TOM ARMSTRONG
Board Chair

Tom’s path has taken him from cab driving and apprenticing with a luthier (without notable success), to educational publishing, to a career as an astrophysicist studying the sizes and shapes of stars.  Along the way, he has danced – folk dancing in graduate school, swing dance (where he met his wife), and now contra dancing – and made music, from Hungarian and Balkan tunes to playing in a vigorous klezmer band, with jazz bass still on his list of ambitions. 

Tom comes from a musical family – one sister is a singer, another was a violinist, and his brother is a guitar player – and he and his wife passed that interest in music along to their two now-adult daughters, taking them to children’s concerts and family dances when they were small and encouraging them as they learned piano and guitar. 

Now that he is retired, he has more time to devote to playing and learning the bass, and to bicycling, gardening, and learning Spanish. 

Joining the Board of Carpe Diem Arts gives Tom a new way to contribute to the growth of music and the arts. He became Board Chair January 1, 2025.

ADRIANA CUTLER 
Secretary

Adriana Cutler, a Venezuelan- and Spanish-American, has over 20 years of experience working in the arts and humanities with a focus on arts education, cultural heritage, and community-focused grantmaking. Most recently, she served for nearly 15 years at the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), where she managed a program that provided funding and capacity building for smaller cultural heritage organizations and led the agency's efforts to expand its outreach to the Latino community and Hispanic-serving institutions. Prior to the NEH, Adriana spent five years at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, working with arts educators and arts administrators from around the nation and globe.

A native Washingtonian, Adriana has lived in Montgomery County since the age of eight and benefited from the numerous visual, literary, and performing arts experiences available in the region. Growing up in the area, she spent many weekends in museums and at music and dance concerts with her parents, who both had careers in the arts. Adriana continues to study dance and practice voice, both for personal enjoyment and as a way to preserve these art forms. She holds a BA in Integration and Presentation of Music and the Visual Arts from the University of Maryland and an MA in Arts Administration from George Mason University.

Adriana hopes to utilize her knowledge in arts administration, arts education and integration, and cultural heritage to support Carpe Diem Arts' impactful work in sharing the benefits of the arts and connecting communities as the organization evolves into its next phase.

MEKLIT BERHAN

Meklit is a Public Health and Program Evaluation Specialist with over 18 years of experience in evaluation design, program planning, operation and implementation, and project leadership. With a solid foundation in qualitative and quantitative study methods, she has executed evaluations across chronic disease prevention and management efforts, global health infectious disease programs, and projects addressing social determinants of health to advance health and economic equity. Meklit has a strong passion for promoting whole health and wellbeing and views arts and community as a critical element for wellbeing. 

CRISTINA FREY 

Cristina is a Mexican-American businesswoman and philanthropist with more than ten years of business management experience. Her work experience includes roles as Social Media Consultant for the Montgomery County Office of Community Partnerships, Executive President of The New Americans Organization, and Collaborator in the Latino Outreach Campaign for Maryland Health Connection. 

Cristina earned a B.A. degree in International Business from the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey, Mexico and is currently pursuing a Masters degree in Nonproft Management from Johns Hopkins University. 

A freelance photographer for the Associated Press, private projects, portraits, and commercial photography, Cristina says, “The more I know about Carpe Diem Arts, the more I fall in love with it and realize it is worth making the effort to put time aside to help making it grow. The work Carpe Diem does with underserved communities is amazing. The arts is a happy place where kids can be themselves and explore new ways, break the rigor of daily school work, and escape family issues. The memories created on kids’ minds are going to help them shape their lives in the future.” 

SUZETTE GARDNER 

Suzette Gardner is a marketing technologist with 20 years of experience helping organizations and businesses leverage digital strategy to drive engagement, growth, and meaningful impact. She specializes in blending storytelling, design, technology, and data-driven insights to create and execute strategies that deliver measurable results. As Family Values @ Work Consortium's digital strategy director, she provides technical assistance to the network and oversees the organization’s digital communication, engagement, mobilization, and partnerships.

Beyond her professional expertise, Suzette is an artist and dedicated radio programmer. She has been involved with Takoma Radio (Maryland), and WPFW public radio station (Washington, D.C.). She is deeply passionate about justice, art, architecture, social entrepreneurship, community, and public space. 

As a board member of Carpe Diem Arts, Suzette is honored to support its mission and contribute to building the Beloved Community through arts and cultural engagement.

