2025 Delaware Arts Summit Workshop Speakers

Kristine Alvarez

Nonprofit Finance Fund, Philadelphia

As a right-brain person who avoided business training of any kind in college, Kristine never imagined she would spend more than fifteen years working with nonprofit leaders to use finance to achieve their mission. In her role as a senior consultant on NFF’s Advisory Services team, Kristine coaches organizational leaders to build their confidence and skills in financial management in service of communities. From her previous experience working with a small, AmeriCorps program in Philadelphia, Kristine understands the reality of nonprofit leaders wearing many different hats – from training volunteers and stuffing annual appeal letters, to writing grant proposal, to setting up and breaking down special event venues. In addition to consulting one-on-one and leading group trainings on finance, Kristine contributes to thought leadership in the sector, including authorship of NFF’s 2015 report, “Overcoming Financial Barriers to Expanding High-Quality Early Care & Education.” Kristine previously served as a business planning consultant to Washington DC nonprofits seeking to launch earned income ventures, Communications Director of City Year Philadelphia, and Volunteer Coordinator for a congressional campaign in Bethesda, MD. She holds a Master of Business Administration from George Washington University, a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Pennsylvania, and a Certified Nonprofit Accounting Professional Certificate from Fiscal Management Associates.

Outside of work, you can find Kristine line-dancing, practicing mindful breathing with her two school-aged daughters, or preparing her Glenside garden for summer vegetables and 14-foot sunflowers.

Susannah Laramee Kidd (she/they)

Independent Consultant, Philadelphia

Susannah is an ethnographer turned evaluator, community-engaged researcher, facilitator, strategist, and reflection partner. Her expertise includes all aspects of qualitative, mixed-methods, and community-based planning, evaluation, and research, with a special focus on public art, public spaces like parks and community gardens, social connectedness, place-based arts and cultural community development strategies, and art for social change. As an independent consultant, they work with artists, government agencies, nonprofit and community development organizations, and community members to generate learning and planning for social change using the lens of systems thinking and participatory processes. She holds a Ph.D. in Religion and Comparative Literature and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies from Emory University. Laramee Kidd is in love with uncovering the social, natural, and built layers of places and is happy to be based in the place that shaped them, the southern part of Lenapehoking, also known as Philadelphia. You can find out more about her work at www.larameekidd.com.

Captain Moira McGuire

Retired, US Public Health Service

Captain McGuire is a retired nurse officer with the US Public Health Service who has worked for over 25 years advocating for Arts in Health programs in support of improved health, prevention, resilience, and well-being in both clinical and community settings. She has extensive experience in program design and evaluation, strategy development, and generating collaborative partnerships and networks. She established the Arts in Health Program at the National Intrepid Center of Excellence at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, a first-of-its-kind in the Military Health System and founded the National Initiative for Arts & Health Across the Military in partnership with Americans for the Arts.

Since retiring from uniformed service, she has been providing community-based arts engagements for active-duty service members, veterans, and military-connected communities and curating veteran art exhibitions. She is an adjunct lecturer at George Mason University’s Arts Management Program and the University of Florida’s Center for Arts in Medicine, is a member of the Board of Directors for the National Organization for Arts in Health (NOAH); and serves as Co-Executive Director of the US Public Health Service Music Ensemble. She is the daughter of a Marine veteran opera singer/voice teacher father and pianist/painter/playwright mother who studied Irish Dance, ballet, piano, violin, flute and harp. The focus of her professional work lies in the belief that creativity and expression are not only essential elements in the treatment of illness and injury, but in the prevention of them as well.

Keri Mesropov

Founder, Spring Talent Development, Denver

Keri is the Founder of Spring, a talent development agency launching young careerists and cultivating multi-generational workforces. Data, research and results driven in its practice, Spring exists to help organizations optimize the generational diversity of their teams toward not-yet imagined future success. Delivering culture assessments and consulting, one-on-one advisories and skill-building workshops, Spring’s work today spans the business landscape of corporations, hospitality, entertainment and social non-profits. Her expertise has been featured in such publications as Newsweek and SHRM’s podcast, Honest HR.

