Staff
Contact Info
Susan Tate
Executive Director
susantate@lawrenceartscenter.org
Margaret Weisbrod Morris
Director of Programs and Partnerships
margaret@lawrenceartscenter.org
Ben Ahlvers
Exhibition Program Director
ben@lawrenceartscenter.org
Ric Averill
Artistic Director of Performing Arts
ricaverill@lawrenceartscenter.org
Candi Baker
Dance Program Director
candi@lawrenceartscenter.org
Jessica Conner
Education Coordinator
jessicaconner@lawrenceartscenter.org
Heather Hoy
Development Director
heather@lawrenceartscenter.org
Amy Albright
Marketing Coordinator/Graphic Design
amy@lawrenceartscenter.org
Laurie McLane-Higginson
Curator of Education
laurie@lawrenceartscenter.org
Pat Russell
Office Manager
patrussell@lawrenceartscenter.org
Linda Reimond
Arts Based Preschool Director
preschool@lawrenceartscenter.org
Rick Yarnell
Business Director
business@lawrenceartscenter.org
Steve Richardson
Maintenance Manager
stever@lawrenceartscenter.org
Executive Director Susan Tate
Executive Director Susan Tate joined the Lawrence Arts Center staff December 1, 2009. She has been active in various capacities with the Lawrence Arts Center since 2000, including serving on the Arts Center Capital Campaign Committee. Tate has been a Humanities and English teacher at Lawrence High School since 1989, while continuing her involvement with arts organizations in Lawrence. She chaired the Van Go Mobile Arts Capital Campaign and served as President of the Spencer Museum Friends Board. Tate has a Masters degree in English and a Bachelors Degree in Secondary Education from the University of Kansas.
Director of Programs and Partnerships
Margaret Weisbrod Morris
Margaret Weisbrod Morris came to the Lawrence Arts Center from the Kansas Arts Commission where she was the program manager for Arts in Education. She managed the funding, partnerships, and program initiatives related to arts education for the state arts agency, and served as the program administrator and event producer for the Kansas Governor's Arts Awards and the Kansas chapter of the Poetry Out Loud National Recitation Competition. Prior to taking her position at the state arts agency, she served as education director here at the Lawrence Arts Center.
Before moving to Kansas, she created studio art and art therapy programs for non-profit organizations in Brooklyn and Manhattan, and provided training on the use of art with people affected by violent crime. Earlier in her career, Morris worked as a prop artist for children's television.
Ms. Weisbrod Morris is active in the arts education and non-profit community, presenting in national forums such as the Arts Education Partnership's National Forum and the National Association for State Arts Agencies National Assembly. She has served as a panelist for the US Department of Education, National Endowment for the Arts, Mid America Arts Alliance and the Oklahoma Arts Council. Morris holds a BFA in painting and printmaking from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and studied with Edith Kramer, the founder of the field of art therapy, to get her MA degree from New York University.
Curator of Education
Laurie McLane-Higginson
Laurie McLane-Higginson is the Curator of Education for the Lawrence Arts Center. Previously, she taught for 27 years in the public schools. The last 12 years were at Lawrence Free State High, teaching drawing, digital media, ceramics, and metals.
The Kansas Art Educators Association has named her the Kansas Art Educator of the Year at three levels: elementary, middle school, and secondary. Laurie currently is a member of the association's board of directors.
Laurie has an MA in Curriculum Design: Integrating the Arts in the Classroom from Lesley University in Cambridge, Mass. She has two bachelor's degrees from the University of Kansas, one in Textile Design and one in Art Education. Laurie enjoys furthering her study of art whenever she gets the chance, attending classes at art schools such as Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts, Mendocino Arts Center and Savannah College of Art and Design.
She has worked with the Seem-to-Be Players, Apple Valley Farm Theatre, and Lawrence Community Theatre as an actress. She has studied ballet and jazz dance and now is a student of yoga and Pilates. Her passion for the arts has been a welcome addition to the Lawrence Arts Center.
Development Director
Heather Hoy
Heather Hoy, Development Director, came to the Lawrence Arts Center in November of 2010. Before coming to the LAC, she was the Program Director of the Homelessness Prevention and Rapid Re-Housing Program (part of the 2008 American Reinvestment and Recovery Act stimulus program) at the Lawrence-Douglas County Housing Authority. From 2004 -2008, Heather was the Development Director for Van Go Mobile Arts, a social service agency serving at-risk youth through job training in the applied arts. While there, she worked to successfully raise $1.5 million for the Van Go Capital Campaign. Heather previously worked at the University of Kansas as a Program Manager for Continuing Education academic conferences and for the Kansas Legislature. Heather attended the University of Kansas where she received her masters'in public administration. Heather and her husband Matt have lived in Lawrence since 1990. They have two sons, Jackson, 11 and Keaton, 9.
