Looking back to move forward

2019 has been amazing in so many challenging and enlightening ways.

In the moment, there always seems to be more work to do. Reflection allows me to sink back into the past, ground, and move forward. During high school track, I learned that runners shift back before propelling forward in space. Training in martial arts taught me that there's a pre-action before the attack. An inhale before the exhale. This is also true in dance - the preparation in ballet, the lifting of the foot before creating a sound in tap, or the plie before the explosive jump.

As in dance, as in life.

Thanks for taking this moment to sink back with me, as I prepare to move forward into 2020. What are some gifts, opportunities, or conflicts that have informed your journey in 2019?

I've written about all of these adventures, individually, but it's a pretty cool to see them all in one place, here:

Performances:
JCWK Dance Lab participated in 9 performances, including the first evening-length concert of my own work, with my own company. We performed in Philadelphia, Reading, Chester, Bethlehem, and Allentown, PA. In some aspect, all of these places have been "home" for me and the women who participated in HOMEbody. 

I created a performance in reflection of Alvernia University's presentation of Michelle Bryn's visual art in the Miller Gallery, as part of my Artist-in-Residency.

And, I continued my role as curator for KYL/D's InHale Performance Series. I stepped down from this position, in October, after curating for 11 years and co-founding the series in 2008.

Publications: 
Shout out to the Reading Theater Project's 5 Minute Fringe in WFMZ 69 News
Review of Shed in The Reading Eagle (by Susan Pena)
Highlight of my community teaching in The Reading Eagle (by Susan Pena)
Mindfulness for teens in English and Spanish in Motivos (by me)
Interview in Scene4 (by Nathan Thomas)
Preview of HOMEbody in The Reading Eagle (by Susan Pena)
Announcement of grants from Berks Arts Council 

Grants:
...from the Berks Arts Council for HOMEbody at Alvernia University in November 2019
...from the Philadelphia Cultural Fund for HOMEbody in Philadelphia in February 2020
(I also wrote and received funding to support Alvernia University's Arts Series in 2020 as part of the Berks Celebration of Women in the Arts.)
------THANK YOU!!!-------

Classes:

Dance for Wellness at Tower Health/ Reading Hospital's Rehabilitation Center continued from January- August.
Contemporary Dance for Every Body continued at the Restorative Center from January - May.

Fundraising: 
Thank you to everyone who has donated in 2019! Interested in helping out? Click here!
Stay tuned for more opportunities to support dance and support local in 2020.

Firsts in 2019: 
First state grant awards.
First mini-documentary about my process by Jake Buczewski (click here to watch it).
First full-evening of JCWK Dance Lab.

Other professional highlights:
In May, I took over as Managing Director of Alvernia University's Arts Series.
In August, I accepted a position as Visiting Assistant Teaching Professor of Dance at Drexel University for the 2019-2020 academic year.

May you find your roots in order to fly!!

pic by Juliana Wall

Giving thanks for HOME

Thank you to everyone who came out to last week's performance of HOMEbody!

Wow! What an audience! What a feeling of community!

A few folks reflected:

"beautiful & thought-provoking" ~MK

"This evening totally felt like a family reunion - in a really good way!" ~MS

"I realized how much I want to move my body more after watching you. I need to move more." ~KW

"Amazing talent" ~JY

"Now, several days after the performance, I couldn't sleep - my dog woke me up. But I remembered you said in your opening that our heartbeat is our own rhythm. I never thought I had rhythm, and I could never dance, but that really resonated with me. And as I was laying there, not sleeping, I focused on the rhythm of my heart. And... that helped." ~KW

"breathtaking" ~EC

"I feel understood, as if all that I've been trying to communicate it clear and validated." ~audience member who identified as "female, student, artist"

Original pic by Thomas Kay

This week, as we celebrate Thanksgiving, may you find (comfort in) HOME in your own ways!

Details for HOMEbody's Thursday performance

We’re looking forward to seeing you on Thursday! 

Included are some details regarding Alvernia University's Arts Series presentation of JCWK Dance Lab. Please give yourself some additional time for parking, if you’re traveling by car.  

What: Alvernia Arts Series presents JCWK Dance Lab's HOMEbodyWhere: Francis Hall Theatre (on Alvernia's Main Campus in Reading, PA)When: Thursday, November 21 at 7:30pm 

The performance runs approximately 70 minutes.


