Perpich News

2025 Minnesota Dance Summit

February 4, 2025

Minnesota dance educators came together this past weekend for the 2025 Dance Summit hosted by Mary Harding, Perpich’s Dance Education Specialist. This year’s guest presenter was Cleo Mack (Dance 1994), Director of Dance at Middlesex County Magnet Schools in New Jersey, co-owner of Washington Rock Dance, and Perpich alum. Cleo has served as a lecturer at Rutgers University Mason Gross School of the Arts and a teaching artist for the American Repertory Ballet Institute, DeSales University, Muhlenberg University, and the University of Iowa.

Participants move together during the 2025 Minnesota Dance Summit

Throughout the day, participants explored different examples of “big ideas/big art” in dance curriculum and culturally responsive strategies that value each student. When asked about their biggest “ah-ha” of the day, one participant responded, “I had so many! I love the idea of assigning student roles, working from prompts to create phrases, developing research questions as a group, and more. When Cleo said, ‘bold moves inspire bold actions’, I wrote it down in my notebook twice. I’m ready to make bold moves for my program to hopefully inspire my students to be bold themselves!”

As a result of the workshop, another participant plans to “think intentionally about the way an essential question can function beyond just a component of lesson planning but can incite interest in students.”

And overwhelmingly, the best part of the day for participants was connecting with other dance educators.

Cleo Mack (Dance 1994)

Cleo Mack is an award winning choreographer and educator. She holds an MFA in Interdisciplinary Art from Wilson College and a BFA in Dance from Mason Gross School of the Arts, Rutgers University. Her work has been described as “a collision of quirky sophistication and unmeasured recklessness”. She has been commissioned by the Outlet Dance Project at Grounds for Sculpture, 10 Hairy Legs, DeSales University, and Quad City Ballet. Ms. Mack has been honored to receive two Individual Artists Fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, in recognition of her high artistic merit. Ms. Mack has been selected by Dance Magazine as one of the “25 to Watch”. She has enjoyed support from the Middlesex County Cultural and Heritage Commission, Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, and has also received space grants from The Field, DTW, and Lincoln Center.

Ms. Mack’s performance work has been presented at Joyce Soho, Dance Theater Workshop’s Fresh Tracks, the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., WAX, P.S. 1 Moma, the Hungarian American Dance Festival in Hungary, and at NJPAC as part of Jersey Moves. 2016 marks the inception of Mack’s newest project, Rock Dance Collective (RDC) is focused on creating interdisciplinary work in traditional and non-traditional environments. Ms. Mack’s sculptural work was on view as part of the NJ Arts Annual “Dissonance” at the Morris Museum and the Olympia Project. She has served on the boards of DanceNJ, CoLAB Arts, and the Montclair Dance Festival.

Ms. Mack is the Director of Dance at the Middlesex County Magnet Schools and co-owner of Washington Rock Dance. She has been a lecturer at Rutgers University Mason Gross School of the Arts and a teaching artist for the American Repertory Ballet Institute, DeSales University, Muhlenberg University and the University of Iowa. Ms. Mack has served on the writing team of the 2020 New Jersey Core Curriculum Content Standards for Visual and Performing Arts Standards and as well as the New Jersey ELA Standards Review Committee in 2015. She has been selected to present her educational philosophies at the National Dance Education Organization National Conferences in Arizona, Washington, D.C., and Florida. She was honored to be the recipient of the 2017 Hollins University Teaching Award.