KETTERING - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Historian
- Senior Program Officer
Alex Lovit is a Senior Program Officer and Historian at the Kettering Foundation. He is the host and executive producer of the Kettering Foundation podcast The Context. On this show, he interviews scholars, politicians, journalists and public servants, to shed light on democracy's history, current condition, and future prospects. Episodes will cover topics like inclusive democracy, citizen engagement, government accountability, and the threat of authoritarianism. As a historian, Lovit also assists in the foundation's analysis of threats to democracy, attending to relevant academic research on these topics, including providing historical context.
Lovit received his BA from Amherst College and earned a PhD in history from the University of Michigan, with a focus on 19 th century political history.
Job Titles:
- Executive Assistant
- Executive Assistant to the Executive Vice President & Chief Operating Officer
Amanda Grant is the executive assistant to the executive vice president & COO at the Kettering Foundation.
Before coming to Kettering, Grant spent two years in Minneapolis as a business analyst/project manager. Before that, she was a human resources professional for ten years.
Grant holds a BS and MS in business management from Indiana Wesleyan University and an AS in software support from Clark State Community College. She and her husband, Adrian, enjoy spending their free time with their three daughters.
Job Titles:
- CEO
- Executive Assistant to the President
Angel George Cross is an executive assistant to the president of the Kettering Foundation. She oversees the president's travel and appointment calendar. She designs brochures, charts, and other graphic material used in presentations by the president, provides technical assistance, and designs and maintains databases.
Prior to coming to the foundation in 1995, Cross was an account representative with Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, with licenses to sell mutual funds, annuities, and life, health, and disability insurance.
Cross graduated magna cum laude in 1994 from Wright State University with a BS in business, majoring in financial services.
She lives in Centerville, OH, with her husband, Rick, and their twin sons, Braden and Justin.
Job Titles:
- Executive Assistant and Paralegal for the Offices of General Counsel and Finance
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board of Directors
Job Titles:
- Program Officer
- Chief External Affairs Officer and Director of D.C
- Chief External Affairs Officer and Director, DC Operations
Brad Rourke is the Kettering Foundation's chief external affairs officer and director of D.C. operations. He leads the foundation's Washington, DC, office and also heads efforts to increase the foundation's impact and reputation across key audiences, developing strategic partnerships and conferences, and promoting awareness and understanding of the foundation's mission.
For more than a decade at the foundation, Rourke served as executive editor of issue guides, creating more than 40 such publications enabling groups of people to come together to discuss fraught public issues across lines of difference and in the face of deep disagreements about what should be done.
He has written and cowritten a number of Kettering reports and articles, including Developing Materials for Deliberative Forums. His essays and op-ed pieces have appeared in publications such as the Washington Post and The Christian Science Monitor. He contributed a chapter on the ethics of citizenship to the book Shades of Gray (Brookings Institution, 2002).
Rourke has been a Kettering program officer since 2013 and was a foundation associate from 2005 to 2013. Prior to joining the foundation, he was president of a public issues firm serving the philanthropic and nonprofit sectors, founder and publisher of the local online news source Rockville Central, director of external initiatives at The Harwood Institute for Public Innovation, and vice president for public policy at the Institute for Global Ethics. He served on the staffs of California's Controller Gray Davis and US Representative Jane Harman of California during their terms in office.
Rourke serves on the boards of Philanthropy for Active Civic Engagement and the National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation. He holds a BA in comparative literature from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MPA from American University in Washington, DC.
Job Titles:
- Executive Assistant
- Office Manager
- Executive Assistant and Office Manager at the Kettering Foundation 's Washington
Caroline Perrotti is an executive assistant and office manager at the Kettering Foundation's Washington, DC, office. Prior to joining the foundation, Perrotti spent 20 years in multifamily mortgage finance and then went on to work for a nonprofit organization for 11 years, managing the office, planning meetings, and providing administrative support.
Perrotti holds a BA in religion from Manhattanville College in Purchase, New York. She enjoys walking around Capitol Hill and visiting museums on the National Mall.