Directions: https://www.alvernia.edu/about/locations/directions 


Parking and campus map: https://www.alvernia.edu/maps  


Tickets: You can still purchase tickets online by clicking here. Please arrive early to claim your will-call tickets if you purchased online. Tickets will also be available at the door.  
Seating is general admission. 

*HOMEbody is supported in part by the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, a state agency funded by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency. 

HOMEbody artist bios

In alphabetical order:

Laura Baehr, DPT & PhD candidate (Dance artist):  Laura Baehr is a movement artist, therapist and researcher who melds her interdisciplinary training in order to facilitate and inspire strength, confidence and quality of life through movement. Baehr earned her Clinical Doctorate in Physical Therapy from Temple University in 2019. She obtained her undergraduate dual degree in Dance and Neuroscience from Muhlenberg College. Currently, she is a graduate doctoral fellow at Drexel University studying the implications of chronic pain in individuals living with neurological conditions. Her performance background includes concert dance, mask work, and dance theatre. Her more recent collaborations are with Jessica Warchal-King and Caroline O'Brien. In addition to performance, she has taught in the Dance Department at Eastern University, the 2016 American College Dance Association annual conference, and is a Dance for Parkinson's Disease and Pilates instructor.

Jake Buczewski (Filmmaker): Jake Buczewski, a Reading native, is a visual artist, writer and filmmaker. He has a BA from Ithaca College in Communications with a concentration in screenwriting. At Ithaca, he wrote for ICTV. His films have been presented by KYL/D's InHale Performance Series in Philadelphia, the Lehigh Valley Dance Exchange and Jill Haley.

Erin Coffey (Dance artist): Erin Coffey is from the Lehigh Valley, PA. She is a sophomore Fine & Performing Arts major with a Dance Concentration in the Doctor of Physical Therapy Program at Widener University. Coffey has been training for 17 years with numerous dance schools and professional dance training programs including the Joffrey Ballet School, American Ballet Theater and the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. She has performed with the New York City Ballet, DeSales University Dance Program, Artistic Edge Dance Company and at various intensives as well as with other artistic directors. Coffey was a company member with Repertory Dance Theater and studied under Trinette Singleton, Jennifer Haltzman-Tracy and Lynn Wiender. Her choreography has been presented by Widener Dance Company where she is a class teacher, choreographer, and Event Coordinator. Coffey is honored to be continuing her dancing and artistic expressions with JCWK Dance Lab and incorporating this work into research at Widener University.

Paul Fejko (Composer): Provocative, Challenging and Iconoclastic, Paul Fejko has always been quite fond of extremes. He can often be found treading on the boundaries of accepted limits and traditions. Art is exploration and provocation; improvisation is a wonderful vehicle for both. He is often chastised for mixing improvisation into repertoire ('taking too many liberties'), but it seems a one way comment; never has there been a charge leveled against the reverse - adding repertoire to improvisation. Fej finds the pipe organ to be his favorite solo instrument. It can muster more power and subtlety than an entire orchestra while having a responsiveness impossible from a large group of people. He is constantly challenging (often to the point of annoyance!) people to shed their preconceived notions of the organ as merely an instrument of religion, and to realize that in the first half of this century almost every movie house and many concert halls had organs. A good pipe organ is a virtuoso instrument of vast capabilities. Fej divides his time among many endeavors, most notably with theater and dance as a composer and conductor, but also as a concert organist and pianist.   To this one must add his work as a sound and lighting designer, photographer (the covers of three of his  ARKAY releases - Incantation, Tyme's Escape and OUTBURST!), audio systems designer, auto mechanic and sometime sculptor (witness the cover of ‘On Making the Flowers Dance’ - designed by Fejko with flowers by Gretchen Ernest. As of this time, he has recorded 13 CDs of large European and American organs, covering a wide range of existing repertoire and his own improvisations. He has been the long-time musician at historic Gloria Dei (Old Swedes') Church in Philadelphia, PA and is a musician with the Dance and Theatre departments at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, PA. In 2003 he founded and is now the Artistic Director of 'The Chester Performing Arts Project', a foundation dedicated to bringing world class performing arts to the formerly depressed industrial city of Chester, PA. His André Café Acoustique in Chester is becoming well known in the region. Fej is a product of The Curtis Institute of Music (class of '75) where he studied with Alexander McCurdy, Rudolf Serkin and Max Rudolf. His first taste of opera came at Curtis from Dino Yannapoulos - a long-time stage director at the Met in NY. In 1987, Dino commissioned an opera from Fejko - Matteo Falcone - for the Academy of  Vocal Arts in Philadelphia where Dino was Artistic Director at the time. A review of Matteo can be found on the Press/Reviews page at this site. After Curtis, he connected with renowned dance scholar and pedegogist Nadia Chilkovsky and became music director at her Philadelphia Dance Academy - a source of many well-known dancers from the 50's through the mid 70's. During this time, he spent summers at the famed Marlboro Music Festival. In 1980 he headed east to become a musician with Maurice Béjart's Ballet of the Twentieth Century in Brussels, Belgium. From there he headed south to become Music Director of The Ballet of Lyon in France. During much of the 80's his time was passed between these two positions, but not without many forays into Italy and Germany for work with other smaller theater and dance groups. There were also many various and sundry organ and piano concerts! Because of this he is now able to converse in five languages. Fej has won first prizes for improvisation in Lyon (1981) and San Anselmo, CA (1990). At their Atlanta convention in 1992, the American Guild of Organists awarded him a second prize.

