Nicole Wesley, owner and artistic director
Nicole is a teacher, performer, and choreographer out of Austin, Texas. She received an MFA in Dance from Texas Woman's University and a BFA in Dance from The University of Texas at Austin. Nicole is a Certified Laban Movement Analyst (CLMA) and has performed works by renowned choreographers David Dorfman, Paul Taylor, Michael Foley, Donald McKayle and Dianne McIntyre. Her choreography has been commissioned and performed nationally and internationally at performance venues such as The Dissolving Borders Symposia in Dundee Scotland; Culturesfrance’s Danses Caraibe in Havana, Cuba; The COCO Dance Festival in Port of Spain, Trinidad; Dance City in Newcastle, England; The Big Read Festival in Austin, Texas; The Dallas Morning News Dance Festival; The American College Dance Festival; The MAD (Modern Atlanta Dance) Festival; The Fringe Festival, Costa Rica; The Fringe Festival, Austin and The Fringe Festival, New York.
Nicole is Artistic Director of The JUSTICE Project in collaboration with her dance partner of twenty years, Darla Johnson. The JUSTICE Project an experiential and community-oriented and devised performance, created and developed collaboratively within diverse populations. Revolving around dialogues of social, political and personal responses to justice, The JUSTICE Project celebrates the authentic artistic voice and embraces the transformation that arises at the intersection of self and community.
Nicole is Co-founder of the Contemporary Choreographers’ Collective and Co-Artistic Director of Trinidad and Tobago’s COCO Dance Festival since 2009. The mission of the Contemporary Choreographers’ Collective is to inspire, encourage and serve the community through creative processes and collaborative and outreach-oriented endeavors. Nicole is currently an Associate Professor of Dance and Head of the BFA Teaching Certification track at Texas State University.
Nicole is Artistic Director of The JUSTICE Project in collaboration with her dance partner of twenty years, Darla Johnson. The JUSTICE Project an experiential and community-oriented and devised performance, created and developed collaboratively within diverse populations. Revolving around dialogues of social, political and personal responses to justice, The JUSTICE Project celebrates the authentic artistic voice and embraces the transformation that arises at the intersection of self and community.
Nicole is Co-founder of the Contemporary Choreographers’ Collective and Co-Artistic Director of Trinidad and Tobago’s COCO Dance Festival since 2009. The mission of the Contemporary Choreographers’ Collective is to inspire, encourage and serve the community through creative processes and collaborative and outreach-oriented endeavors. Nicole is currently an Associate Professor of Dance and Head of the BFA Teaching Certification track at Texas State University.
Sheridan Roalson, owner and general manager
Sheridan comes from an artistic and educational background. She has worked as a performing musician in Austin, TX, for over twenty-five years. Sheridan also worked as a public school teacher and department chair of Special Education for eight years. Her administrative skills were honed as she performed her duties that included accurately completing documentation for over one hundred-twenty students per year, and overseeing the tasks and responsibilities of her team. With Wimberley Dance Elite, Sheridan is given the opportunity once more to learn and excel. She applies her organization and communication skills and expands her accounting and marketing knowledge to make WDE a strong, sound business.
Kristin Messerli, acro director
Kristin and her family are new to Wimberley, Texas. They moved just over a year ago from north of Chicago. Kristin and her husband, Jesse, have 3 children; Jovi, Indiana, and Jacob. She is very excited to have the opportunity to share her love of dance, gymnastics, and fitness with WDE. Kristin comes from a family of coaches, teachers and athletes. She has been a dancer/gymnast since she was 3, when she started ballet lessons. Over the next 20 years, she studied ballet, jazz, contemporary, and modern dance. Much of her dance experience came from her gymnastics gym. She began competitive gymnastics at the age of 8 and competed up to Level 7.. After struggling with knee injuries, Kristin changed her focus to cheerleading. She participated in cheerleading through High School and earned the title of All American Cheerleader 2 years in a row. During her school years, Kristin also fell in love with the theater. She performed and stared in several productions at her school, the local community theater, and then at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign where she attended college. Some of her favorite roles include Carmen (Fame), Sandy (Grease), and dancing in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Jesus Christ Superstar, and A Chorus Line.