Job Titles:
- Archivist
- Library Manager
- Manager
- Certified Archivist
Collette McDonough is the archivist and library manager at the Kettering Foundation. Her main responsibilities include processing the foundation's collections: conducting essential low-level conservation, preparing collection guides, and adding and updating records in the foundation's archival database. She provides reference and research support by assisting other employees. She also handles interlibrary loan and manages the library journal subscriptions.
McDonough is a certified archivist and an active member of the Society of American Archivists and the Society of Ohio Archivists. She holds an MA in history with an emphasis in public history and a BA in history with an emphasis in Eastern European history from Wright State University.
Job Titles:
- Senior Program Officer for Defending Inclusive Democracy
Damien Conners is senior program officer for defending inclusive democracy at the Kettering Foundation.
Conners is a former executive director and chief operating officer of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. He brings a deep background in community development and racial and social equity to his role at Kettering.
Conners also served as vice president of promise and impact with the Harwood Institute for Public Innovation, where he led partnerships with the Hawaii Department of Education, Kamehameha Schools, American Library Association, California State Library, the Greater Clark Foundation, and United Way. He also served as vice president of operations and corporate development for Bizzell Group LLC, a management consulting firm that works to build healthy and sustainable communities both domestically and around the world through partnerships with a host of US government agencies and other organizations. Among other positions, Conners is also the former executive director of Excel Bridgeport, an educational equity organization in Connecticut.
Conners holds several degrees, including a BA in political science, music, and Africana studies from Ramapo College of New Jersey; a MDiv with a concentration in women's studies and the Black church from Princeton Theological Seminary; and a ThM with a focus on race, religion, and politics from Emory University. He holds numerous awards and recognitions for his work as a leader on issues related to civil rights, social equity, and nonviolence.
Job Titles:
- Coordinator
- Senior Fellows
- Senior Fellows Coordinator
Darla Minnich is the senior fellows coordinator. The Kettering Foundation created a senior fellows program that includes a distinguished group of experts and thought leaders who represent the nation's leading democracy thinkers and practitioners. In her role as senior fellows coordinator, Minnich supports and serves as a resource for the senior fellows. She also makes sure there is visibility, internally and externally, of the work they are doing in alignment with the foundation's vision and mission to advance and defend inclusive democracy.
Minnich has worked at the foundation in prior positions where she contributed to its research by promoting and strengthening deliberative democratic practices. Prior to joining the foundation, Minnich served as director of annual conference and program manager for Grantmakers In Aging, a nonprofit membership organization. She worked closely with philanthropic leaders across the country for more than 15 years to create and execute programs to help improve the lives of older adults. Minnich served as an assistant long term for the Dayton, Ohio, law firm Altick & Corwin in the areas of probate and municipal law.
Derek W. M. Barker is a program officer at the Kettering Foundation. With a background in political theory, he works primarily on research concerning the democratic role of higher education institutions; philanthropy and nonprofit organizations; journalism; and the professions. Barker is the coeditor (with Alex Lovit) of Kettering's Higher Education Exchange and also works closely with the foundation's team of resident researchers.
Additional contributions to Kettering research include "The Colonization of Civil Society" in the Kettering Review (2010) and the coauthored working paper Research on Civic Capacity (2011). Barker has also edited several Kettering publications, including Democratizing Deliberation: A Political Theory Anthology (with Noëlle McAfee and David McIvor, 2012), A Different Kind of Politics: Readings on the Role of Higher Education in Democracy (with David W. Brown, 2009), and Connections (with Melinda Gilmore, 2012).
Barker's academic publications include the book, Tragedy and Citizenship: Conflict, Reconciliation, and Democracy from Haemon to Hegel (SUNY Press, 2009). He has also published articles on the intersection between deliberative democratic theory and virtue ethics; oligarchy and modern representative government; Wilson C. McWilliams and the state of contemporary populism; and conceptual frameworks for "engaged" forms of scholarship.
Barker's previous experience includes an appointment as visiting assistant professor of political studies at Pitzer College. He holds a PhD in political science from Rutgers University.