Suzette holds a B.A. in history from the University of the District of Columbia, and an MSc in technology management and e-commerce from the University of Maryland, University College.

JOSEPHINE GARNEM

Josephine Garnem is a leader, advocate, community mobilizer and public speaker with over 23 years of extensive international and domestic experience. She is passionate about racial equity and justice and immigration.

Josephine was born in Sierra Leone and has lived and worked in the Middle East, Nigeria, Uganda, Cameroon, Haiti, Pakistan and Afghanistan before moving to the USA.

Josephine is the founder and CEO of the Khalil Garnem Foundation, the co-founder of Immigrant Community Services, and a volunteer technical and strategic advisor for multiple non-profits. Josephine has organized and led multiple diaspora-led free surgical, training and medical missions to Sierra Leone and Cameroon.

Josephine serves on the Board of Directors of the Healey International Relief Foundation, the Michael and Mauritia Patcha Foundation, and is recently appointed to serve on the National Council of Pax Christi, USA. She has served in the Health and Human Services' Leadership Institute for Equity and Elimination of Health Disparities (LIEED) advisory group, is a founding member of The Hub for Culture & Democracy at Sandy Spring Museum, former Chairperson for the Montgomery County's African Affairs Advisory Group, and former County Executive's liaison to the African immigrant community.

Josephine holds a bachelor's degree in Education, a degree in Sociology (exp 2021), is a 2020 Cohort of the Center for Action and Contemplation's Living School (Theology and Social Justice), She is also pursuing a master's degree in Social Work and Public Health. Josephine currently works with Montgomery County's Office of Community Partnerships' Gilchrist Immigrant Resources Center. She and her family live in Olney, MD.

AMY HARBISON

Amy K. Harbison, CPCC is a certified coach in private practice through her company, Open Window Creative Strategies LLC. She has coached clients from all over the world, with a focus on professional and personal transitions. She previously facilitated a leadership development training through Montgomery County Government’s Office of Human Resources.

Prior to her work in coaching, Amy was an award-winning communications strategist with more than 25 years of experience in positioning, messaging, storytelling, donor communications, and branding. She served in executive communications roles for large and small arts nonprofits, such as Olney Theatre Center and The Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, and in higher education, associations, philanthropy, and health care.  She also previoulsy served on the Board of the Arts & Humanities Council of Montgomery County.

Amy is a graduate of Leadership Greater Washington Class of 2010 and a graduate of Senior Leadership Montgomery 2018. She is a pro bono coach for Women’s Impact Alliance. She previously served as a Commissioner on the County’s Commission on Aging and hosted a public access show for the County on issues related to older adults. She is active in EmpowHERed, a chapter of Indivisible. 

Amy believes in the power of the arts to transform lives. She recognizes that small community nonprofits like Carpe Diem Arts are important in introducing people to art forms to which they might not otherwise be exposed and in helping them access emotions and process new ideas and perspectives. The arts create community, foster hope, and celebrate our differences.

Amy is married with two adult children and two grandchildren and is a 30+ year resident of Montgomery County, Maryland.

DIANNE HARRISON

Dianne Harrison is a mom, passion advocate, wellness meditator, entrepreneur, and arts enthusiast. Outside of her greatest joys, her two sons and family, Dianne Harrison derives personal fulfillment from helping others, sharing with others and connecting to others in purposeful and creative ways. Joining the board of Carpe Diem Arts has allowed Dianne to contribute to helping, sharing and connecting with others using the creative arts for good causes.

Dianne’s early interests in the arts were shaped largely by her mother and father who participated in the arts in very different ways. Always having been passionate about the arts afforded Dianne to test the breadth and depth of what it means to bring understanding and meaning of the arts across cultures, genders, ages, and ideologies. Involvement in Carpe Diem was a natural extension of serving the arts, having already been a dancer/performer in the early years and a board member of Class Acts Arts/Artivate.

Dianne, a lifelong Washingtonian, hopes to bring a wealth of experience and knowledge to Carpe Diem Arts from a business perspective. Dianne is the owner of Passionary and Copiosity Designs, both of which were started while earning a Master of Business Administration, Master of Management with a specialization in Marketing, and later, a Master of Management with a specialization in Public Relations from the University of Maryland - all while raising sons, Kendred Jones, now a data analyst, and Kamil Jones, now a financial consultant.