"I have a Bachelor's in theater and religion from Hope College in Holland, MI. Besides those two focus areas, I also had extensive training in vocal performance and dance. I then studied at University of North Dakota where I received my Master's in Theater Performance Theory.

I've been performing all my life and have focused the last few years on coaching and teaching others. I still love to perform and do on occasion, but seeing young people (or anybody for that matter!) grow in confidence in any type of performance area brings me great satisfaction. I believe everyone has talents and abilities just waiting to be explored and truly enjoy seeing people excel in areas they previously had not explored.

In addition to music education, I'm also qualified in a number of English language areas. I particularly love literature. One of the (to me) unfortunate aspects of Common Core Standards are a lack of emphasis on literature, focusing instead on informational text. I believe literature has a great many things to tell us about ourselves,the world around us, and the interaction between the two that informational text cannot." less...