Job Titles:
- Senior Accounting Manager & Program Liaison
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board of Directors
Job Titles:
- Senior Program Officer for Democracy and Community
Elizabeth Gish is senior program officer for democracy and community at the Kettering Foundation. She brings years of experience in community and faith-based work as well as in research and higher education to her role at the foundation. Gish's research focuses on the intersection between religion and democracy, as well as how citizens and communities can work together to have more say over their lives and futures.
Along with articles in publications such as Journal of Theology and Sexuality and Good Society: A Journal of Civic Studies, Gish is the coauthor of On the Significance of Religion for Deliberative Democracy (Routledge 2023).
Before coming to Kettering, Gish was a department head and associate professor in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at Western Kentucky University. She did her undergraduate work at Miami University of Ohio and master's and doctoral work at Harvard University.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board of Directors
Job Titles:
- Program Officer
- Program Officer for Democracy Around the Globe
Ileana Marin is a program officer for democracy around the globe. She has been affiliated in one capacity or another with Kettering since 1997, after having previously participated in international workshops and conferences held by Kettering between 1994 and 1996. Over the years, her responsibilities have included coordinating the international fellows program and multinational research exchanges and contributing to the foundation's work conducted both nationally and internationally on matters related to civil society, democracy, forms of dialogue and deliberation, community-building, and civic engagement. She has also worked on the development of new lines of research on environmental studies and notions of leadership. Marin has been the ongoing liaison and contributor to research exchanges with the Antonio Núñez Jiménez Foundation for Nature and Humanity in Cuba and the Arab Network for the Study of Democracy.
In 2003, Marin was program manager and director for a Romania-based program, Romanian-American Sustainable Partnerships, developed by US World Learning for International Development. In 2004 and 2005, she served as program officer for another World Learning for International Development program, ChildNet, which was a child welfare reform project in Romania.
Marin holds an MA in Romanian and Hungarian linguistics and literatures, University of Bucharest, Romania, and Janus Pannonius University, Pécs, Hungary, and an MA in ethnic and minority studies, ELTE Institute of Sociology, Budapest, Hungary. She also earned an MA in human and organizational systems from Fielding Graduate University, Santa Barbara, CA, where she is an ABD in human and organizational development. She has published articles and books in Romanian, English, and Spanish.
Isabel Pergande is a research assistant at the Kettering Foundation. She recently graduated from the Mahurin Honors College at Western Kentucky University with degrees in both political science and history. Pergande developed her research skills throughout her undergraduate experience, collaborating and coauthoring five pieces for publication.
Her honors thesis combined public opinion research, jurisprudential analysis, and quantitative methodology to examine the relationship between law enforcement and the Fourth Amendment, specifically concerning no-knock warrants.
Pergande's research interests include how cultures of impunity affect public confidence in democracy and the role of education in promoting civic responsibility among incarcerated peoples.
Job Titles:
- Creative Strategy Manager
Jamaal Bell is the creative strategy manager for the Kettering Foundation. Bell plays a key role in developing and managing creative communication strategies to further elevate and make visible the work of the Kettering Foundation.
Bell has managed many creative projects. Throughout his career, his focus has been on helping leaders, communities, and organizations use brand storytelling to further their initiatives. In 2021, as a senior brand strategist at Slide Nine Agency, he was a major contributor to the research, development, and creative strategy of Saint-Gobain North America's national sustainable communities initiative, Sustaining Futures Raising Communities. In 2019, as creative strategies manager for Central Ohio Transit Authority (COTA), he played a vital role in the branding, advertising, and launching of COTA's first ride-sharing service, COTA//Plus. As communications director at the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity, he directed the award-winning documentary Free to Ride and a film presentation of "A Reading of the Letter from Birmingham Jail."
Bell's professional work aligns with his community service. He has served in board roles at Mental Health America of Ohio and Catholic Social Services. Further, he has served on many community organization committees for United Way of Central Ohio and The Women's Fund of Central Ohio.
Bell is a veteran of the United States Navy. He holds a BS in public relations from Ball State University, an MA in communications management from the University of Southern California, and an accreditation in public relations (APR).
