Staff

Kim Gutfreund joined Dance Kaleidoscope as Executive Director in June 2021.  Kim has more than twenty-five years of nonprofit leadership experience, serving as executive director of Jackson School of the Arts in Michigan and as the founding executive director of Peter Sparling Dance Co. in Ann Arbor.  As executive director of the school of the arts for 16 years, Kim was a driving force behind the tremendous growth of the organization and the community’s arts and cultural sector.  She positioned the organization as a leading provider of accessible arts education and developed a public-private partnership with the City of Jackson to relocate the organization downtown to support organizational growth and the city’s economic developments. At the school of the arts, she planned and managed the capital campaign to transform the historic Masonic Temple into a center for the arts, and when she arrived at Dance Kaleidoscope, with the Board and David Hochoy, completed the $2 million capital campaign to create an artistic home for the company.  

Ms. Gutfreund has been active in volunteer activities and has served on numerous boards. Most recently she served as Chair of the Jackson Public Arts Commission and on the board of the Arts and Cultural Alliance, Business and Professional Women, the Jackson Symphony Guild and was a frequent panelist for the Michigan Arts and Culture Council. She also served 6 years on the Board of Directors of Classic Turning, Inc., a manufacturing company that specializes in machining precision components for the aerospace, medical, defense, precision industrial and high performance automotive industries where she led marketing and customer service initiatives.

After graduating from Valdosta State University with a BA in English, she worked in advertising and public relations in New York City and then at the American Express Foundation in the international philanthropic department.