While registration for classes is on a give-what-you-can basis to ACDA members and non-members, institutions have the opportunity to purchase these classes as guest artist experiences for your students and faculty.

A $100.00/class fee will cover up to a maximum of 20 spaces for dancers from your institution in one class. Unused class spots will not carry over from one class to another. Institutions may request multiple classes at $100 each. If you have fewer than 10 students/faculty who wish to attend a Give & Take class, you may request an invoice of $10 per person (up to nine people) per class.

The class fee will be deemed a registration fee, rather than a donation. The procedure for those interested in getting access to a class or multiple classes for your institution is as follows:

• Contact the ACDA National Office (info@acda.dance).
• Specify for which class(es) you are interested in securing spots.
• Specify whether you want to pay by credit card or check.
• Note: credit card charges incur an additional $3.00 processing fee.
• Note: In order to grant Zoom access, each student or faculty covered by your institutional fee must individually register for the class through the online form on the ACDA website.
• This offer is available only to current ACDA Institutional Members in good standing.
• Please contact the ACDA National Office if your membership has lapsed but renewal is in process or if you intend to begin the renewal process.

ACDA will send you an invoice based on your request.
Questions? Contact us. We are happy to discuss further.

Mike Esperanza is an acclaimed artist from New York City who has established a national presence in the dance communities. Mike has presented on prestigious stages including the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Sergerstrom Center for the Arts, McCalllum Theatre, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Salvatore Capezio Theater at Peridance, The Royal Conservatory in Cordoba, Spain, and the Australian Circus Festival.  The Los Angeles Contemporary Dance Company, Dark Circles Contemporary Dance, and other universities around the United States have commissioned Mike’s work.  

Mike’s talent garnered the 2005 “Dance: Creation for Performance” grant presented by Dance/USA and the Irvine Foundation, the 2010 “Innerstate” tour presented by ODC Theater, the 2010 paid engagement award at the Palm Desert Choreography Under the Stars Festival, the 2014 Reverb Dance Festival commission award, and the 2014 and 2020 CUNY Dance Initiative. Mike’s work has been described as “bold, athletic movement and theatricality – the latter clearly the coming together of Esperanza’s many talents – the company epitomizes the dance of the new millennium: shape-shifting, vernacular-blending with a prescient focus on the brave new world in which we live.” ~ Jessica Abrams, Explore Dance. 

All donations from Mike Espernza’s class will be evenly shared by ACDA and Movement Exchange.
Movement Exchange unites dance and service through its network of university chapters, international dance exchanges, and year-  round programs in underserved communities.
Click here to learn more about Movement Exchange

The Joy of Movement Class Description
This class is for dancers of various skill levels to bring us together in an open and supportive way and connect us all to our love for dance and community. Grounded in the fundamentals of traditional modern technique, particularly the work of José Limón, the class focuses on concepts of alignment, core strength, and the use of breath for efficiency of movement. The class will begin with simple floor exercises and develop into standing warm-up combinations and a center movement phrase.

Because music and its relationship to movement is such an important focus for Gerri’s approach to dance, we are delighted to say that music for these classes will be provided by the wonderful long-time ADF musician, John Hanks.

Gerri Houlihan’s Biography
 Gerri Houlihan began her professional training at the Juilliard School, studying with Antony Tudor, Alfredo Corvino and members of the Martha Graham and Jose Limon dance companies.  She performed with the Metropolitan Opera Ballet Company and the Paul Sanasardo Dance Company and spent five years as a soloist with the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company touring extensively throughout the United States and Europe. Ms. Houlihan has taught or choreographed for such institutions as N.Y.’s High School of Performing Arts, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, the Bates Dance Festival, the Boston Ballet, Meredith College, the University of South Florida, the North Carolina School of the Arts, the University of North Carolina –Greensboro and Virginia Commonwealth University.  From 1984-1987 Houlihan directed her own school and company, The Boston Dance Project.  She was one of five finalists in the Boston Ballet’s International Choreography Competition.  From 1988-1999, Ms. Houlihan was on the faculty of the New World School of the Arts in Miami, Florida.  During that time, she was also the artistic director of Houlihan and Dancers.  The recipient of two Florida Individual Artist Fellowships in Dance/Choreography in 1991-92 and 1996-97, Houlihan and Dancers was on the touring roster for the state of Florida.  On the Advisory Board for the American Dance Festival, she has been on the faculty of the ADF from 1981-1983, and from 1987 to the present.  As an international representative for ADF she has participated in seventeen international linkages, teaching in Korea, China, Brazil, Paraguay, Chile, Estonia, Poland, the Philippines, Moscow and Mongolia.  She is the 2005 recipient of the ADF’s Balasaraswati, Joy Ann Dewey Beinecke Endowed Chair for Distinguished Teaching.  She was Co-Dean and then Dean of the ADF School from 2010-2015.  Completing her undergraduate work at Virginia Commonwealth University, she went on to get her MFA from the Hollins/ADF MFA program.  She joined the dance faculty at Florida State University in 2007, and received the Pearl S. Tyner Distinguished Professor in Teaching award from FSU in 2012.  She recently retired from FSU where she is now Professor Emerita.  Currently, she teaches at the year-round American Dance Festival studios in North Carolina and directs the Big Red Dance Project- a group of dancers ages 35-78.

