Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts™
State College, Pennsylvania

July 10-13, 2008 ~ Children's Day is July 9, 2008

2008 FESTIVAL STAFF AND BOARD

Click to view STAFF and our BOARD!

STAFF

• Rick Bryant, Executive Director
• Carol Baney, Operations Manager
• Diane Bloom, Director of Development
• Annie and John Nelson, Brown & Associates, Inc., Bookkeeping Services
• Doris Mack, Performing Arts Consultant

About Our Staff

Rick Bryant, Executive Director

Rick Bryant joined the paid staff of the Festival as its Director of Visual Arts in 1999, though his involvement with the CPFA which stretches back to 1984 when he first volunteered on the Trash Crew. Rick was named Executive Director in 2005.

Born in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania before the county hospital moved to State College, Rick attended public schools in State College, and afterward the University of Virginia, where he took a bachelor’s degree from the School of Architecture in 1979.

After college he entered the family insurance business and pursued professional education, earning a Chartered Property and Casualty Underwriter designation in 1986. He retired from the insurance business in 1998 to pursue other interests.

In addition to serving as a long time Festival volunteer, he served as a founding board member, and later as president of The AIDS Project, an independent AIDS service organization providing client services and education regarding HIV/AIDS in Centre and Clinton Counties. He was the treasurer of the Centre CARES steering committee, which hosted two visits of portions of the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt (the largest community art project in the world), to State College/Penn State. He served as President of the Art Alliance of Central Pennsylvania, an independent art school founded in 1968. He is a member of the Society of Architectural Historians and the Society for Commercial Archaeology.

Rick serves on the State College Board of Health and on the Community Advisory Board for Penn State’s Center for the Performing Arts and is Chairman of the State College Historic Resources Commission. He is also a member of the Board of Deacons of the State College Presbyterian Church.

Return to top

Carol Baney, Operations Manager

Carol Baney has been with the Festival for 13 years. She is a native of Bellefonte, Pennsylvania and attended public schools there, and afterwards attended the Hagerstown Business College, Hagerstown, Maryland, where she received an Associate in Arts degree.

Following college, Carol worked at the Washington Hospital Center for twelve years as a medical assistant for the chairman of the Department of Orthopaedics, and also in the Office of Public Affairs and Marketing. Carol notes that the stress levels of the Festival do not compare to those of a large urban hospital.

Carol is responsible for the considerable and valuable presence of her family at the Festival and First Night® State College. Her parents, Dick and Shirley Baney, her brother Allen, her sister-in-law Katie, and her roommate Cindy Schultz, answer the call for volunteers whenever it goes out. They tackle every task asked of them, from selling Festival buttons, to leading children’s craft workshops, to operating one of the Festival’s rented forklifts.

Carol enjoys fishing, quilting, the company of her nephews Ross and Ian, and playing with her dog, Cheyenne, and her cat, Lily.

Return to top

Diane Bloom, Director of Development

Diane Bloom joined the Festival staff in January 2007. She worked for Penn State for 35 years, the last 31 at the Center for the Performing Arts where she was responsible for fundraising and special events. Obviously, her retirement was short lived!

Diane's approach to sponsorship is simple - create and nurture a partnership that is mutually beneficial. Through these relationships, the Festival can continue to grow and thrive while the sponsors receive significant exposure and recognition.

Diane has served as a volunteer with the American Cancer Society and the American Heart Association as well as with the Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts. On occasion, you will find her serving as classroom "grandparent" in the schools attended by the little ones. She takes great pleasure in nurturing her many gardens, which serve as a source of mental therapy. She and her husband, Barry, also "retired", enjoy traveling - both on their Harley as well as to places such as Alaska and the Caribbean. Part-time work has afforded more time with family and friends. They have two children, Krista and Jason, as well as three granddaughters, Paige, Katelyn and Julie. Destin, FL, serves as the extended Bloom family's annual family retreat.

Return to top

Contents © Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts
Design © Homestead Graphics and Design :: Hosted by Centre of the Web