Meet The Faculty

Anne Marie Kimmell

Anne Marie, a high school graduate of the Virginia School of the Arts. Anne Marie’s training also includes the Princeton Ballet and Ballet West Conservatory.

Katie Beliveau

Katie received her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Ballet with teaching and performance emphases from the University of Utah. Her training also includes Caryl Maxwell Classical Ballet, Ballet West Conservatory, Shenandoah Conservatory and Frederick Classical Ballet.

Dara Watson

Dara Watson began her dance training at the age of three. She started dancing at the Ashburn Academy of Dance, with Katie Beliveau and Anne Marie Kimmell, at the age of 10 where she studied Ballet, Jazz, Tap, and Lyrical.

Colleen Giardina

Colleen Giardina is the Children’s Director and Director of Darby’s Dancers at Ashburn Academy of Dance. She graduated from Radford University with a BFA in classical ballet.

Katie Hooper

Katie Hooper is our Ballet, Lyrical, Jazz, and Darby’s Dancers instructor for the 2017-18 dance season. She started dancing at Ashburn Academy of Dance, with Katie Beliveau and Anne Marie Kimmell, at the age of 8 where she studied Ballet, Tap, Jazz, Hip Hop, and Lyrical.

Melanie Rainville

Melanie Rainville Thurston has been dancing, professionally teaching, and choreographing dance in the Northern Virginia area for over twenty years. Her career encompasses studies across the United States and in Europe.

Nicole DeMiglio

Nicole DeMiglio- received her BFA in Dance from George Mason University, where she received the Central Fidelity Dance Scholarship, Kevin Campbell Summer Scholarship, and the Academic Achievement Award in Dance.

Lauren Niehoff

Lauren Niehoff began dancing at the age of two. Her love of dance lead her to study many styles of dance such as ballet, jazz, lyrical, tap, hip hop, pointe, and modern.

Jose Soto

Jose started dancing at the age of 17 at Maryvale High School in Phoenix, Arizona. His studio training began under Miss Elizabeth Roper in ballet, and since then has developed a roster of both Arizona’s finest and some of the country’s most prominent professionals.

Daphne Batista

Joy Chappell