Job Titles:
- Chief Financial Officer
- Treasurer
James (Jim) Martin is the Treasurer & Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at the Kettering Foundation. Martin brings a wealth of experience working as a CFO in the nonprofit sector and a deep understanding of the Kettering Foundation, its staff, and its new strategic plan. In this leadership role, Martin will work closely with the finance team, staff, senior leadership, and the board of directors in carrying out our mission to advance inclusive democracy.
Martin has government, nonprofit, and for-profit Chief Financial Officer experience. He has previously served as the CFO for the Columbus Metropolitan Housing Authority, Ohio Education Association, and Ohio Police and Fire Pension Fund.
Martin earned an MBA at the Ohio State University. He is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), Certified Management Accountant (CMA), and a Certified Public Finance Officer (CPFO).
Job Titles:
- Chief Operating Officer
- Executive Vice President
John Dedrick is executive vice president and chief operating officer at the Kettering Foundation. He has a longstanding research interest in the theory and practice of democracy and has worked closely with higher education professionals and community-based forum moderators on numerous scholarly and community-based research studies.
Dedrick has written on deliberative politics in The Deliberative Democracy Handbook (Gastil and Levine, eds., Jossey-Bass, 2005), The Journal of General Education, and Deliberation and the Work of Higher Education: Innovations for the Classroom, the Campus, and the Community (Dedrick et al., eds., Kettering Foundation Press, 2008).
Dedrick is the former board president of Philanthropy for Active Civic Engagement, and he serves on the public policy committee of Philanthropy Ohio. He has previously served as a faculty fellow at Fielding Graduate University, where he led seminars on topics including deliberation, dialogue, and civic engagement.
Dedrick received a BA and MA from the College of William and Mary and an MA and PhD in political science from Rutgers University.
Job Titles:
- Senior Program Officer
- Senior Program Officer for Democracy and the Arts
Joni Doherty is senior program officer for democracy and the arts. Doherty develops, manages, and evaluates programs involving the intersection of democracy and the arts with the aim of supporting the mission, vision, and values of the foundation. Because human experiences involve all the senses, the arts engage with aspects of being human overlooked by analytically based methodologies. This multisensory approach to research can offer fresh insights into democracy's challenges and the struggle to realize its ideals.
Doherty's past experiences as a studio artist, teaching in the American studies program at Franklin Pierce University, and conducting research at the intersections of aesthetics and ethics have offered her opportunities to work collaboratively with artists, curators, communities, organizations, and institutions. Since coming to the Kettering Foundation in 2015, she has led research projects that explored the ways in which higher education institutions, humanities councils, libraries, and museums have contributed to strengthening democracy. For example, the multi-year Historic Decisions project involved writing and editing guides for deliberation about historical issues, working with museums across the country as they developed their own historic decisions issue guides and associated programs, leading workshops, and organizing conference presentations.
Doherty's reviews and essays have been published in Art New England, Deliberative Pedagogy, Deliberation and the Work of Higher Education, First-Year Civic Engagement, Connections, and the Higher Education Exchange.
Doherty earned a BFA in painting at the University of New Hampshire in Durham, an MA in cultural studies at Simmons College, Boston, and a PhD in philosophy and art theory from the Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts in Portland, Maine.
Job Titles:
- Logistics Coordinator
- Meeting and Logistics Coordinator
Kate Schneider is the meeting and logistics coordinator for the Kettering Foundation. Schneider's primary responsibilities include coordinating the foundation's research meetings both virtually and in-person, as well as working with hotels, ground transportation, airlines, and other vendor partners.
Prior to joining the Kettering Foundation, Schneider had 20 years of experience in event planning and logistics for both domestic and international events. Her experience also includes working on process improvement and project management. She has served on several local boards, including Vandalia Youth Theater, JADE, and Miami Valley Down Syndrome Association. She is currently the fundraising and grants chair for Dayton Dance Conservatory Company.
Schneider holds a BA in communication studies from Wright State University and has Green and Yellow Belt Six Sigma certifications.
Schneider is an avid sports fan, particularly of the Ohio State Buckeyes and the Cleveland Browns. She lives in Vandalia, Ohio, with her husband, Bo, and their two children, Madi and Brady.