Sarena Kabakoff (Dance artist): Sarena Kabakoff is a native of Reading, PA and started her dance training at Berks Ballet Theater. Throughout high school, she performed multiple times a year in BBT performances and dance festivals across the state. She went on to attend college at Temple University where she had the pleasure of performing with Megan Mizanty, Laura Katz, and Janis Brenner and Company. She also interned with Dance Therapist Teresa Benzwie to teach special needs children academics through movement. She graduated Magna Cum Laude in 2013, receiving the Benzwie Dance in Education grant for her extensive work with children. After college she went on to dance with Philadelphia based companies: Jenkintown Dance Company, PIMA group, and FRED Dance Company. She also taught dance at the Conservatory of Music and Dance, Jenkintown Dance Arts, Beth Jacobsen School of Dance, and Imhotep Charter School. Her passion for dance also carried her to do outreach programs, using dance/yoga as a vehicle for healing at Safe Harbor (a program for grieving children), and in the greater Cancer Support Community. In fall of 2017 she attended an Expressive Dance Therapy program entitled, “Tamalpa” in Northern California. Since then she has been touring her yoga/dance therapy workshop called “Unpacking the Body,” in and around the Philadelphia area, as well as dancing for the band, “The Retinas,” in their most recent music video. In addition, she started her own yoga studio entitled, “Sarenity Yoga,” and has been dancing with Netco Dance Company for the 2018-2019 season. Sarena is passionate about movement’s capability to heal, to show us the stories we’ve been hiding from, and to move us forward into our own inner light.


Kyleigh Kover (Dance artist): Kyleigh Kover is from Moorestown, NJ. She is a sophomore at Widener University studying Fine Arts in the Doctor of Physical Therapy program. Kyleigh started her dance education at the age of two as a ballerina, tap dancer, and eventually jazz dancer at The Dance Workshop in Maple Shade, NJ. She also studied at Danec Xperience in Mt. Laurel, NJ, where she added genres of hip hop, acrobatics, musical theater, modern, and point. Kyleigh joined the Dance Xperience Company and performed in numerous dance competitions, community service events, and at Disney World. She has received several dance awards for her performances and original choreography. Additionally, Kyleigh attended Rutgers Mason Gross Summer Senior Dance Conservatory. Studying with Jessica Warchal-King has given Kyleigh a new outlook on dance and she has enjoyed educating others on how dance is a high impact practice. Currently, Kyleigh is an assistant teacher at Dance Xperience, musical theater teacher/ choreography chair of the Widener Dance Company, and Co-Captain of the Widener Dance Team.

Colin Lang (Lighting/ Technical Director): Colin Lang is a Philadelphia-based designer. Lang has designed a number of shows throughout Berks County and the Lehigh Valley as well as a variety of shows in many professional, community, and educational facilities. He is a proud member of IATSE, the stage technicians union. Lang also does a variety of other designing, programming, and tinkering. Thanks to his family and girlfriend for all their support. 

Nathan Thomas, PhD (all things Theatre at Alvernia): Dr. Thomas has been the director of the Alvernia Theatre program since 2003. A professional actor and director, Thomas has directed about 80 projects large and small over the last 16 years. Those projects ranged from the Classics to American and world premiers. Thomas studied with Arkady Katz, People's Artist of the Soviet Union, at the Vakhtangov Theatre in Moscow, Russia. He has written a monthly column for "Scene4.com," an on-line arts journal for 20 years, serves as Literary Advisor to the award-winning Chesapeake Shakespeare Company (CSC). Thomas has played Tevye, Shylock, Prospero, and Lear. 

