Parkins to be the inaugural Arnhold Director in Dance Training

June 30, 2022

By Kari Dickinson

Michelle (Chell) Parkins was lately named the inaugural Arnhold Director in Dance Training with UW–Madison’s Dance Division, a place she’s going to begin on Aug. 1.

This new place was made doable by a present from dance advocate, educator, and founding father of the Dance Training Laboratory Jody Gottfried Arnhold (BA 1965) and her husband John Arnhold. Their help was matched by the Faculty of Training’s Affect 2030 initiative.

“Chell brings a wealth of expertise working in dance training in New York, Tennessee, and Texas,” says Andrea Harris, an affiliate professor and chair of the Dance Division. “She can be an innovator and fierce advocate for dance in Wisconsin public faculties. We see this as a very transformational rent, for our division, group, and state.”

Parkins presently is a doctoral candidate finishing her time period as web site coordinator for the Dance Training Program at Lecturers Faculty, Columbia College. Her analysis focuses on the experiences of Latinx-identifying lecturers and college students engaged in culturally related and sustaining dance education schemes. She lately served as a scholar-in-residence and marketing consultant to the group engagement director at Ballet Hispánico, the place she assisted within the growth of the corporate’s group engagement curriculum. 

Earlier than her transfer to New York Metropolis, Parkins resided in Tennessee, the place she was a dance and motion marketing consultant for the Tennessee Arts Academy, the manager director of the Tennessee Affiliation of Dance, a full time lecturer in dance at Center Tennessee State College, and a advantageous arts subject material knowledgeable for the Tennessee Division of Training. 

As Parkins begins work with the Faculty of Training, her priorities will embody being an advocate for dance training statewide and regionally; designing and implementing a dance training curriculum within the Faculty of Training; instructing programs, networking, and collaborating with faculty districts; creating partnerships and pathways for future dance lecturers; and main Okay-12 dance programming regionally and past.

Parkins has bachelor’s levels in dance and appearing from Washington College in St. Louis and an MFA in dance from the College of Texas at Austin. She is predicted to obtain an EdD in dance training from Lecturers Faculty, Columbia College, in December 2022 or Might 2023. 

“I’m thrilled to be becoming a member of the distinguished dance college at UW–Madison at a pivotal time in our nation, notably concerning the drastically evolving wants of our public faculty youth recovering from trauma induced by the pandemic, disembodied studying, and extended isolation,” says Parkins. “I hope to comply with within the progressive footsteps of Margaret H’Doubler, who returned from her research at Lecturers Faculty, Columbia College, to create the primary college dance main at UW–Madison in 1926, carving a path for dance training in public faculties. My imaginative and prescient entails creating new and constructing on present partnerships between the UW–Madison Dance Division and public faculties, mentoring college college students coming into the sphere of dance training, and advocating for equitable entry to bounce training for each baby throughout the state.”