The Great Northern welcomes three new members to its board of directors: Torrie Allen, President and CEO of Arts Midwest; Jothsna Harris, Director of Community Engagement at Climate Generation: A Will Steger Legacy; and Carson Kipfer, co-founder of SportsEngine. The board of directors brings extensive expertise, enthusiasm, and guidance to The Great Northern and plays a significant role in nurturing vision and growth.
“Jothsna, Torrie and Carson have been such valuable advisors and supporters of The Great Northern, and it is truly an honor to bring them on board more formally,” said Executive and Artistic Director Kate Nordstrum. “Their enthusiasm for what we are building, joined with their collective experience, energy and ambition, brings tremendous strength and momentum to the organization.”
Board president Eric Dayton added, “I’m thrilled to welcome three outstanding new members to The Great Northern’s board of directors. Each brings unique strengths, but they all share a belief in Kate Nordstrum’s inspiring and ambitious vision for the organization and I look forward to working together to help make that vision a reality.”
Learn more about Torrie, Jothsna, and Carson below.
Torrie Allen has more than 30 years of wide-ranging experience in national, regional, and local arts leadership including executive and artistic management, fundraising, marketing, policy, adjudication, grantmaking, and international performance. In 2019, he was recruited to become the new president and CEO of Arts Midwest. Allen currently serves on the boards of National Arts Strategies, VocalEssence, NIVA Foundation, and AIR Institute. Prior to his career in nonprofit leadership, Allen spent a decade traveling the world as a professional concert and opera singer.
Jothsna Harris is the director of community engagement at Climate Generation: A Will Steger Legacy, where she leads planning and implementation efforts for the organization’s community engagement work. Harris has helped bring the issue of climate change to communities across Minnesota, building community resiliency and capacity through multi-stakeholder alliances and connecting people through the power of storytelling. Her work includes the award-winning Climate Conversation series in partnership with Three Rivers Park District, the Talk Climate Institute, 2017-18 Youth Convening Minnesota, and the 2014-16 Climate Minnesota project. She is a co-editor of Eyewitness: Minnesota Voices on Climate Change and a recipient of the CERTs Women in Energy series.
Carson Kipfer co-founded SportsEngine, a sports technology startup that grew into the leading provider of Sport Relationship Management (SRM) software, empowering athletes, parents, coaches, and sports organization administrators with tools and services to manage their organizations and sports lives. Kipfer served as Co-Commissioner of the premier outdoor hockey tournament U.S. Pond Hockey Championships from 2010 to 2019. He has also served on the board of the Positive Coaching Alliance and is a founding board member of The Great Northern.