Job Titles:
- Director, Kettering Democracy Prize
- Is Director of the Kettering Democracy Prize
Laura Carlson is director of the Kettering Democracy Prize, a new award sponsored by the Charles F. Kettering Foundation. Previously, she was an editor for the foundation's publications and website.
Prior to joining the foundation, Carlson worked for the American Library Association, West Publishing, and Springer-Verlag New York. She was the director of the Antioch Writers' Workshop from 2004 to 2009 and project coordinator for the Yellow Springs Center for the Arts from 2009 to 2011. She is the co-editor of two books: Literary Laurels: A Reader's Guide to Award-Winning Fiction and Literary Laurels: A Reader's Guide to Award-Winning Children's Books.
Carlson holds a BA in English from Carleton College and studied publishing and publication design at the Denver Publishing Institute and the New School in New York City.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board of Directors
Job Titles:
- Content Development Specialist, Democracy Around the Globe
Job Titles:
- Executive Assistant
- Executive Assistant to the Vice President for People and Culture
Manal Moreb is the executive assistant to the vice president for people and culture. In this role, she supports foundation initiatives by coordinating day-to-day activities for the office of people and culture and serving as a member of the executive support team.
Prior to joining the foundation, Moreb worked for Kettering Sports Medicine as a rehabilitative medical office assistant. She has also worked as a community interpreter in court, medical facilities, and schools.
Moreb earned an associate of applied science in business information systems and a medical office specialist certificate from Sinclair Community College. She speaks and writes both Arabic and English and fluently and holds a TCI (The Community Interpreter) certificate.
Moreb was born and raised in Palestine and moved to the United States in 2006 after marrying her husband, Rami. Moreb and her husband have grown to have a beautiful life and are parents to four children.
Job Titles:
- Facilities Maintenance Technician
Job Titles:
- General Counsel
- Vice President
- Director of International Programs, Vice President, and General Counsel
Maxine Thomas is vice president and general counsel for the Kettering Foundation, and secretary for the foundation's board of directors. In 2022, she was named director of international programs and is poised to lead an expansion of the foundation's international work in this moment of rising authoritarianism around the globe.
Thomas also directs Kettering projects in higher education, community leadership, and the relationship between citizens and officeholders. She is a coeditor of Deliberative Pedagogy: Teaching and Learning for Democratic Engagement, published by Michigan State University Press. She also serves on the group that oversees the operations of the foundation and has been a member of the Kettering Foundation task force on China since 1993. She captured insights from the foundation's decades of work with the Institute of American Studies in the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in China-United States Sustained Dialogue: 1986-2001 and in her article, "Kettering and China: Thirty Years and Counting," in the foundation's flagship periodical Connections.
Before coming to the Kettering Foundation, Thomas was associate dean of the University of Georgia School of Law, where she also served as associate and assistant professor. She was previously on the faculty of the University of Oregon School of Law and a Fulbright lecturer at Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan, from 1988-1989. She served on the Fulbright Association Board from 1991-2000 and was a Kellogg Foundation National Fellow in 1985. From 1973 to 1976, Thomas was assistant attorney general for the state of Washington.
Thomas received her BA and her JD from the University of Washington.
Job Titles:
- Director of Communications
Melinda Gilmore is director of communications for the Kettering Foundation. She directs all communications in service of the mission, vision, and values of the foundation. She works on the overall communications strategy for the foundation, overseeing print and digital publications, press relations, and digital communications.
Gilmore has worked at the foundation in a variety of capacities and with increasing levels of responsibility, including, most recently, as director of strategic initiatives. She has for many years played a key role in conceptualizing, writing, and editing foundation publications and communications. From 2012-2022, she served as executive editor of the foundation's periodical, Connections, and from 2019-2023, she was editor of the foundation's electronic newsletter, News & Notes. Gilmore is the coeditor of Democracy and Civic Life: What Is the Long Game for Philanthropy? (2020), an essay series produced in collaboration with the Knight Foundation.
