Donna Odom is a native of Chicago, Illinois.  She   holds  a   Bachelor of Arts Degree from Kalamazoo   College and a   Master of Arts Degree from Loyola   University of   Chicago.  Her background includes   teaching at the high   school and community college   level and higher education   administration in   Chicago.   She retired from the   Kalamazoo Valley   Museum   where she coordinated history   programs   and special   projects from 1994 to 2010. She   founded  the   Southwest Michigan Black Heritage   Society   in 2003,   which in 2015 became SHARE (Society for   History and Racial Equity). She now serves as executive director.

Donna was a member of the Steering Committee for the Southwest Michigan RACE Exhibit Initiative, is a past board member of the Kalamazoo County Historical Society, the Historical Society of Michigan, and the Michigan Oral History Association. She currently serves on the Kalamazoo College Emeriti Alumni Leadership Council and has been appointed to the Michigan Underground Railroad Commission. She was Project Director for the 2009 History Detectives Oral History Project, Project Co-director of the 2010 Telling the Kalamazoo Community Race Story Project in partnership with the WMU Journalism Program, and Project Co-Director of the Engaging the Wisdom Oral History Project in partnership with Kalamazoo College.  She is a recipient of the YWCA Women of Achievement Award (2018), the Westminster Presbyterian Peace Award (2019), and was a 2021 fellow for the AARP Purpose Prize.