Terry grew up in NYC, with a deep and abiding love for visual and performing arts. Her first career was as an educator, she then worked on Wall Street with Fortune 500 companies, for the largest minority and woman-owned brokerage. Terry also was a publisher of a magazine for children, as well as owning her own 17-year consulting practice, when she moved to Los Angeles, serving organizations with budgets from $2 million to over $250 million. During her time in Los Angeles, she taught at the Center for Nonprofit Management for 10 years and at the University of Southern California, working to grow missions that included the arts, education, health, literacy, homelessness, seniors, the environment, and serving families affected by developmental disabilities, with a special focus on autism. She has a background in marketing and communications and has been a speaker at national conferences, as well as a former CEO of a national nonprofit. Within the world of art and culture, Terry worked with the Santa Monica Museum of Art, known now as the Institute of Contemporary Art, the Pacific Symphony, Celebration Theater, Los Angeles Youth Orchestra and traveled with one of her clients, a ballet company in a cultural exchange to China.