CWDA Staff
Jane Venezia
Owner
School Director
Ballet Instructor
Jane’s early ballet training was at the Jordan College of Music, in Indianapolis, IN. She was a scholarship student at the Boston Ballet School, an apprentice with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet Company and a company member of New Hampshire Ballet. As a member of Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre she danced in productions of "Giselle", Nutcracker" and "Swan Lake". In NYC she was a member of the Radio City Music Hall ballet ensemble. She moved to New Jersey and taught at the Mercer High School for the Performing Arts. She founded Montgomery Dance Arts in the fall of 1992. She is in the 1994 edition of Who's Who Among America's Teachers. She has set works on companies/schools in Iowa City, IA, Bainbridge Island, Grand Rapids, MN and Ellensburg, WA.
She has been the director of the Central Washington Dance Academy for the past sixteen years. She founded the Central Washington Dance Ensemble (CWDE), the performing company of the school, in order to give dedicated dance students more opportunities to perform and to share the beauty of dance with the Ellensburg community on a larger scale. CWDE has presented five ballet productions under her direction, several in collaboration with the CWU theatre and dance depts. Within that same time period she has directed annual productions for the school featuring all levels and dance styles from the school.
Jane is also an American Ballet Theatre (ABT) certified instructor obtained through her ongoing seminars and testing in New York City at ABT headquarters.
Cindy Bruns
Ballet & Conditioning
Instructor
Cindy studied ballet with Toni Pimble, Riley Grannon, and Susan Zadoff at the Eugene School of Ballet. She attended summer intensives at Whitman College and at the Royal Academy of Dancing's summer program in Toronto, Canada. She began touring with the Eugene Ballet Company (EBC) at age 14 when she was cast as Clara in the Nutcracker. After that, she began performing corps de ballet roles with EBC on a regular basis. In addition to The Nutcracker, in which she danced various roles including Chinese and Waltz of the Flowers, she performed in Cinderella, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Romeo and Juliet, and Bolero. As an instructor, she has taught at the Eugene School of Ballet, Berkeley Ballet Theater, and Berkeley City Ballet. She has been teaching ballet at Central Washington Dance Academy (formerly Stage Door Dance) since 2010.
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Taylor Bir
Office Administrator
Tap, Contemporary & Ballet
Preschool, Kinder, & Combo
Instructor
Taylor Bir began dancing at three years old, receiving the bulk of her training at Dance Expressions in Maple Valley. Taylor was a member of Ensemble Ballet Theatre, dancing with the company for eight years. She also danced at Summer Dance Lab in Walla Walla, Washington, where she has taken classes from members of Spectrum and Eugene Ballet, Allison Keppel and Jennifer Martin, respectively. Taylor is a graduate of Central Washington University where she received a MS in Administrative Management, BA in Communication Studies and a dance performance minor. Taylor is a former dancer and choreographer for the Orchesis dance company at Central Washington University, although she has graduated, she continues to work closely with the company. Taylor works with the Physical Education, School Health and Movement Studies program at CWU teaching classes ranging from tap to dance fusion. Taylor enjoys community outreach programs choreographing for various organizations throughout Ellensburg, most notably, Distinguished Young Women of Ellensburg. Taylor still attends national conventions and conventions such as NUVO and Radix to grow as a dancer, choreographer and Instructor
Christina Kowalski-Holien
Musical Theater
Instructor
University of Washington Doctorate Christina Kowalski-Holien is a native of Germany, where she received her Masters in Music at the Hochschule fuer Music und Kunst in Frankfurt, Germany. Christina began her stage career at the age of six and has since then been engaged in numerous stage productions in Germany and the U.S. She was a part of the University of Puget Sound Affiliate Artists for 16 years, where she coached voice students, preparing them for graduate programs and placing students regularly at prestigious graduate schools like the Royal Conservatory of London and The American Musical and Dramatic Academy, NYC.
Christina has been a private voice instructor and coach since 2005 and is currently the director of the Windy City Voice Studio, a nationally based online and in-person studio; home to professional musicians such as the Pipeline Vocal Project and former American Idol contestant Adriana Latonio. Christina’s Musical Theater teaching experience includes choreographing dance routines and directing and conducting group Musical Theater classes, camps, and performances at the Community Music School, Tacoma. She is also the original creator of the Musical Theater program at the Ellensburg Dance Ensemble (EDE). .
Christina is excited to join the ranks of professional and experienced teachers at Central Washington Dance Academy.
Emily Evans
Office Admin
Ballet & Contemporary
Instructor
Emily is a Central Washington University graduate with degrees in Dance and Applied Mathematics. She started her dance training at The Ballet Slipper in Oak Harbor, WA with a focus on ballet until she graduated high school. During her four years at CWU, she performed annually on campus with the Orchesis Dance Company, and she also performed with Orchesis at the Northwest Regional Conference of the American College Dance Association on three separate occasions, the National Dance Education Organization Conference in Bellevue, and the Detroit Dance City Festival.
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She joined a CWDA production of The Nutcracker in 2021, and has been performing with them since, with highlight roles including The Lilac Fairy in Sleeping Beauty and Bert in Adventures with Mary Poppins.
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At CWDA, Emily is an office assistant and teaches ballet and contemporary for ages 6 to 7.
