{"id":18113,"date":"2017-08-17T11:43:33","date_gmt":"2017-08-17T15:43:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=18113"},"modified":"2017-08-17T11:43:33","modified_gmt":"2017-08-17T15:43:33","slug":"new-executive-director-explores-new-opportunities-for-cultural-centre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/new-executive-director-explores-new-opportunities-for-cultural-centre\/","title":{"rendered":"New executive director explores new opportunities for Cultural Centre"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a far cry from being an accountant, but the number crunching has served Suzanne Haines well as she dropped the traditional nine-to-five job to embrace her love of the arts \u2013 and they are skills she continues to draw upon as she charts a new path for the Aurora Cultural Centre.
\nMs. Haines, a native of Mono near Orangeville, took over as the Centre\u2019s second Executive Director this spring. A resident of Burlington, she comes to the Aurora Cultural Centre after previous stints as Executive Director of the Burlington Performing Arts Centre, and General Manager of the Gateway Theatre in Richmond, British Columbia.
\nShortly after her appointment, she hailed the Centre as a \u201cgem in a community that is growing and changing\u201d but now that she has had a couple of months to get her feet wet, she senses that the \u201cgem\u201d is also a resource that is growing and changing.
\n\u201cThere are so many ideas running around in my head,\u201d she says. \u201cWorking with my staff and trying to determine where there might be space to add is the first step and where we have an opportunity within the community to add as well. The facility itself is quite occupied and busy, which is great \u2013 a product of their success \u2013 and we need other people and partners to come on board if we\u2019re going to be able to grow the organization, add programming and add opportunities.\u201d
\nWhen she first learned of the job opportunity at the Aurora Cultural Centre, Ms. Haines says she was \u201cdelighted\u201d by how much had transpired around the Centre since its inception.
\nThere are \u201cgrowing pains\u201d in any community following the opening of a cultural centre, she says, and Aurora is no exception.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s nice to see that we\u2019re past that and the community has embraced it and the programs are very successful,\u201d says Ms. Haines. \u201cI was looking for an organization that was still small and looking at growth opportunities and had a strong foundation. As I [did my research] and read the governance documents I thought, \u2018Wow, this is an organization that has this all sorted out. That\u2019s great!\u2019\u201d
\nSeeking growth opportunities has been a hallmark of Ms. Haines\u2019 career so far.
\nIn the line of duty, one of the first questions she asks people she has never met before is, \u201cWhat was the first memorable arts experience you ever had?\u201d Oftentimes, people who love arts and culture have an \u201cearly touch point\u201d with the arts from a very young age \u2013 and she is no exception.
\n\u201cMine is going to see As You Like It in Stratford when I was eight,\u201d she says. \u201cMy parents took us as a family and I was just mesmerized. I asked to go to theatre camps just to get involved in the arts. I was very, very shy at that age but [through the arts] I found my voice.\u201d
\nBut, despite serving in a leadership capacity as a teen, sitting on the board of Theatre Orangeville as they restored the local opera house back to its original purpose, she set out to pursue a career in business.
\n\u201cI wanted to be an accountant!\u201d she says with a chuckle, noting she initially pursued this path with Xerox before the muse began beckoning with an opportunity to spearhead a concert program. She eventually followed this trail to the Gateway Theatre in her early 20s.
\n\u201cThe opportunity that was presented to me [at Xerox] was really exceptional, so I think there were other people in my life who said, \u2018Why are you turning your back on this opportunity to be fully trained as a CA with all this money at you?\u2019
\n\u201cWell, what\u2019s important? It has always been to love my job, connect with the community and I didn\u2019t know I could do that in the financial services world. I didn\u2019t know how to connect that. I was more interested in that creative side of things. I am a numbers person and that has served me, helping organizations be sustainable. I carried what I needed with me.\u201d
\nAs she works with the Aurora Cultural Centre\u2019s Board of Directors, she looks forward to exploring every opportunity that presents itself both inside and outside its historic Church Street walls, and making use of every inch of the heritage building.
\n\u201cThis is your Cultural Centre, so come and enjoy it,\u201d she says. \u201cYou can see the same quality of art here that you can see elsewhere. There is lots of opportunity for growth and partnership. My door is open and the space is open for people to come and enjoy. Watch and see what happens \u2013 I don\u2019t need to turn the ship. I can stand upon the foundation of what has been created by boards and staff before be and continue to build.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s a far cry from being an accountant, but the number crunching has served Suzanne Haines well as she dropped the traditional nine-to-five job to embrace her love of the arts \u2013 and they are skills she continues to draw upon as she charts a new path for the Aurora Cultural Centre. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":18079,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[27,4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-and-culture","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/2017-08-17-05.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-4I9","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-29 10:44:25","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18113"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18113\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}