Rachel Spitzmiller Receives National Dance Award

Rachel Spitzmiller-NDEO National Award Recipient

Rachel Spitzmiller, Fine Arts Center Dancer, has earned the 2015 National Dance Education Organization (NDEO) Artistic Merit, Leadership, and Academic Achievement Award from the NDEO. The awardees were selected by the National Honor Society for Dance Arts adjudication committee.

Junior and senior high school students who have been inducted into the National Honor Society for Dance Arts are eligible for this award, one of the highest dance honors program in the nation. Nominees are evaluated based on nine criteria, including artistic merit, leadership, and academic achievement. Rachel also submitted a video of her performing her own work of choreography.

Photo credit: Brooke Schneider, FAC Visual Art Student

National Honor Society for Dance Arts Induction

Members of the National Honor Society for Dance Arts

Jack Beaule, Rachel Bierly, Olivia Hopkins, Lauren Hurley, Ellen Kilby, Peyton Lemen, Samuel Painter, Sydney Parker, Ashley Pavia, Nicole Pavia, Lucy Quattlebaum, Kiersten Rist, Rachel Spitzmiller, Callie Thackston and Leah Wade

Rachel Spitzmiller was the National Winner in the 2015 NDEO Artistic Merit, Leadership, and Academic Achievement Award, the highest national award given to high school dancers by the National Dance Education Organization!

Sydney Parker was one of two National Finalists in the 2014 NDEO Artistic Merit, Leadership, and Academic Achievement Award, the highest national award given to high school dancers by the National Dance Education Organization! 

Rick McCullough Ballet Guest Artist

Rick McCullough, Associate Professor of Dance at Florida State University, taught two ballet master classes for the PM Dancers in March. Rick McCullough danced in the original North Carolina Dance Theater, the Harkness Ballet of New York, and for nine years with Netherlands Dance Theater. He was Ballet Master for Pittsburgh Ballet Theater and has choreographed works for North Carolina Dance Theater, Washington Ballet, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Ballet Pacifica, Boston Ballet, and School of American Ballet. Recipient of five NEA choreographer’s fellowships, he also directs the North Carolina School of the Arts summer dance concert series on Roanoke Island.

Rick McCullough and Dr. Roy Fluhrer

Guest Artist Rick McCullough and FAC Dancers