In 2017, Gilmore was selected to participate in the Council on Foundations' Career Pathways program, an intensive, yearlong leadership development program for senior executives in the philanthropic sector from across the country. She is a member of the advisory board for the Ashland University Women in Leadership certificate program and has served on Philanthropy Ohio's conference planning committee since 2021.
Gilmore earned a BA in English from Wright State University and an MA in English from the University of Dayton. She also holds a Women in Leadership certificate from Ashland University.
Job Titles:
- Vice President for People and Culture
Mindy LaBreck is vice president for people and culture. In this role she provides leadership for organizational effectiveness and culture, talent development, and advancing an inclusive and equitable organizational culture that innovates for democracy. She also provides leadership for the development and administration of personnel policies and benefits, the adoption of information technologies, and the recruitment, development, and assessment of talent.
LaBreck holds a BA with a concentration in humanities, an MA in management from Antioch University, a graduate certificate in employment law from the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations. She is also a SHRM-SCP.
Job Titles:
- Senior Program Officer for Democracy Around the Globe
Paloma Dallas is senior program officer for democracy around the globe at the Kettering Foundation. In this role, she works closely with the director of international programs, shaping the foundation's international work to address the myriad democratic challenges around the globe. For more than a decade, Dallas worked as an editor and writer, reporting on Kettering research and findings. She led the foundation's efforts to begin to translate some of its research into Spanish and has helped to guide its citizen diplomacy programs, particularly its work in Cuba, where Dallas served as a Spanish-English interpreter during Kettering Foundation exchanges with civic organizations. Dallas was coeditor of The Dartmouth Conference: The First 50 Years, commemorating the longest-running sustained dialogue between representatives of the US and Russia (previously the Soviet Union).
She co-led the foundation's exploration of the role of arts and culture in strengthening the civic life of communities around the globe, and for the last few years has led the foundation's work in journalism and democracy. Dallas, a former journalist, brought together innovative journalists from around the world to explore ways in which the media can avoid increasing polarization and instead contribute to people's ability to work across differences on shared challenges. In 2023, she coedited and the foundation published a book of essays stemming from this work, Reinventing Journalism to Strengthen Democracy.
Prior to working at the foundation, Dallas was the founding director of Del Pueblo, a community-based nonprofit organization established to build bridges between Spanish- and English-speaking residents in southwestern Ohio. Dallas was part of the artist collaborative JParalelos, which used interviews, text, photography, and mixed media to spark conversations on social issues. She also worked as a freelance journalist, a reporter with Reuters in Bogotá, Colombia, and a researcher with the in Americas program area of the New York City-based Committee to Protect Journalists.
Dallas holds BAs in political science and Spanish from Macalester College, an MIA from Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, and a graduate certificate in creative nonfiction from Spalding University in Louisville, Kentucky. She is the recipient of a Roothbert Fund Fellowship, a Women in Communications Jessica Savitch Scholarship, and a Spalding Emerging Writer Scholarship. She and her husband, an artist, have collaborated together on many projects, including raising their daughter.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board of Directors
Job Titles:
- Program Officer
- Program Officer for Democracy Around the Globe
Phillip Lurie is a program officer for democracy around the globe. With a background in education policy, he works primarily on research concerning the educational capacity of communities; the relationship between citizens and governmental agents and organizations; and the ways citizens face persistent problems in their communities. In addition, he manages the daily operation of the foundation's Washington, DC, office.
Lurie's contributions to Kettering research primarily include managing learning agreements and convening research exchanges across a range of foundation program areas. He also has served as past and current chair for several foundation research workgroups, including Public-Public Education and Public-Government; and has served as editor and as a contributing writer of various editions of Kettering's flagship periodical, Connections.
Lurie holds an EdD in educational administration and policy studies from The George Washington University.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board of Directors
Job Titles:
- Strategic Project Manager
Sarah Dahm serves as strategic project manager at the Kettering Foundation. In this role, she manages and advances internal and external facing projects and programs, including risk management and DEI initiatives.
During her tenure with the foundation, Dahm has demonstrated her versatility in various capacities related to publications. She has contributed to the production process, orchestrated displays for research events, overseen inventory tracking, engaged in marketing and networking efforts, and assumed the role of editorial administrator for the Kettering Review. Throughout her career, she has cultivated proficiency in information and knowledge management, research, communication, and promotional activities.
