Kim grew up in a broken home of limited financial means in apartheid South Africa, gaining a background in the performing arts.
In 1993 she began an oral-history project to capture personal histories of Holocaust survivors and witnesses for the Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation.
Inspired by her work, she started the Foundation for Tolerance Education, which spread awareness of humanity and the lessons taken from history to young people. The lessons dealt with tolerance, choices, self-responsibility and the power of love and empathy. Due to the crises of HIV/AIDS in South Africa, Kim created an oral history project that would give a voice to orphans coming out of this tragedy. This led to Kim’s decision to create the “Tomorrow” Publication.
She gathered stories from many of the young orphans she worked with and collated them into a book. This first best seller included hand drawn photographs and original stories from the children and a majority of the profits raised by sales of the book went into the Tomorrow Trust, Kim’s self-created nonprofit.
In 2005 Kim started the Tomorrow Trust to support orphan and vulnerable children and youth with integrated education and holistic support. Rather than simply helping orphans survive, the trust focuses on giving these very dynamic individuals an opportunity to tap into their potential to break their cycle of poverty and become active members of society and the economy released from charity. Kim’s approach is considered innovative for its simplicity and applicability.
She designed the organization intending for it to be replicable anywhere in the world. The approach is longitudinal and deep to ensure a sustainable impact from Grade R (K1) – Grade 12 and then onto college and university.
All aspects of the program are quality based and not simply quantitave which includes education, nutritious food, transport, psycho social support with the underlying foundation based on self-development with classes on budgeting, critical-thinking, self-awareness, self-mastery and team-building.
Today, Kim currently lives in America/South Africa with her daughter and son. She has been a part of many successful ventures and organizations. Represented Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Institute – Formed by Steven Spielberg – in South Africa for 18 yrs; Founding director of the Apartheid Museum; Sat on Human Rights Commission for Education; Founder/CEO of Tolerance Foundation teaching over 70 000 children life skills based on history. She is also an Ashoka Fellow and has studied at Harvard Kennedy School of International Studies.