All donations from Gerri Houlihan’s class will be equally shared by ACDA and the American Dance Festival.

American Dance Festival Mission Statement: to encourage and support the creation and presentation of new modern dance work by both established and emerging choreographers, to preserve our modern dance heritage through continued presentation of classic works as well as through archival efforts, to build wider national and international audiences for modern dance, to enhance public understanding and appreciation of the art form and its cultural and historical significance, to provide a sound scientific and aesthetic base for professional education and training of young dancers, and to maintain a forum for integrating and disseminating information on dance education.Click here to learn more about the American Dance Festival

Louisiana Noir! Class Description
Class explores street and social dances of Louisiana. Some of the dances have their origins in night clubs and dance halls from Southwest Louisiana like “zydeco” while others were created out of parade traditions from New Orleans such as “second line”. The music is hard-driving and playful roots music with elements of Cajun, Blues, Rock ‘n Roll, Jazz, Brass and Afro-Caribbean rhythms. The dances explored in class create beautiful connections and yet allow for inspired individual play and freedom.

Millicent Johnnie’s Biography
A child of South Louisiana and daughter of dance, Millicent Johnnie (writer/director/choreographer) is a culture bearer, scholar and world citizen, following in the footsteps of her immediate ancestors as well as her dance heroines. As a teenager, she hosted a local social justice TV show met by protests and objection from the local KKK; she traces her professional determination and commitment to social issues in black culture to this early opposition. Former Associate Artistic Director of Urban Bush Women, she has also served as a choreographer for Walt Disney Creative Entertainment’s Frozen: Live at the Hyperion; has worked A & R in the music industry through Marvelous Enterprises; performed at the 2016 Opening Ceremonies of the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro; choreographed the feature film, Scary Movie 5, and collaborated with Academy Award-winning director Tiffany Rhynard, on the short film “Ma Negresse: Blood Memories” (2020 release), featuring four-time Grammy Nominee, Cedric Watson. Then, with 20 years experience working as a choreographer, director and assistant professor in the performing arts, Johnnie applied to film school at the Florida State University. Knowing that filmmaking would be the natural evolution of her artistic work, Johnnie recently received her MFA in film, having also just choreographed Thoughts of a Colored Man, a Broadway-bound play produced by Syracuse Stage and Baltimore Center Stage.

Your generous donations are appreciated.
All donations from Millicent Johnnie’s class will be equally shared by ACDA and Sisters Unite Productions.

Sisters Unite Productions brings together visionary female artists to tell stories that illuminate current social issues and awaken empathy for other human beings. We create documentaries, dance films, video installations, and music videos. All work is crafted with an emphasis on heightening awareness, finding poetic pauses, and generating dialogue. We maintain creative license over our work and are dedicated to producing films and media that remain true to our desire to expand human connection and fight injustice.Click here to learn more about the Sisters Unite Productions

Contemporary Jazz Class Description African Cultural Values and principals are the frameworks inside of a contemporary jazz dance space, creating a unique ethos within a dancing community.

This Contemporary Jazz class consists of grounded and athletic movement that inspires the dancer physically and taps naturally into the emotional nature of the artist. Expect syncopated rhythms, undulation, isolations, and active use of plié; weight shifting, and stylized/technical movement. The dancer will be encouraged to achieve not only a strong focus on style and technique but also, to investigate and celebrate the freedom of expression through the body.