Prior to joining the foundation, Dahm accrued over 15 years of experience in information management and research at LexisNexis, where she held diverse roles including business applications consultant, senior research specialist/team leader, and senior custom solutions manager. Her responsibilities spanned various sectors, including business-to-business consulting across industries and law firms. In these capacities, she collaborated with clients, sales teams, and product development to identify and craft tailored solutions such as custom interfaces, portals, and third-party alliances. Her skill set encompasses ad hoc research comprising of due diligence, intellectual property, public records, SEC filings, other financial reports, and risk management.
Dahm earned a Bachelor of Science in financial services from Wright State University.
Sarah Murphy is communications manager for the Kettering Foundation, playing a key role in increasing the visibility of the work of the foundation. She manages the communications work for external audiences across mediums and platforms. This includes maintaining a knowledge and understanding of the status of all communications projects.
Since joining the foundation, Murphy has worked closely with editors and graphic designers on the publication process for the foundation's materials. She is also the editor of the foundation's electronic newsletter, News & Notes.
Throughout her career, Murphy has focused on effective communication with a variety of audiences. She taught public speaking at Cedarville University and served as the district director for two different Illinois state representatives.
Murphy holds a BA in communication from Cedarville University, an MS in public communication from Drexel University, and a graduate certificate in strategic communications management from Purdue University.
Job Titles:
- Administrative Assistant
- Administrative Assistant With
Saravia Williams is an administrative assistant with the Kettering Foundation, providing support to program officers Derek Barker, Amy Lee, Ray Minor, and Brad Rourke.
Prior to coming to the foundation in 2014, Williams worked in administrative support roles as a data entry clerk with the University of South Alabama Hospital and as an administrative assistant in human resources with SCAD (Savannah College of Art and Design). She also has experience as a receptionist, customer service representative, legal secretary, paralegal intern, and child care provider.
Williams graduated from South University in 2011 with a BS in legal studies.
As a new Kettering employee, she is extremely excited about being a part of the Kettering Foundation family and providing support to a great organization that is actively working to address the challenges in making democracy work as it should.
Williams is a native of Dayton, Ohio, where she lives with her son and daughter.
Job Titles:
- CEO
- Member of the Board of Directors
- President
- President and CEO of the Charles F.
Now, under Sharon L. Davies' leadership and working against the backdrop of rapidly evolving global threats to democracy, Kettering is widening our aperture. This new focus enables the foundation to tackle the most pressing challenges to democracy today and contribute to a future where people are informed and engaged in shaping their collective future.
Sharon L. Davies is the president and CEO of the Charles F. Kettering Foundation.
Davies' career spans both academic and nonacademic fields. From 2017-2021, Davies was provost and senior vice president for academic affairs at Spelman College. She joined Spelman from The Ohio State University (OSU), where she was vice provost for diversity and inclusion and chief diversity officer. Davies was also a member of OSU's Moritz College of Law faculty for 22 years, serving as the Gregory H. Williams Chair in Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. In addition, Davies directed the university's Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race & Ethnicity, an interdisciplinary engaged research institute known nationally for its work in social justice, equity, and inclusion. She also held an appointment to the Ohio Advisory Committee to the United States Commission on Civil Rights.
Davies was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar and a Notes and Comments Editor of the Columbia Law Review while in law school at Columbia University. After graduation, she worked for Steptoe and Johnson in Washington, D.C., and Lord, Day & Lord Barrett Smith in New York City. She served for five years as an assistant United States attorney in the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Southern District of New York.
Davies was the recipient of a YWCA Woman of Achievement award from the YWCA Columbus chapter (2015); the Robert M. Duncan Award by the Columbus Chapter of the American Constitution Society (April 2014) in recognition of her contributions to democracy, fostering legal education, ensuring access to justice, and preserving individual rights and the rule of law; and the Liberty Bell Award from the Columbus Bar Association (June 2013).