Upon graduation, Kristin moved to California to join AmeriCorp and give a year of service as a reading tutor for at-risk elementary school children. While there, she found a passion for teaching and also found her husband. Kristin then earned her Multiple Subjects Certification and Education Specialist Certification and taught elementary special education for 5 years. Kristin rediscovered her love of fitness and athletics after having her third child. She stopped teaching to stay home with her kids and took that time to get certified as a group instructor and personal trainer. She is also a certified TRX instructor. Since then, Kristin has been coaching small group classes in her home or in various gyms and studios and coaching large groups with Orangetheory Fitness. She found that the knowledge, skills, and overall body awareness that she developed early as a dancer/gymnast has given her an eye for proper form and technique in the fitness world. She is extremely excited to get back into the world of dance and gymnastics and share her passion for health, fitness, and to do some cartwheels and flips!!!
Upon graduation, Kristin moved to California to join AmeriCorp and give a year of service as a reading tutor for at-risk elementary school children. While there, she found a passion for teaching and also found her husband. Kristin then earned her Multiple Subjects Certification and Education Specialist Certification and taught elementary special education for 5 years. Kristin rediscovered her love of fitness and athletics after having her third child. She stopped teaching to stay home with her kids and took that time to get certified as a group instructor and personal trainer. She is also a certified TRX instructor. Since then, Kristin has been coaching small group classes in her home or in various gyms and studios and coaching large groups with Orangetheory Fitness. She found that the knowledge, skills, and overall body awareness that she developed early as a dancer/gymnast has given her an eye for proper form and technique in the fitness world. She is extremely excited to get back into the world of dance and gymnastics and share her passion for health, fitness, and to do some cartwheels and flips!!!
Paige Carter, assistant director Elite Dance Company
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Paige Carter is a dancer, instructor, and choreographer from Cedar Park Texas. She has always had a strong passion for dance that has lead her to hold Head Captain positions on her middle school, high school, and college dance teams. During her time in high school she took different classes within Austin-based studios and travelled to LA to train and take classes with professionals at the E.D.G.E. Performing arts center. She graduated from TXST with a dance education degree with honors. It was there that her experience on the TXST Strutters jazz elite team, Pom squad, officer line and eventually head captain role lead her to many performance opportunities. Some of which include performing in the 2016 Presidential Inaugural Parade, Black Tie and Boots Inaugural ball, abroad in Honduras, on the Liberty of the Seas cruise ship, and in multiple NBA halftime shows. She is an enthusiastic instructor who believes in her students, and is committed to seeing growth in them everyday. She is very excited to be teaching with WDE and looks forward to meeting all of her students!
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Teaching Staff
Angela Altmeyer
Angela Altmeyer began dancing at the age of two at a small dance studio in Guam. When she moved back stateside, she continued her dance education at Betty Jack's School of Dance, Fredrick Maryland Regional Ballet Company, Ballet Austin and January's Academy of Arts, but her dance home was always the Wimberley Dance Studio. After five years as a dancer at WDS, Angela began her teaching career at the age of sixteen, and worked and danced at Wimberley Dance Studio for ten more years. During this time, she graduated from Wimberley High School and got her Bachelors of Fine Arts at Southwest Texas State University, focusing in metallurgy, art history and, of course, dance. Angela has also worked at Jackie's Performing Arts school in Austin and the Jadco Dance Company in Charleston, West Virginia, where she was also a principal dancer.
Now that she is back home in Wimberley, she is excited to join Wimberley Dance Elite family and continue teaching and sharing her love of dance.
