Staff & Board

A dancer all her life, Sarita graduated from California State University Long Beach with her BFA in Dance and her BASI Pilates certification with a dance specialization. She has performed professionally with ConDanza Repertory Dance Company and PUSH Dance among others in the San Francisco Bay Area. Now based in Portland, she is finishing her MPA with an emphasis on Nonprofit Management and is thrilled to be joining the Dance Wire team.

Native to the Northwest, Megan started dancing at the age of 9 when her grandma enrolled her in a summer dance program at the local performing arts studio. From tapping her toes on the car dashboard to pas de bourrees through the grocery store, dance quickly became her passion. As a teen she competed with her local performing arts company around the United States and carried that training and experience with her to college. While pursuing a bachelors degree in Interpersonal Communications at the University of Portland, Megan was a dancer for the NBA Portland Trail Blazers Jam Squad along with teaching classes for local studios, high schools and colleges in the community. After graduating college, Megan moved to Chicago to pursue a career in marketing communications and knew that she needed to continue having dance apart of her life.  She received the opportunity to push herself creatively and found a dynamic blend of how dance + fitness fuse together. Megan led classes for Women’s Health Magazine and SELF Magazine in both Chicago and Miami and is the lead instructor for a fitness DVD, part of the Dance Off The Inches series. She also developed a Cardio Dance Fusion training program for Coach Club, an at-home interactive workout series in Paris, France.

Currently Megan works as the Marketing Communications Manager at Oregon Reproductive Medicine and is the Director and a choreographer of Mixd Dance Company, an all-lady dance team working together to share their love of dance with Portland Community and beyond.

Brian has always had a love of singing and dancing.  Going all the way back to the time he was captured performing a rendition of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” on 8mm film with his younger brother, he has been in love with performing and the musical arts.  With his performance days behind him, he currently enjoys providing tax consulting and compliance with McDonald Jacobs, a downtown Portland CPA firm and a company that has strong ties to the local arts scene.

Being a transplant to Portland, Brian is seeking more ways to become involved in the arts community and enjoy everything that the city has to offer.  Brian believes that the public needs access and education when it comes to the local arts scene and believes Dance Wire is a great tool for achieving this.

While his dreams of becoming a backup dancer might be in the past, he still enjoys witnessing others live and experience their passions through song and dance.

Kathleen Adam is the West Region Marketing Manager for U.S. Bank Private Wealth Management. She develops integrated marketing solutions to help deliver outstanding client and advisor experiences that enable growth and meet top-level goals. She equips client facing team members with appropriate marketing tools and resources, executes marketing communications in alignment with brand, and champions the client experience. Working in marketing has been a change from past nonprofit work, but also an exciting challenge.

Prior to joining U.S. Bank Private Wealth Management, Kathleen worked at the historic NTC Foundation event venue, curated exhibits and managed programs at the Women’s Museum of San Diego, worked in the archives and with board members at the Japanese American Historical Society of San Diego, and developed children’s programs with SMARTS Farm. A bachelor’s degree in history from California State, Los Angeles and master’s in museum studies from the Lorenzo de' Medici Institute laid the groundwork for her interest in nonprofits.

RACC’s Art of Leadership program led to Kathleen meeting Emily Running and Brian Rapp. Their enthusiasm for Dance Wire caught her attention, and made her think maybe one of those Fred Astaire dance numbers will go from dreams to reality someday. As a board member she looks forward to getting involved in the Portland nonprofit community, bringing her marketing expertise as well as past museum experience and passion for arts and culture to the table.

Kate – choreographer and performance artist – holds a BA in Dance from Colorado College. She studied modern dance under Patrizia Herminjard and exchange artists from the Taipei National University of the Arts. In 2011, she founded AUTOMAL, a project-based dance company with a focus on risk and interactivity. She has presented work at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, American College Dance Festival, the Fertile Ground Festival, Lindsay Matheis’s (a)merging, PDX Pop Now, and OSCON.

By day, she is the Platform and Content Administrator at Northwest Outward Bound. Before that, she was the Assistant Box Office Manager at Chamber Music Northwest, managed the marketing of Portland Columbia Symphony Orchestra, interned with White Bird and tEEth, and served as a production assistant for TBA performances by Emily Johnson and Miguel Gutierrez.