Carolina Ballet Names Five Members To Board Of Directors

RALEIGH, NC, October 19, 2012 (Press-News.org) Robert Weiss, artistic director and CEO of Carolina Ballet (http://www.carolinaballet.com), has announced the addition of five new members to the organization's board of directors. The board, under the chairmanship of Melanie Dubis, welcomed Michael Jacobs, Laura Gualdoni, Rob Tiller, Tammy Brown and Laura Bayzle at Carolina Ballet's annual fall meeting.

Jacobs is the founder and CEO of Jacobs Capital, LLC, a Research Triangle Park-based investment banking firm. He has managed investment banking departments for several large organizations and served as director of corporate finance at the U.S. Treasury Department from 1989 to 1991. Jacobs received his Master of Business Administration from Harvard Business School and his Bachelor of Science from UNC Kenan-Flager Business School. Married with a daughter who is an aspiring ballerina, Jacobs is actively involved with the Big Brothers/Big Sisters program.

A native of St. Louis, Gualdoni began her career with Ernst & Young in Clayton, Mo. She now works as an international tax manager in the Raleigh office of Deloitte Tax LLP. Gualdoni has assisted Friends of Kids with Cancer and Habitat for Humanity through corporate philanthropy events. She is a graduate of St. Louis University.

Tiller and his wife have been supporters of Carolina Ballet since the company's first season in 1997. He is vice president and assistant general counsel at Red Hat Inc., where he heads the intellectual property and litigation team. Before joining several law firms, he was a law clerk for Justice Antonin Scalia of the U.S. Supreme Court and for Judge Stephen Williams of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. The Tillers' involvement in Carolina Ballet includes being longtime season ticket holders and Pointe Shoe Sponsors of Corps de Ballet member Lola Cooper. He has served on other nonprofit boards including Interact and the Raleigh Chamber Music Guild.

A North Carolina native, Brown has held leadership positions in three Fortune 250 companies in marketing, communications and community relations. She now serves as the assistant vice president of client and community relations at PNC Bank in the Eastern Carolina region. Previously she led the Progress Energy Foundation, shaping strategy for philanthropy for the entire corporation throughout the Southeast. Brown was instrumental in helping Carolina Ballet obtain its chief sponsorship from Progress Energy for the new Nutcracker in 2001. She has served on numerous boards including Boys and Girls Club, Big Brothers/Big Sisters and the Rocky Mount Area United Way.

Bayzle is a research director at The Link Group in Durham, which specializes in market research for a wide variety of clients. As its philanthropy chair, she organizes and leads events for her colleagues at Habitat for Humanity, Urban Ministries and The Volunteer Center of Durham. Bayzle has been involved with Carolina Ballet in several capacities for a number of years. She has conducted a variety of market research projects and co-chaired the "Funding the Dream" Committee for the Mardi Gras Ball. She received her Master of Business Administration from The Fuqua School of Business at Duke University.

QUOTES:
"We are delighted to have such an eclectic mix of talent and interests serve on our board," said Weiss. "It is very gratifying that they want to help us with the growth and stabilization of the company."

NEW MEDIA CONTENT:
Carolina Ballet Facebook page:
http://www.facebook.com/CarolinaBallet

Carolina Ballet Twitter feed:
https://twitter.com/#!/CarolinaBallet

Carolina Ballet Meetup page:
http://www.meetup.com/dance-507/

Carolina Ballet Pinterest page:
http://pinterest.com/carolinaballet/

ABOUT CAROLINA BALLET:
Carolina Ballet is a world-class professional ballet company based in Raleigh, N.C. Since its professional launch in 1998 under the leadership of Artistic Director/CEO Robert Weiss, the company has staged more than 80 world premiere ballets, toured internationally in China and Hungary, and has been acclaimed as one of the premiere arts organizations in the country. The mission of Carolina Ballet is to entertain and enlighten audiences in Raleigh, the greater Triangle area, North Carolina and beyond. The organization seeks to accomplish this mission by presenting traditional ballets of legendary masters; commissioning new works by innovative choreographers; educating current and future audiences through programs for school-aged children and other performance outreach activities; and attracting, developing, and retaining excellent dancers and artistic personnel, combined with a fiscally responsible management and board of directors. For more information, please visit http://www.carolinaballet.com or call (919) 719-0800.

Emily Packard
MMI Public Relations
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emily@mmipublicrelations.com
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