Davies' writing has been published in some of the nation's leading law journals, including the Duke Law Journal, the Southern California Law Review, the Columbia Law Review, the Michigan Law Review, and Law and Contemporary Problems. In 2010, Oxford University Press published Davies's narrative nonfiction account of a 1921 murder trial in Birmingham, Alabama, titled "Rising Road: A True Tale of Love, Race, and Religion in America," for which the mayor of Birmingham presented her with a "Key to the City."
Davies serves on the advisory committee for the Campaign to Create the Julius Rosenwald & Rosenwald Schools National Historical Park, serves as a commissioner of the Council on Higher Education as a Strategic Asset, and was included among the Dayton Business Journal's Bizwomen Power50 2023. Davies has an undergraduate degree from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and a law degree from Columbia University School of Law.
Job Titles:
- Chairman of the Board of Directors
Job Titles:
- Member of the Board of Directors
Job Titles:
- Chief Strategy Officer and Senior Advisor to the President
As chief strategy officer and senior advisor to the president, Tayo Clyburn will serve as a guide and resource to staff in carrying out the foundation's new strategic plan. He will work across the senior team and program leadership to identify strategic opportunities to innovate and create change through the foundation's programs. Acting as a trusted advisor to the president, this role will provide guidance on internal priorities, challenges, culture, and decisions.
Clyburn has held leadership roles at Colby College as the dean of diversity, equity, and inclusion and St. Mary's College of Maryland as the vice president for inclusive diversity and equity. Prior to these positions, he served as the executive director for mission and strategic partnerships in the Office of Diversity and Inclusion (ODI) at The Ohio State University. Throughout Clyburn's career, his work has been cross-functional, interfacing with senior leaders, staff, and local community members to strategically integrate inclusive and equitable practices.
Clyburn earned his MA and PhD from Ohio State's Department of English, where his work focused on critical race theory, post racialism, and post-civil rights African American literature.
Thomas Fryman is the controller at the Kettering Foundation. In this role, he is responsible for internal controls, general ledger accounting, financial reporting, tax and regulatory compliance, budgeting, payroll, and business process improvement.
Prior to joining the Kettering Foundation, Fryman had more than 15 years of public and private accounting and finance experience, serving as corporate accounting manager at Winsupply Inc., controller at Edison State Community College, and audit manager at Clark Shaefer Hackett.
Fryman holds a BS in accountancy and finance from Wright State University. He is a certified public accountant and certified fraud examiner.
Job Titles:
- Senior Advisor for State and Local Government
Valerie Lemmie is senior advisor for state and local government at the Kettering Foundation. An adept strategic thinker and local government thought leader, Lemmie is a distinguished pracademic with over 40 years of experience solving public problems and controversial issues in governmental organizations; leading research on democratic practices and public engagement; and advising communities across the United States on innovative and effective strategies for advancing multiculturalism. Currently, Lemmie is coproducing, encouraging, and supporting strategies, programs, and policies that strengthen democracy, foster inclusion, and advance public accountability, transparency, and collaboration.
Lemmie joined the foundation after a distinguished career in public service. She served as city manager for the cities of Petersburg, Virginia, and Dayton and Cincinnati, Ohio; commissioner on the Public Utility Commission of Ohio; and district director and acting chief of staff for Congressman Mike Turner (Ohio's 10th District). Lemmie has also served as adjunct professor at Howard University, the University of Dayton, and Port Elizabeth Technikon (now Nelson Mandela University) in South Africa; the latter in cooperation with USAID.
Lemmie serves on numerous local, federal, and international boards and commissions, including: Initiatives of Change, USA; SIVIO Institute, Zimbabwe; National Civic League; National Conference on Citizenship; and the Dayton Foundation. She is chair of the Ohio Civil Rights Commission and the Ohio Matriots nonpartisan political action committee. She is also an advisor to the Portman Center for Policy Solutions at the University of Cincinnati. A fellow and past board chair of the National Academy of Public Administration, Lemmie is a published author and international speaker on democracy, public governance, leadership, and diversity.
Lemmie received her BA in political science and urban sociology from the University of Missouri and an MA in urban affairs and public policy planning from Washington University in St. Louis.