For over two decades, Mary Berryman Agard has consulted in cultural and strategic planning, foundation management, civic dialog, donor advising, and non-profit management. Her recent projects include advising in the redesign of a major local public arts agency, identifying and evaluating applicants for public funding initiatives, conducting community cultural plans, facilitating a national coalition,and assisting in the redesign of a national foundation. Her work has addressed a variety of topics including arts and culture, environmental preservation and restoration, sustainable agriculture, verified voting systems, social and economic justice, and education. Mary's clients include government agencies, non-profits, individuals, foundations, businesses, and educational institutions.

Before working as a consultant, Mary helped found a preschool focusing on the arts, worked as an actor in an educational theatre company, directed productions for a youth theatre, and founded and managed the nation’s first system of municipal support for childcare centers. She worked as both a Community Arts Development Officer and the Director of Programs for a state arts agency.

Her long history of community involvement includes community organizing and volunteer work in both public and alternativel schools, political campaigns, environmental organizations, local artists' cooperatives and arts organizations, childcare programs, food pantry programs, and neighborhood organizations. She is the former Chair of the Madison CitiArts Commission (now the Madison Arts Commission), a former Police and Fire Commissioner, and has served on a number of boards. She currently sits on a city-university liaison committee and is an advisor to an emerging arts organization. She is the proprietor of Mary Berryman Agard & Associates, formerly Hyperion Associates.

Mary lives in Madison, Wisconsin with her large extended family. Her personal activities include reading, writing, costume design, and mosaic sculpture. She is  deeply grateful for her family, her garden, the man who taught her to read, and the blues.

Selected Reports and Publications

The Park Street T with Paul Soglin

Madison Cultural Plan 

Wisconsin's Children and Our Common Prosperity

Tried, True, and Protean with Jane Ahlstrom

Culture at the Edges with Robert Bush

The MBA Board Self-Assessment Instrument

Public Support for Emerging Arts

Next Generation Now

Child Welfare Practice in Wisconsin: A Users Guide

A Management Audit Instrument for Not-for-Profit Organizations

50 Cities: Local Government and the Arts with June Spencer

A Municipal Perspective: Surplus School Space with Hal Levy

To read from a sample of Mary Berryman Agard & Associates recent reports, choose the page titled Samples of Our Work from the menu bar to the right.