Lindsey Gerson
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Lindsey Gerson was born in Germany and grew up in El Paso, Texas. She started her dancing career in classical ballet at 13 and continued for 6 years under the direction of David Alejandro Duran. After graduating high school, she traveled abroad for 7 months in Germany and China during a Discipleship Training School where she also experienced native dance forms. After returning, she moved to Austin and began choreography and improv classes with Darla Johnson and learned American Sign Language at Austin Community College. During this time, she began sewing and costume making. After gaining her Certificate in American Sign Language Studies, she transferred to Texas State. She was a member of Merge Dance Company for the 2016-2017 season and traveled with them to preform in Trinidad for the Contemporary Choreographers’ Collective Dance Festival. She joined Transient Dance Collective in 2016 and was the President this past year (2017-2018). Her dance films, Refine and Imprisoned, have both been selected for various film festivals. She graduated in May with her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance with an emphasis in Performance and Choreography. She continues her selftaught work as an amateur seamstress and also teaches dance in the surrounding Austin area. She will be preforming with the aerial dance company, Blue Lapis Light, this fall. Lindsey’s darling black cat, Coco, enjoys assisting with all sewing projects. Lindsey is very excited to be teaching at Wimberley Dance Elite this year!
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Derrick Lee
A late bloomer, Derrick’s passion for dance didn’t blossom until his freshman year of college when he audition for an organization on the Texas A&M University campus called Fade to Black. Predominantly focusing on hip hop, he studied a variety of dance styles from tap and contemporary to Bollywood and salsa. In addition to dancing on campus, he danced with MTV’s America’s Best Dance Crew’s SoRealCru Performance Team and was awarded many scholarships at different conventions such as PULSE and Monsters of Hip Hop. His success and experience in the arts helped leverage his move to New York City in March of 2015 where he took class, auditioned, and performed on several stages. On his third year, Derrick is excited to continue inspiring, leading, and directing individuals, front and center on this beautiful stage we call life.
Madison Loewen
Madison Loewen started dancing her sophomore year of high school both in studio and as a member of The Colony High School Topcats Drill Team where she served as Captain her senior year. After high school, Madison attended Tyler Junior College where she spent the best two years of her life as an Internationally Famous Apache Belle, making her a member of the 69th line. After TJC she attended Stephen F Austin State University where she had an amazing experience as a member of the SFA Dance Teams. Wanting to further her education, Madison decided to transfer and be a part of one of the best dance education programs in the country at Texas State University. Still having a love for drill team, Madison became a member of the World Famous Texas State Strutters during her first year at Texas State. She has just recently graduated from Texas State and received her BFA in Dance Education.
Dana Mosbey
Dana Mosbey is a native Texan who began her dance career at age two. During her elementary years, Dana left dance to pursue athletics but returned in junior high and high school where she participated in musicals, served as Dance Captain for show choir, and competed as a team cheerleader. Dana Mosbey graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Dance Studies with a Minor in Honor Studies (Magma Cum Laude) from Texas State University. Dana has performed in many Texas State productions including The Tempest, Opening Door Dance Theatre, Choreographer Showcase, BFA Thesis Concert, Creation In Motion 5.0 and served as a dance company member of CIMTEYA: Creation In Motion Touring Ensemble for Young Audiences underneath the direction of Kaysie Seitz-Brown. Dana has performed at three international dance festivals; CoCo Dance Festival in Port of Spain, Trinidad and US Festival in Bedford, England for two years. Dana has choreographed works for high schools in the San Antonio area and teaches various styles at Wimberley Dance ELITE. Dana is an active researcher in the field of Dance Ethnography and has published her Honors College Thesis, Encompassment: Dance Ethnography Through Live Performance. Dana has served as a Study Abroad Ambassador for two years, completed the Disney College Program twice in Orlando, Florida, where she worked at Disney's Hollywood Studios as an Attractions Cast Member. She is also a member of the Disney Alumni Association. Dana currently teaches and choreographs in the Austin, Texas area.