Staff & Leadership

Executive Director

John McEwen has served as the Executive Director of New Jersey Theatre Alliance since 2001.

Prior to the Alliance, John served as Vice President for Development of the New Jersey Network Foundation where he was responsible for providing the leadership for an annual fund goal of more than $7 million in support of NJN Public Television and Radio’s programs and services. Prior to joining NJN, John served as the Director of Development for Paper Mill Playhouse where he oversaw all fundraising activities, long-range planning, and board development.  John provided the leadership for Paper Mill’s successful $10 million capital campaign.

In 1992, McEwen developed the Cultural Access Network Project, a project of the New Jersey State Council on the Arts and New Jersey Theatre Alliance, for which he received the inaugural Leadership Award in Access from The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation. John serves as a trustee of ArtPride NJ andFund for the New Jersey Blind. John has served as an adjunct professor in arts management at Seton Hall University, Drew University, and New York University.

John has consulted numerous organizations on board development, long-range planning, fundraising, and cultural access. He received a BA from Montclair State University and an MA from New York University.

John is a graduate of Leadership/New Jersey and was selected as one of 50 nonprofit arts leaders to participate in the Executive Program for Nonprofit Arts Leaders at Stanford University, a partnership of Stanford and National Arts Strategies.

When John is not attending the theatre, he enjoys cooking, collecting glass art, and anything to do with the water—boating, sun bathing, swimming.

Administrative Assistant

LaWanda began her career with Citibank, N.A. on Wall Street.  Later she transitioned into healthcare and worked with one of the top dialysis companies for over 11 years.  Her last position as a Remote Regional Operations Coordinator allowed her to assist 2 of 4 Regional Operation Directors in managing operational components and provide teammate engagement and legislative visits to 35 dialysis clinics and 40 unit administrative assistants.  She was also the Divisional Lead for physician education in best practices for unsigned orders.  LaWanda left the dialysis field with a strong track record in all that she created, managed, assisted, and revised.  To this day that division has expanded and is still growing rapidly.

Following this experience LaWanda decided to change her career and pursue a bachelor’s degree in Business Management through William Paterson University to expand her entrepreneur venture: a residential and commercial cleaning company named after her grandchildren: J&L Cleaning with a Purpose, LLC.  She is also pursuing an online degree in Fashion Design through Penn Foster to help establish the growth of DaintyThings by LMM, LLC since 2003.  LaWanda joined New Jersey Theatre Alliance in 2017 to help advocate for minorities and to help support the use of art to develop cultural awareness in meaningful ways.  LaWanda’s hobbies are singing, tennis, painting, baking liturgical dancing, and flag dancing.