And me, Jessica C. Warchal-King. 

Pic by Thomas Kay

ICYMI - In the HOMEtown news

In case you missed it...

HOMEbody's been in the news this week.

In the announcement from the Berks Arts Council about the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts PA Partners in the Arts Grants... Click here to read more

And in a feature by Susan Pena in the Reading Eagle... Click here to read more. 

Thanks so much, Berks County, for the support!!

I look forward to sharing HOMEbody with you next week!

Excepts of HOMEbody performed in Bethlehem. Pic by Juliana Wall

HOMEmade Soup

I often think of my work as a collage or a soup. There's a lot that goes into the pot (or on the paper, or into the research and rehearsal process), but the ingredients meld and blend until sometimes they're not distinguishable as their own, but as the greater part of the whole. A little salt? You might not be able to taste it as salt inside of the soup, but you might notice a huge difference in the flavor once it's added (or when it's missing...).

Refer back to my earlier post about the Metaphorical Soup.

So... what's going into HOMEbody's HOMEmade soup? In no particular order, but very specific in choice:

1. Stories and stories and stories of home. Very personal stories from my dancers, stories from published authors, storytellers, and other mediums. For all of that in one place, click here. 

2. My dancers and the very specific way I've chosen them. I'm admitting a sort of bias here, which I feel important to acknowledge as a social researcher/ dance anthropologist/ person in 2019 America. All of my dancers are professionally trained and white; I know there's a disparity of ethnicity on stage. However, in order to move forward from this current moment in my artistic journey, I needed to reflect and tell MY story. I can't speak for or from any experiences that aren't my own. So, my dancers - albeit much younger than I am - are white and are professionally trained which might assume a certain level of socioeconomic status. The assumptions aren't necessarily or always true, but those are all aspects of these stories. There is a diversity of age on stage. I wanted and tried for a greater range, but life, schedules, time and travel got in the way. My limitations have informed the process.

3. Paul Fejko's music. Paul and I have been collaborating for almost 9 years in some form - from working together in the classroom to other professionally produced performances. He sometimes describes his music as the soundtrack of a horror movie. I think it's multilayered, nuanced, and demanding - reflective of the stories we carry in our bodies.

4. White costumes. White light is the absorption of all light colors. White is the color of the Women's Suffrage Movement.

5. Nov. 21st. November 19th is the internationally declared celebration of Women's Entrepreneurship.  Because of schedule conflicts, we couldn't have the performance ON Nov 19th, so we're celebrating a few days past. The Women's Entrepreneurship Summit in NYC is the previous week. But everyday is Women's Entrepreneurship Day!

6. Alvernia University in Reading, PA. I grew up in Reading and Alvernia has a deep history in my family. I'm honored to be sharing this challenging and exciting work in this place that has been both challenging and wonderful.

7. Jake Buczewski's video. Jake is not only a video storyteller, but he's also my cousin. And he's from Reading. He lends another perspective to my own challenges of growing up as an artist in a town that didn't always feel receptive. And he knows me as a family member, not just as a professional artist.

8. The movement vocabulary. Some of the movement has been generated from improvisational prompts. Some of the movement comes directly from codified dance techniques that I've studied. Some of the movement is in homage to people and other movement that lives in my memory and in my physicality.

9. A new way of relating to audience. We're trying something out.... you'll have to come to see what it is. Get tickets here. 

10. Performance practice, feedback, and photos from the journey. Each moment that the soup is tested and tasted, we get more information on how to enhance the recipe and flavor. Thanks to everyone who shared in these experiences at Widener University's Undergraduate Research and Creative Activities symposium in Chester, PA; Sarah Carlson/ DanceLink's presentation of Rising Tide in Bethlehem, PA; and KYL/D's InHale Performance Series in Philadelphia, PA!

pic by Juliana Wall

10. And your stories... you bring your own experiences as you witness the performance. What are the ingredients that you add to the soup?

Thank you for your service. Welcome home!

To all of those who have served our country...
To all of those who continue to serve...
To all of those who have served those who have served...

For all of the ways you have fought for our freedoms...
For all of the ways you continue to fight...
For the conversations you've challenged us to have...
For the conversations you've allowed us to have...
For the work that you ask us to do...

