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Faculty

Rubi Calderon

Rubi Calderon

Classical & Hip Hop | Children & Teens, Elite, and Adult

Rubi Calderon began her training with ballroom before making the big switch over to Ballet, Jazz, and Hip Hop. Later on she expanded her dance education into various Modern techniques, Musical Theater and Pom. Rubi began teaching at 15 years old and quickly realized that is was something she wants to do for the rest of her life. She has gone on to manage competition teams, performance teams, and high school vocational education classes in both Gilroy and Hollister. Now Rubi has found a home for her love of teaching at Purdance, where she teaches Tap,Ballet,Tumbling, Jazz, and Hip Hop!

Anthony daste

Anthony daste

Hip Hop | Children & Teens and Adult

Anthony Daste is a Northern California native who currently attends San Jose State University as a Public Health major and a Dance minor. He started off as a street/freestyle dancer and has since trained in multiple styles. In 2016, he joined an urban choreography team called VIP San Jose where he started to compete at different competitions. He is currently on the Academy of Villains, the choreographer and co-founder of Commonality San Jose, and is the president of SJSU’s hip hop club. He has showcased and competed at various dance shows such as World of Dance Finals, Vibe dance competition, Evolution Urban Dance Competition, and had the opportunity to be cast in a dance movie called “No Dance, no life” with the Academy of Villains. He currently teaches street styles, intermediate breakdance, and intermediate Hip Hop at Prudence.

Olivia Negrete

Olivia Negrete

Children & Teens and Adult

Olivia Negrete is a dancer, choreographer, and student from Granada Hills, California. She is currently studying at San Jose State University as a Marine Biology major. Olivia started dancing at the young age of two, and grew up training in ballet, contemporary, jazz, pointe, and hip hop. She also was a part of her studio’s competition team and became a teaching assistant at the age of 13. This allowed her to share her passion and love for dance. Later, she joined Granada Hills Charter High School Dance Team and became an officer which allowed her to choreograph and lead routines. In college, Olivia joined the Synkronize Dance K-Pop club at SJSU and is currently an officer for the club.

jessica reis

jessica reis

Classical | Children & Teens, Elite, and Adult

Jessica Reis is a dancer, instructor and choreographer based here in the South Bay. Originally from the east coast, Jessica received her BFA in dance along with a teaching licensure at George Mason University where she had the pleasure of performing works by David Parsons, Doug Varone, Mark Morris and Ohad Naharin. After performing professionally in New York City for 2 years, she made the move out to California along with her husband and cat. Over the past 4 years, Jessica has had the pleasure of performing with numerous Bay Area dance companies including Kaneisee Collective, ArcTangent and Perspectives Dance Company. In addition to dance, Jessica is also a Pilates instructor which has greatly influenced not only her own dancing but how she teaches movement to others. You can find her at Purdance on Mondays and Wednesdays teaching everything from contemporary and ballet to technique and jazz.

Kailani Ponti

Kailani Ponti

Children & Teens and Adult

Kailani Ponti aka Divinity (they/them/theirs) is a freestyle movement artist and choreographer who has been dancing for 5 years. They are a practitioner of different street dance, club, and hip-hop styles with their personal movement style heavily influenced by waving and vogue femme. They also are influenced by movement from artists that they look up to. Wacking and vogue femme are styles that they have been training in for a few years. Starting in high school, they started dancing with styles such as breaking, taking choreography classes, and choreographing for school events. Kailani has also taught multiple classes around the East and South Bay as well and now they are currently choreographing for James Logan’s advanced dance class performance. After graduating, they trained under Snackpack for 2 seasons and are currently on Tribe dance crew based in San Carlos.  They have participated in battles around the Bay Area and Sacramento and recently won the War on The Hills battle hosted at Cal East Bay. 

Erika Alvarez

Erika Alvarez

Classical | Children & Teens, Elite, and Adult

Erika has been training at Purdance since 2017 and was on the Purdance Classical Competition Team for 4 years. She found a love for dance and passion in teaching. In 2021, she became an instructor and administrative assistant at Purdance! She is trained in ballet, contemporary, jazz, tap, hip hop, and acrobatics. Currently she teaches both Children and Teens classes, as well as Adult classes. As an administrative assistant, she handles the Children and Teens program and planning for Recital. 

