UUCS - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Religious Education Coordinator
Archana started attending UUCS in 2022 along with her son, and is excited to be the RE Coordinator at UUCS. Prior to joining, she had been through a rigorous training program focused on special education and has extensive experience in utilizing critical thinking and effective communication to engage children of all ages. Other than teaching, her educational background includes a Bachelor's in Computer Science, and two Master of Science degrees in Integrated Marketing Communications, and Space Studies respectively. When she is not preparing a RE lesson plan for a Sunday service, she enjoys being a Policy Analyst at an aerospace non-profit, teaching Robotics part-time to elementary age kids, traveling, reading, and spending time with family and friends.
Job Titles:
- Administrator
- Office Administrator
Carolina Terrazas joined the UUCS staff as office administrator in May 2023 and is excited to be here. In her full-time position, she works for Loudoun County Public Schools. She has worked extensively in special education and has a diverse work profile, which is primarly in early childhood education.
Carolina enjoys spending time with her family and playing with her dog Snowy. She is a foodie, loves meeting new people, and can't wait to travel with her husband in the near future. She's a mom of two boys, which are 20 and 16 years old.
Kris graduated from Indiana State University with a bachelor's degree in Music Education in 2004. She has over 13 years of formal music education practice and 20 years of professional singing experience. Kris was previously the Music Director at UUCS from 2008 - 2017. After taking time to start a family, Kris returns to UUCS ready to bring years of knowledge and even more energy.
Kris has two international championships in Barbershop quartet singing through Harmony Incorporated. She sings professionally as both a caroler and as a member of Snowday, an a cappella group that mostly focuses on education and teaching confidence and teamwork through singing.
Kris is also a multi-talented musician, playing piano, saxophone, bass guitar and Ukulele as well. She is a mom of 2 beautiful kids and a wife to Rob. She loves having a home here at UUCS where her WHOLE family feels welcome and supported. Kris's hopes for the music program at UUSC is that all who come, find a place. That could be in the band, in the choir, or an active participant in the music made at Sunday service. She believes that music fills the spaces where words fail. It can transport you to a new place or provide a foundation to stand on. It can speak to the masses or touch one single heart.
I am the piano accompanist for the Choir and the Sunday Services. I also accompany soloists and instrumentalists when needed.
When I was seven, in a small town in Kentucky, my mother woke me one summer morning and said to me, "Get up Mary, you have a piano lesson this morning." I replied, "But we don't have a piano." She told me that my grandmother said there was no one to play the piano for our little town church and I should learn and I could practice on the antique pump organ that was in my grandfather's antique shop down the street… thus began my career as a church pianist.
I believe music is one of the true equalizers in life. It can be heard by all types of people of different cultures, social, religious & economic levels, and enjoyed equally by all, with each giving to the piece their own interpretation, spanning all emotional levels. To be able to perhaps give someone that opportunity to go where they may have never gone before, in turn, gives it back to me. So, I feel I am the richest person on earth when I play the piano for others.
Rev. Ashley comes to UUCS after seven years as a hospice chaplain. She received her Bachelor of Arts degree in religion from Barnard College and her MDiv from Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York. She has also worked as a chaplain in New York, Dublin, Ireland, and Philadelphia. Before her work in ministry, Ashley founded the nonprofit organization Students Active For Ending Rape (SAFER), devoted to providing college antiviolence activists with grassroots organizing training, and worked in LGBTQ/HIV+ human and civil rights advocacy.
Ashley's personal spiritual path includes practicing in the Kagyu lineage of the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. She loves dancing and native plant gardening and lives with her family and a menagerie of animal friends in Maryland.
Rev. John was ordained as a Unitarian Universalist minister in August 2020. On his journey to the ministry, he has served internships at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Fairfax (UUCF) and UUCS, and at Sibley Memorial Hospital. He also served as acting minister for social justice at UUCF. Rev. John's beautiful stole, which he wears each time he preaches, was a gift lovingly made and presented by UUCS.
Rev. John's faith is rooted in his belief in what Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., called "an inescapable network of mutuality" that binds all living beings together, and his call to ministry is rooted in his belief that we are all called to the work of kindness, compassion, and justice. At present, John is working as an editor and writer, which has been his vocation for the last 30-plus years. He lives in Centreville, Virginia, with his wife, Karen, and their two cats, Kittyfish and Belle.