Monique Haley’s Biography
Monique Haley (Springfield, VA) is a graduate of The University of the Arts in Philadelphia, PA, with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in performing arts, specializing in jazz dance. Monique honors nine memorable years with the prestigious River North Chicago Dance Company, as the first African- American female to join the company in 2001. She has also been a member of the Bermuda Dance Company and the Eleone Dance Theater of Philadelphia. 

In Chicago, Monique was a frequent teacher for the Lou Conte Dance Studio, the Visceral Dance Center, and the Joffrey Academy of Dance Trainee Program. Monique participates yearly as part of the Chicago Dance Connection Jazz Camp Faculty and has taught for the former River North Chicago and Inaside Dance Company Summer Intensives. She has set choreography for high school, collegiate, and professional companies on a national scale. As a dance educator, Monique has been a guest teacher in 2016, 2017, and 2019 ACDA East Central Conferences.

In musical theater, Ms. Haley was featured as a dancer and ensemble member in the Disney musical The Jungle Book, directed by Mary Zimmerman and choreographed by the Tony Award-winning Christopher Gattelli. In Chicago’s regional theater seen, she was dance captain/ensemble member, and associate choreographer, for the Drury Lane Oakbrook Theater’s production of Aida, and the associate choreographer of Paramount Theater Aurora’s inaugural production of My Fair Lady. Additional theater credits include HAIR, Joseph, and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (Mrs. Potiphar). Chicago (June), On the Town, amongst others.

Monique has choreographed for American Midwest Ballet, Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre, Nomi Dance Company, Visceral Dance Company, the Chicago Repertory Ballet Company, and the collaborative works with the Chicago – based companies Muntu African Dance Company, and DanceWorks Chicago. In 2010, she created the entertainment segment for the Danny Clark Foundation Annual Celebrity Gala: Le Moulin Rouge, a Night in Paris, to help raise money to promote advocacy, education, and outreach programs to those in need. Haley’s choreography has been featured in Dance for Life Chicago, the annual aids benefit concert. In 2015, she premiered a collaborative theatre/dance piece Still Life with Drumming at the Myron S. Szold Music and Dance Hall at The Old Town School of Folk Music. Collegiate commissions include work for the former Marygrove College, Western Michigan University, and the University of the Arts, to name a few. 

Monique’s career and creative works are recognized in such publications as Dance Spirit and Dance Magazine. Haley is one of the first artists to receive a 3Arts Award (2012) for choreography and dance, as well as her contribution to the arts community in the city of Chicago. 

Ms. Haley holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in Dance from The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She began to devise her dance process research, the Diasporic Encounter Method (DEM), which centers African cultural values and rituals in jazz dance pedagogy. Monique has been invited to the prestigious American Dance Festival (ADF), to be a part of their summer 2020 dance faculty. Haley will use DEM as a foundational teaching tool to inspire an authentic ethos and connection between participants in their daily jazz practice. Pending COVID-19 restrictions, she now looks forward to bringing this opportunity to fruition in 2021. 

Concerning future endeavors, a multi-authored book of jazz dance educators and experts, “21st Century Jazz Dance” by editors Lindsay Guarino, Carlos Jones, and Wendy Oliver features Ms. Haley’s DEM research. Her chapter, Cultivating African Diasporic Ethos and Cultural Values in Contemporary Jazz Dance, to debut sometime in 2021. 

In addition, she is a resident choreographer for Chicago’s, Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre, and will soon begin virtual rehearsals on her work, ROOT (2019), as well as a new music and dance collaboration working with three other Chicago artists in the performance work, Mood Swing. CRDT Artistic Director, Wilfredo Rivera will lead us and composer Joe Cerqua in developing duets between musicians and dancers that respond to the current pandemic crisis and social justice movement, to be debut later in the 2020-2021 season.

In Kalamazoo, Monique continues to inspire and passionately educate her students at the Western Michigan University Department of Dance, teaching jazz dance curriculum and working with the musical theater performance students as an Assistant Professor of Dance.

Your generous donations are appreciated.
All donations from Monique Haley’s class will be equally shared by ACDA and The Paige Fraser Foundation.

