Our Team

Karen Aroh

In 2009, a refugee invited Karen to her apartment for tea where she learned that this kind woman lived in a refugee camp in Nepal for 20 years. Many challenges followed her to Louisville and she needed income to help her family. This inspired Karen to do something to make a difference in their lives which led to the birth of Maya Collection (Maya means “love” in Nepali).

Over the last 17 years, Karen has met and worked with countless refugee and immigrant woman in Louisville, empowering them to use their artisan skills to make a living and sharing God’s love for them.

Fun Fact: Karen loves spending time with her grandkids and a good game of pickleball.

Founder/Director

Sherubine Theva

Sherubine is the newest member to the Maya team! In her role, she utilizes her background in education, theology, and business to provide both spiritual care and organizational leadership for all of our staff. She leads our team in daily devotionals and prayer meetings, oversees our volunteer and outreach programs, and mentors some of our teen girls who have a desire to deepen their walk with God.

Fun Fact: Sherubine joins us from Toronto, Canada and loves a good game of spikeball.

Associate Director

Operations Manager

Kelsey Dibble

Kelsey oversees Maya’s day-to-day business operations to help ensure efficiency for our organization.

Fun Fact: Kelsey grew up serving with her family’s ministry in Uganda and loves experiencing new places and cultures.

Brand/Marketing Manager

Keri Johnson

Keri oversees branding and design direction as well as manages social media content and graphic design projects.

Fun Fact: Keri loves spending time with family and always thinks pizza is a good idea.

Hadeel Alelayawi

Hadeel oversees our sewing room, making sure everything runs smoothly and our artisans have the supplies they need to do their job well. This includes making sure sewing kits are prepped, supplies are ordered and our sewing room volunteers have well organized and labeled projects.

Hadeel is in charge of rivetting and strapping all products after the artisans are done sewing them. She jumps in to sew when she’s needed and helps with new product prototyping.

Fun Fact: Hadeel is mom to 4 kiddos, 2 of which are twins and loves sharing her Iraqi recipes.

Sewing Room Supervisor

Yashoda Phuyel

Yashoda is our full-time sewer and in charge of all sewing products. She is an incredible seamstress and helps with fabric choice when she has time and is great at trying out new products and prototyping.

Fun Fact: Yashoda loves playing games and dancing with her family.

Sewing Lead