Thank you.

Welcome home.

This pic is moment from "Shed" which will be performed with HOMEbody at Alvernia University on Nov. 21st. Photo by Mike Hurwitz. 

For more info and tickets click here.

Looking at the language - HOMEbody

I've been very specific in thinking about the wording of this work.

Homebody:

1. A person who likes to stay at home, especially one who is perceived as unadventurous (from lexico.com)

2.  A person who enjoys the warmth and simple pleasures of life (from urbandictionary.com)

3. One whose life centers on home (from merriam-webster.com)

4. A person who likes spending time at home rather than going out with friends or traveling to different places (from dictionary.cambridge.org)

and...

What does it mean to be at HOME in my BODY?

As a female and as a dancer, I've had expectations and stereotypes placed on my body for many, many years. Sometimes, these expectations are contradictory. Sometimes, they're unpleasant. Often, they're confusing and unrealistic.

As an educator, I've often heard women say things about their bodies that I've told myself. But I vehemently disagree with the negative self-talk. Would I say to someone else what I say to myself? Of course not! But why then, do I dishonor my own body with negative self-talk?

This process has also been a journey of exploring the layers of self-talk that women tell ourselves and how that impacts our ways of being in the world over time. I often still here my 18-year-old self make a judgement about my current self that I need to reframe. Through this work, I've been trying to find ways to model positive reflection and the honoring of all of the bodies of our bodies - our emotional bodies, our physical bodies, our mental bodies, our spiritual bodies - and find comfort in the learning and the growth that comes from being human.

So, I think it is radical to attempt to be at home in my body.

I think it is radical to declare that home can be adventurous and exciting.

I think it is radical to invest in our places of origin, especially if they're small and unassuming.

There is so much to unearth in the BODY that is HOME.

Moment during HOMEbody. Pic by Mike Hurwitz. 

A HOME by any other name...

HOME has so many layers and so many perspectives. 

In addition to digging through my own, and those of my communities, I've been researching how other people have published and researched HOME. 

Here's some of what I've found: 

(yes, I'm linking, but no, I don't get any profits if you click. I'm putting these out there so you, dear readers, can increase your perspectives and depth of knowledge. I've made a direct link when I could and otherwise, you're welcome to explore and/ or find other options for engagement.) 

NPR asked for poems about home

Clare Cut shared her story of finding home in her body through yoga:

Archeology reveals that our bones tell our stories

Home is waiting for you (us). (A poem by David Whyte)

Suggested reading:

Emergent Strategy by Adrienne Maree Brown

The Ranch That Was Us by Becky Crouch Patterson

Suggested listening:

The Homecomers

Notes from HOME - by Michael Lancaster

Earlier in the year when I posted some our of research questions for HOMEbody, some brave folks answered the call in their own ways.

Michael Lancaster shared this. His many roles in life I cannot try to list, but some include author, dreamer, seeker, friend, husband, father, Vietnam Veteran, warrior, musician, artist, protecter, teacher.

"It's evening. Still sunny. I can see the expanse of the Chesapeake, gentle against the evening sku. The Bay can rage because it is relatively shallow for such a large body of water. Average 40' depth. Occasional deep spots. One just NE of our lookout. Drops to over 100'. From up here you can also see how brown the grass is becoming. Sweet birds still here in numbers, though some gone altogether. Weather settling in over Cape Charles, the other side of the Bay and more properly called the Eastern Shore, referring to the eastern shore of the Bay rather than a more generic notion of the East Coast of the US. But who's a stickler for details. Down here on our part of the Bay, the DELMARVA peninsula is not very wide. 20ish miles from eastern shore of the Bay to East Coast of the US. 100 miles or so to the Gulf Stream and sport fishing magic. Learn what you can about where you live, it's geography and why it matters. Will reward your time. Learn its nature. Place is more important than a hangout, though that is part of whom you are too. Be at peace with your place."

Photo by Michael Lancaster

Notes from HOME - by Jenner Shaffer

Earlier in the year when I posted some our of research questions for HOMEbody, some brave folks answered the call in their own ways.