The mission of TPFF is to create a safe space for aspiring young artists, with or without disabilities, to reach their full potential in Dance, Music, Theater and the Visual Arts.
Click here to learn more about the The Paige Fraser Foundation

Contemporary Modern Class Description
This class explores contemporary modern vocabulary and technique, focusing on the expressive use of the rounding and arching (articulation) of the spine, joint mobility, swinging, casting, and off-balance movements. Beginning with a pre-stretch warm-up followed by structured improv, the class continues with unconventional plie and tendu exercises focusing on the lengthening of the limbs supporting increased flexibility and range in motion. In addition, all aspects of tempo, movement range, rhythmical patterns, and dynamic accents are explored culminating with a learned combination.

Elijah Gibson’s Biography 
Elijah Alhadji Gibson, Founder and Artistic Director of Social Movement Contemporary Dance (SMCD), began his training at the San Diego School for the Creative and Performing Arts. Gibson continued his education and studied dance in college and received his Master of Fine Arts in Dance from the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, with a focus on dance history, somatic studies, and pedagogy. In 1999, he joined the world-renowned Gus Giordano Jazz Dance Chicago, touring nationally and internationally, performing work by the late Gus Giordano, Margo Sappington, Billy Seigenfeld, Christopher Huggins, Mia Michaels, Liz Imperio, Randy Duncan, Mark Swanhart, Tony Powell, Ron De Jesus, Alberto Arias, and Davis Robertson, among many others. 

Gibson has received commissions to create work around the world. In his artistic process, he draws on personal experiences, current issues, and systems surrounding him. Gibson’s choreography reflects his belief that dance mirrors how people embrace and/or resist the cultural boundaries, limitations, and expectations laid upon them by social constructs. This conviction motivated Gibson’s creation of We Are Greenwood, which received critical acclaim and has been performed both at the Kennedy Center and Jacob’s Pillow. He followed up We Are Greenwood with The Black Card, an evening of new works providing a glimpse inside his personal experiences dealing with race, cultural affirmation, and expression in the United States. The show illustrated the problematic duality of assimilation, specifically, how one may reject their own cultural identity to fit in, and the aftermath of those choices. Through expression of the struggle against established systems of oppression that hinder the pursuit of the “American Dream,” Gibson explored the boundaries of cultural appropriation and appreciation and offered a solution towards reconfiguring the ideas and values that have shaped the nature of subjugation in the United States. 

Gibson has also had the privilege of guest performing with many companies, including Instruments of Movement, Cirqua Rivera Dance Theater, Thodos Dance Chicago, and Especially Tap Chicago. He has taught throughout the United States, as well as in Germany, France, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Costa Rica, Latvia, Spain, Ecuador, Canada, and Mexico, in addition to serving on the faculties of Gus Giordano Jazz Intensive, American College Dance Festival Association, Jazz Dance World Congress, Dance Masters of Wisconsin, RDA Midwest, Chicago National Association of Dance Masters, Leon Dance Arts NY, Embrace Dance Convention, Black College Dance Exchange, and Key West Modern Dance. 

Your generous donations are appreciated.
All donations from Elijah Gibson’s class will be equally shared by ACDA and Social Movement Contemporary Dance.

Social Movement Contemporary Dance Mission StatementSocial Movement Contemporary Dance (SMCD) promotes social consciousness through creative arts and community engagement by expressing the breadth and depth of the human condition through dance and storytelling.
Click here to learn more about Social Movement Contemporary Dance

Enmeshed: Classical and Contemporary Indian Dance Practice Class Description
This technique class explores a burgeoning contemporary dance field, borrowing elements from existing Indian classical, folk, martial art, contemporary, and commercial styles. In particular, it will present a democratic approach to the landscape of Indian dance focusing on Odissi (classical), Bharatnatyam (classical), Kalaripayattu (martial art), and Shankar (contemporary). It will end with a celebratory folk form that is used widely in the commercial dance form of Bollywood.  The movements will explore concepts such as geometric angularity, curvilinearity, musicality, percussivity, groundedness, centering, balancing, and expressivity across a range of classical, folk, contemporary, somatic practices, and commercial styles. 

Your generous donations are appreciated. All donations from Kaustavi Sarker’s class will be shared by ACDA and Arts without Borders.

Arts without Borders Mission Statement: To popularize classical performing arts in North America. To explore and highlight the ways in which oriental and western classical art-forms resemble or complement each other. To create opportunities for everyone to learn, enjoy and contribute to classical performing art. Click here to learn more about the Arts without Borders