Prior to launching Spring, Keri was the Chief Talent Officer for TRG Arts, one of the world’s most influential consulting firms dedicated to the arts, where she created unique organizational culture initiatives that optimized productivity and creativity while motivating and retaining top talent.

Before becoming TRG’s first-ever Chief Talent Officer, Keri served as Vice President of Client Service and as a senior consultant for TRG, leading teams for consulting, database management and business intelligence services. As consultant and VP, she advised theater, ballet, orchestral and Broadway producing organizations on how to build resiliency through data-driven strategies in consumer relationships, financial stability, organizational frameworks and people-centric teams. She led a VIP portfolio that included New York City Ballet, the Chicago Symphony, Toronto International Film Festival, Boston Ballet and the Denver Center for the Performing Arts.

Known for her expertise in developing Gen Z professionals, Keri was a Professional in Residence at her alma mater, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, in the College of Journalism and Mass Communications’ new Experience Lab, where she worked with students to build their leadership skills. She currently serves as an Advisory Council member for the Nebraska Women’s Leadership Network as well as on the board of The Dance Archive at the University of Denver. In 2022 she received the prestigious Woman of Courage, Character and Commitment award from UNL’s Women’s Center.

Keri’s thirty years of experience in administration has included executive leadership roles at Colorado Ballet, The Washington Ballet, Washington Performing Arts and the Trey McIntyre Project.

Francesca Olsen

Independent Consultant, Massachusetts

Francesca is a writer and consultant with 15+ years of experience in marketing and communications, from branding to digital strategy. It’s her job to find the golden threads in people’s stories: the values, experiences and touchpoints that fuel their work and connect it to others. She works with artists, creative professionals, nonprofits, and businesses on branding, narrative, and digital strategy. She gives regular workshops on digital marketing and social media. In addition to her professional work, she is a textile artist who focuses on storytelling, heritage, ritual, magic, and the power and significance held in objects and stories.

Ryan Stubbs

Chief Program and Strategy Officer, National Assembly of State Arts Agencies, Washington, D.C.

As chief program and strategy officer, Ryan Stubbs oversees NASAA’s programs and services to the field, including research and community learning activities. He ensures strategic alignment among NASAA’s mission, planning and program priorities to serve and strengthen state arts agencies. With deep knowledge and experience in the field, Ryan serves as a key leader and communicator to advance state arts agencies and NASAA.

Ryan served for 13 years as NASAA’s director of research and senior director of research. In these roles, he significantly contributed to NASAA’s organizational effectiveness and mission by spearheading research articulating the value of state creative economies and the impact of the arts across sectors, and visualizing the reach of state arts agency programs and activities. Ryan stewarded revisions to state arts agency data taxonomies and contributed to national technical working groups in areas such as arts impact data, arts education data, arts service organizations and more. He contributed to and led large-scale projects in collaboration with the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Governors Association, ArtPlace America, the National League of Cities, the Community Opportunity Alliance, Grantmakers in the Arts and others.

In addition to his experience at NASAA, Ryan’s prior work in state government, local government, politics and the arts have made him uniquely qualified to understand the complex policy and political environments of state arts agencies.

Prior to joining NASAA, he served as research director for Creative West, where he developed data and technology frameworks for a national creative economy index. Before that, Ryan worked for the Colorado Department of Higher Education as a capital analyst, authoring legislative submittals for statewide higher education capital construction needs. Ryan has experience in local economic development, working as a business development manager in Adams County, Colorado, where he implemented state tax incentives along with business attraction and retention programs. He served as deputy director for a state senate campaign fund targeting high-priority races in Colorado. Ryan holds two master’s degrees, in public administration and urban and regional planning, with an emphasis in economic development planning, from the University of Colorado, Denver.