at NBC, she was the recipient of a National Headliner award for her work as field producer on a six-month investigative piece about Florida teachers with criminal backgrounds. She also produced a one-hour documentary on former Secretary of State Colin Powell.

Kuae has worked for The Oprah Winfrey Show, ABC News and King World Productions, and she is a former education reporter for The Miami Herald. Her articles have appeared in The Washington Post and The Philadelphia Inquirer, and she is former editor in chief of Black Family Today magazine. She was also a contributing editor for Plum Magazine, a pregnancy and parenting magazine for women over the age of 35, and contributor to The Huffington Post.

Kuae is National President of Mocha Moms, Inc., a non-profit support organization that provides sisterhood, support and service to mothers of color in more than 60 chapters in 44 states with nearly 2500 members and an online and social media following of more than 100,000. Mocha Moms are actively engaged in weekly support group meetings, moms-only get togethers and a wide range of community service. They host educational summits, health and wellness symposiums and financial literacy workshops, march for babies, promote the importance of breastfeeding, global vaccines and cord blood donation, and support each other through the various seasons of motherhood.

Mocha Moms, Inc. was a stakeholder organization during the Obama Administration with the White House, Department of Education and EPA. In February 2012, Mocha Moms was invited to The White House for a historic Moms Summit with senior Obama administration officials. More than 150 Mocha Moms leaders traveled from across the country for the private briefing, marking an unprecedented milestone for the organization. Kuae and her organization have participated in numerous White House events, including summits on Women and the Environment, Women and the Economy and a special event to honor girls involved in STEM hosted by the White House Council on Women and Girls. Since 2003, as national director of media and publicity, national director of community service, and now national president for the past 13 years, Kuae has increased the visibility of Mocha Moms and highlighted the powerful stories of numerous mothers of color. Mocha Moms has been profiled in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Essence and Ebony Magazine, and television segments have appeared on NBC Nightly News, Good Morning America and ABC’s Nightline.

Kuae was an at home mother to her three children for 13 years. She sits on the advisory board of the return-to-work organization iRelaunch and believes deeply in empowering women, particularly mothers. In August 2013, she was one of three women featured in the New York Times Magazine as part of the viral cover story “The Opt-Out Generation Wants Back In,” by bestselling author Judith Warner. She was one of five recipients in 2020 of the Richard D. Parsons Community Impact Award, WarnerMedia’s prestigious award recognizing exceptional community and public service.

Kuae holds a B.A. in Print Journalism from Howard University, where she was Campus Editor of the critically acclaimed student newspaper The Hilltop, a member of the Society of Professional Journalists, the Frederick Douglass Honor Society and the Golden Key National Honor Society. She also holds an M.S. in Journalism from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, where she was awarded a fellowship with the Alfred I. DuPont Center for Broadcast Journalism. She is originally from Philadelphia.