Program Directors
Theater, Film. and New Media
Ric Averill
Ric Averill is Drama Program Director and Artistic Director of the Seem-to-Be Players, professional children's theatre company. Averill has been the artistic director, composer and principal playwright since the company was founded 31 years ago. He directs the Center's drama program including Summer Youth Theatre program, Lil'Bees, Soon-to-Be Players, First Saturday Players and City Youth Theatre. For 30 years the Summer Youth Theatre has been an extensive theatre program providing high quality educational and performance opportunities for young people during the summer. The Seem-to-be Players touring company have performed in 50 Kansas communities, 35 states, performing for and education more than 200,000 students each year. The company is on the Kansas Arts Commission and Mid-American Arts Alliance Touring Programs. They have received the Kansas Governor's Arts Award.
Averill has received numerous playwriting fellowships and has been selected for five professional play development symposiums including the Kennedy Center's New Visions/New Voices and the Indianapolis Bonderman Youth Theatre Playwriting Symposium. He has had plays published by Dramatic Publishing, including The Seven Voyages of Sinbad the Sailor, Sacagawea, The Princess and the Pea, Kings and Magical Things, Alex and the Shrink World and T-Money and Wolf (with Kevin Willmont). Among his commission are the Kennedy Center's Alice and Wonderland, First Stage Milwaukee's Little Drummer Boy, and the Coterie Theatre's Frankenstein. His children's opera based on the story of The Emperor's New Clothes was commissioned by the Kennedy Center, premiered in 2001 and toured nationally in 2003-20004. Ric graduated with a BFA in Music Composition and an MA in Children's Theatre from the University of Kansas, studying with Dr. Jed Davis.
Dance
Candi Baker
Candi Baker is Dance Program Director and Artistic Director of the Prairie Wind Dancers, a professional, educational dance company. Ms. Baker started the Center's dance program in 1984 with the introduction of Creative Movement classes for ages 4-8 and Child/Parent Movement and Music classes for infants and parents. With the popular Peanut, Popcorn, Pretzel and Pistachio Companies, performance dance classes, she produces 2-3 children's storydances per year. In 1992, the Center assumed the dance studio from the local dance studio, which had closed. The program has grown from 12 to 60 classes per week, from 120 to 800 students enrollments per semester and from 2 to 24 professional teachers.
The Prairie Wind Dancers continue their residency at First Step House in Lawrence, working with the residents and their children. This includes regular workshops, mini-concerts, and the development of the dance, Stories of Addiction, based on the lives of the residents. The Company works with students at four elementary schools After School Programs. They are on the artists rosters of the Kansas Arts Commission, Missouri Arts Council, Arts Midwest and Kansas City Young Audiences. Candi was recognized during National Education Week with the "Community Friend" Award from the Alternative High School and USD # 497. She received the Lawrence Arts Commission's Phoenix Award for Performing Arts in 1998.
Ms. Baker has an MA in dance from Mills College. She founded a high school dance program and her own school of dance in California, before moving to Kansas. She was a founder and first president of the Kansas Dance Network. She has served on numerous panel and boards dealing with artists and dancers in education. Candi was one of 4 authors of the Dance Curriculum Guide for the Kansas State Board of Education. She has also written a publication "Move Freeze" about her approach to movement and music for the young child.
Arts Based-preschool
Linda Reimond
Linda Reimond is the Director of the Arts-Based Preschool Program, which was started in 1985. Linda was the original director and lead teacher. The program has grown from 20 students and two teacher/artists to 140 children and 9 teacher/artists, as well as visiting artists. The Center believes that art education for all individuals is imperative to the future of the arts and what better way to work for this vision than a preschool program teaching the arts--dance, drama, music, literature, storytelling, drawing, sculpture and architecture.
This special teacher, who truly enjoys her students, has a degree in elementary education and taught kindergarten for 4 years and preschool for 12 years. In 1994, she completed her master's degree in early childhood education. Linda has presented workshops at local, state, regional and national Early Childhood Conferences. She was an instructor for the training grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and has been an adjunct instructor in the Early Childhood Education at Washburn University. Linda is Past President of the Douglas County Association for the Young Child and currently serving on the board. In 2004, Mayor David Dunfield made a surprise to the preschool and awarded Linda the Excellence in Education Award from the City of Lawrence.
Exhibitions
Ben Ahlvers
Ben Ahlvers began his role as Gallery Director at the Lawrence Arts Center in the fall of 2009. Prior to that Ben served as Associate Education Director at the center. Ben has curated exhibitions and coordinated symposiums that have been featured in international publications. He also is an active artist in his own right, exhibiting regularly around the country. Ben received his MFA from Ohio University, in 2004, preceded by a BFA from Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.