CATHERINE FAIR has been employed by Amherst Ballet since 1997 where she began as an instructor, was promoted to Assistant Director and currently serves as Director. She has taught ballet and jazz to hundreds of students in Massachusetts and Virginia where she founded The Southside School of Ballet and also served as the Artistic Director of the Academy of Emporia Ballet. Fair passed her teaching examinations with merit in 1998 with the Royal Academy of Dance (RAD) and is an RAD certified teacher. She has entered students in RAD examinations since 1991 with excellent results. Fair has created and choreographed numerous works including Amherst Ballet's production of The Magician's Nephew and An Evening of Music and Dance with Johann Sebastian Bach. Recently, she was the choreographer for Amherst Ballet's The Very Lonely Firefly and The Honeybee and the Robber performed at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art. Fair received her Bachelor's degree from George Mason University in 1985 and currently lives in Amherst with her husband and three children.

SHERYL HOLMES, (Lower School Ballet & Creative Movement) home educating mother of nine, returns to the dance world.  She attended the Walnut Hill School of Performing Arts during her high school years. Sheryl studied & performed with the Northampton School of Ballet & Pioneer Valley Ballet as a dancer, teacher, rehearsal mistress and assistant stage manager for PVB’s Nutcracker.  Sheryl majored in Dance & received the Chancellor’s Talent Award Scholarship at the University of Massachusetts, earning a BFA in Dance.  She holds a Master’s Degree in Dance Movement Therapy from Antioch University.  Holmes is excited to get back into teaching children the love of movement & dance as a ballet and creative movement teacher at Amherst Ballet.

KAREN MICHAELS, (Lower School Ballet, Modern Dance guest teacher) earned her BFA from the Boston Conservatory of Music in Dance. She began her training in Modern Dance at the age of 7, and ballet at 13. Also trained as a musician, Ms. Michaels has worked with many dance companies, including Tslila Goldstein & Dancers, Choreo, and Lightning Dance. She has studied ballet with Marcus Shulkind, Margo Parsons, Roseanne Ridings and Kenneth Lipitz, among others.

CHING-SHAN (Sandra) PARKS, (Advanced Ballet, Advanced Jazz & Adult Ballet), BFA in Dance Performance from Tisch School of the Arts, NYU, MFA in Choreography and Dance from Smith College, MA

Sandra is originally from Taiwan where she received her ballet and Chinese dance training, and she danced with Fours Season Ballet and Wu-I Dance Company. Upon graduation from Tisch, Sandra toured nationally and internationally with a Broadway production of the King And I. In addition, she has been the lead dancer and choreographer for more than 75 different concerts for singers from Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, and New York area since 1996. She moved to Boston in 2001, and she danced with Bosoma Dance Company, Dance Collective, and Impulse Dance Company.

Sandra started her teaching career in 2000 and she has taught beginners from inner city public schools, advanced students from performing arts academies and college dance majors. She was invited to teach master classes in Taipei, Taiwan in the summer of 2004 and 2006, American Dance College Festival in Boston University 2006 and she remains teaching privately in New York City. She is currently a faculty member at Amherst Ballet, Belmont High School, Mass Movement/Young Audience and Mass Motion Dance.

JENNY BENNETT-MANSUR, (Jazz 1, 2 ,3 , Lower School Ballet and Creative Movement, Modern Repertoire), BFA in Dance, cum laude, from the University of Massachusetts. Jenny has taught modern, acrobatics, jazz, ballet, and hip hop since 2001. She is currently on faculty at various studios throughout western and central Mass. She has performed repertoire by Robert Battle, Fritha Pengelley, Trisha Brown, and Doug Varone within the Five Colleges. This is Jenny’s second year on the faculty of Amherst Ballet.