Stella Dang

Stella Dang

Classical | Children & Teens, Elite, and Adult

Stella Dang is a dancer, choreographer, and instructor from San Jose, California. She started dancing at Purdance in 2015, where she trained in contemporary, jazz, ballet, pointe, lyrical and musical theater. She was a part of multiple elite teams at Purdance which allowed her to perform and compete all across the Bay Area. Stella began working as a teacher assistant at 13 years old. From then she has continued her love for teaching. She adventures in other styles and even found a passion for cheerleading. She cheered all throughout highschool and as captain her senior year was able to lead and choreograph for the team. Stella is studying at Mission College as a Business Management major. She is also currently teaching for both Purdance and CLAP Arts. She hopes to keep dancing all throughout her life and is excited for where it will take her!

audrey richter

audrey richter

Classical | Children & Teens and Adult

Audrey Richter is a dancer, choreographer, and instructor based in the Bay Area. She is from Birmingham, Alabama, where she graduated from the Alabama School of Fine Arts Dance Department. Audrey holds a BFA in Dance Performance from the University of South Florida. Audrey’s professional performance credits include dancer and resident choreographer for Collective Soles Dance Company, Diavolo’s Veterans Project, OneLight Dance, DRIP, and Adin & Ferguson Dance Theatre. She has held many teaching positions including adjunct faculty at Southeastern University, Florida Southern College, and Blake High School Theatre Department, summer intensive faculty at Columbus Dance Theatre and Gulf Shore Ballet, and director of the Collective Soles Youth Ensemble. Audrey relocated to California’s Bay Area in 2019, and is enjoying contributing to the already thriving performance art community with Purdance, Starting Arts, and CMT San Jose.

SHEILA USUI

SHEILA USUI

Classical | Children & Teens and Adult

Sheila is a multidisciplinary artist who began her dance career at nineteen with the Fercos Manimal Magic Las Vegas review. She was also a circus performer in the Amazing Ricardos’ “Motorcycle Death Globe” act. Later she signed with LVSB productions where she toured Japan as a dancer/singer in “Legends” and “Festival of the World”.Sheila settled in Japan in 1996 where she worked in Japanese commercials,Television shows,and Music Viideos. She received accolades for her work in Kyoe entertainment’s “Karen.” While continuing her work as a choreographer and dance educator, Sheila also made the transition to stunt performer where she trained and worked alongside some of Japan’s finest in the industry. Her favorite stunt being the high fall. Sheila is happy to be back in the studio passing on her knowledge to future generations while teaching Tap, Ballet, Tumbling and Jazz.

SYDNEY STRONG

Classical | Adult

Sydney Strong began her formal ballet training at Tarrant County College in Hurst, Texas under the direction of Dr. Kihyoung Choi. There she danced with Dr.Choi’s semi-professional company, Movers Unlimited Dance Company. She apprenticed for Dallas Neoclassical Ballet for one season before furthering her dance education at The Joffrey Ballet School in New York City. Post graduation, she became a trainee at San Jose Dance Theatre where she choreographed two short ballets as well as danced in soloist roles in their production of, “The Nutcracker.” Sydney has also performed with Opera San Jose in their production of, “West Side Story,” choreographed by Michael Pappalardo.

Garrett Yuan

Garrett Yuan

K-Pop | Children & Teens and Adult

Garrett Yuan is a dancer, choreographer, and student at San Jose State University who is currently studying as a dance and business marketing major. He began his training in 2017 with K-pop on and started training in hip hop in 2020 at Capitol Dance Studio. In 2021, he began his journey as a dance major training in Ballet, Jazz, Modern/Contemporary, and Choreography. as well as founding the Synkronize Dance K-pop team at SJSU. He is currently an enthusiastic K-pop, Hip Hop, and Modern teacher at Purdance!

KENNY FUNG

Hip Hop | Adult

Kenny Fung is dancer, choreographer, instructor, and teacher from the Bay Area, where he finished his teaching credential program and his graduate program at San Jose State University. He started dancing during high school but started learning hip hop and open style choreography during his senior year of high school when his friends showed him the KPop songs, Where U At and Wedding Dress by Taeyang. Inspired by this, he continued his dance training into college. He studied, trained, and competed under Jeffro Rosalejos and Wrawsome Dance team, along with Jazz dance training under Professor Vernon Gallegos. Kenny‘s love for dance has taken him towards assisting, managing and directing college dance courses, project teams, performance teams, and even being a guest speaker in college lectures.