Jenner Shaffer, an artist, illustrator, writer, heirloom farm manager, among other titles, shared this with me (and his Facebook community) from his own sense of home in Michigan:

"Back road roam. Shed the vernal velvet for shining tines of autumn. A younger buck crops purple prairie clover. Along fence rows plump wild fruit wait for the taste of front. Shaggy bales in the pastures like along bison. The Valley of Monsters, Osage for the land of the Pomme & Sac flowing north. Land of backward, broken, upside-down things, puzzle pieces, Bootheel stomps & meteoric meltdown, storm tracks. Nothing stands long.
The lines of an Airstream a cozy bubble, arcing, flattened, belly-round, posing elements of a question mark. Where does this road go? Native, after a time, Spanish, French, American bushwhackers. Where is home? The commerce of eons, advance & retreat of seas & armies, dead hotspots of island arcs, plastic apologies for today's politic worms, roads that run into the reservoir. Aux-arcs, to the top, over the rainbow, word of a new lake winds that spiral in my ear. Here is now, & what do the persimmons say? Woolly bears are dark, cross the gravel in a hurry, someplace to be. Further on a box turtle is always at home.
Hedgeapples weigh on bowing branches, lost to every purpose but their own, the honey locust still on guard, gripping fossils in the hollows, browsers turned to stone. Asters white, asters purple, much endures in yellow as the barbed-wire winds. Milkweek pods crack open, a tuft of fluff for a wind to tease free.
The road was a loop, found my way back. Tomatoes sweet on a withered vine, volunteer. Save a few for dinner, toss the rest in the chicken run.

https://www.americanforests.org/magazine/article/trees-that-miss-the-mammoths/?fbclid=IwAR3mtdFqncDyUUwzuraf-p9MvenF8LeNHMny1MdnWFwaLtDk7UjbSuklCcU
https://www.almanac.com/content/predicting-weather-using-persimmon-seed?fbclid=IwAR0Hfcdgdxs691KzLGH4sucsW1PTTQ8vfum-TwmX1T71IRGtPArmq9hjm8s
https://www.weather.gov/arx/woollybear?fbclid=IwAR2lDP-xzWuhGYGMWZZHPQPiNVsXN2edEusSuyd20oI_0uuC19hQNEw5Qe4     "

All pics by Jenner Shaffer.

My last InHale

October 19th will be my last time serving as KYL/D's InHale Performance Series curator. Kun-Yang and I founded InHale in 2008 and over the past 11 years, have presented over 1000 performance artists to more than 1500 audience members.

The tagline for InHale has been: Diversity. Opportunity. Community.

These words are very meaningful to me and meaningful to what I've been able to bring to the Philadelphia Dance stage through InHale.

Diversity at InHale has embodied many layers. It has referred to

• racial diversity of artists, directors and performers - whether apparent or not
• age of artists
• gender 
• career trajectory of artists and where they are when they present (in college, long time professional)
• genre of the work (ballet, hip hop, modern, classical Indian, etc)
• context and subject matter
• process of development (work in progress, finished work, excerpts)
• medium (dance performance, dance on film, theatre, music, spoken word) 

Opportunity. 

• InHale artists received a safe space to present, try out new ideas, meet new audiences, interact with other artists and create collaborative potential with technical professionalism and marketin. Additionally, InHale artists often received feedback from audience members to help reflect on or continue their process, video, photos, and a published review of their work. 
• InHale audiences also received the benefit of these elements to the artists as well as the potential to see a vast amount of dance in one evening, for a very affordable price. 

Community. 

• InHale provided an intimate space and created an informal, yet professional environment for these opportunities. 
• Audience development occurred in the presentation of multiple, diverse artists in one evening and allowing the artists and audience members to communicate through written feedback and in informal gatherings after the shows. 
• InHale had applications and participating artists from all over the country - bringing their experiences of dance from MA, CT, NY, NJ, PA, MD, DC, VA, NC, GA, LA,  IL, IA, and WI.  
• I executed a Service Learning project in collaboration with Alvernia University that allowed students to experience the value of service through professional performance, technical production, and curation. 
• I mentored many additional students and young professionals through the process of arts administration, technical production, and performance. 

I'm so grateful to everyone I've met and worked with over the past 11 years. Thank you to KYL/D for this opportunity. Thank you to the artists who have applied and been a part of the InHale community. Thank you for the diverse ways you all have helped me grow - in my thoughts about dance and community, in my artistry in creating and performing my own work, in technical theatre production, in my development as as an administrator, in my understanding of presenting and event planning, and so much more. 

I'm confident that, as I pass the torch, InHale will continue to grow in new ways. 

I'm excited for new adventures on my horizon as I to continue to serve and grow in the dance community.