Kaoru “Kay” Yamamoto
Kaoru “Kay” Yamamoto is the founder of JHC Foundation and Chair of the Inspiration Arts Group International. She has dedicated her career to promoting multiculturalism and global citizenship through educational, artistic, and cultural curricula and programming.
For nearly 25 years, she served as the founder and principal of the sister schools Greenwich Kokusai Gakuen and the International Academy of Arts and Sciences, which offered preschool-kindergarten programs, ESL and foreign language courses, and after-school enrichment programs, including in the creative arts. In this capacity, she organized numerous cultural exchange programs between U.S. and Japanese educational and arts institutions, and sponsored visas and residencies for Japanese artists and musicians.
Prior to JHC Foundation, Kay founded and ran the Women’s Institute of New Studies (1974-1984), a women’s training and job placement program, which launched the first women’s professional network of its kind in Tokyo, Japan. She also worked as a commercial real estate broker in New York City (1988-1997).
Kay is an active member of her community. She was a member of the Greenwich Rotary Club from 2008 to 2020, and served on the Board of Trustees for the Hammond Museum and Japanese Stroll Garden in 2021. She received her B.A. in Asian and International Studies from Tokyo University of Foreign Studies and M.A. in Psychology and Early Childhood Education from Sarah Lawrence College. Kay has two daughters and resides in Upper Saddle River, New Jersey.