Gabrielle is 15 years old, and started dancing with CA Dance Company at 6 years of age. Right away she knew tap was her game. She received the “Tapper of the Year” award two years in a row. She also loves all forms of dance including Hip hop, Jazz, and Lyrical. She is currently the captain of the Foothill High School JV cheer squad, and basically loves any music you can move to. She enjoys choreographing dance, and watching her students progress, and have fun. Gabrielle is very excited to be a part of the CA Dance Company teaching team, and looks forward to meeting you.

Megan is 15 years old. She has been dancing at California Dance Company since the age of 7. She has been a member of the competition team for four years. She was chose as Junior Dancer of the Year in 2005 and Senior Dancer of the Year in 2008. She has been taking every style of dance offered at the studio since she began dancing. She is very excited to teach this year and share her love of dance with her students.

Laura has been dancing ballet since she was eight years old in Redding and has worked with both pointe shoes and soft shoes. Although ballet has been her main study, she also enjoys learning and teaching jazz. She strives to work with different types of dance such as hip-hop and lyrical, and feels it is important for dancers to expand his or her dance range and experience new teachers and forms of dance. Throughout her life most of her free time has been focused on dance, but also being an Allstar Cheerleader whose team took 2nd place at Nationals, she truly learned what it means to be dedicated to dance and to stick with something you have a strong passion for even if time is scarce. This is her third year teaching and taking classes from California Dance Company and she feels very fortunate to be able to share her knowledge and passion of dance with her students. She is currently working on her bachelors in Kinesiology and will then work to master in Physical Therapy.

Rosannah Riess began her dance training in Classical Ballet with the Sebastopol and Santa Rosa Ballet. While in college, Miss Riess expanded her studies to include Jazz, Modern Dance, Scottish Folk Dance and Fencing. In 2003, she graduated from UC Berkeley with a Bachelors in Mathematics. Further studies in Modern Dance at San Francisco State led to an invitation to the Palucca Schule University in Leipzig, Germany. There she studied with school director and Dresden Semperoper Ballet dancer, Raymond Hilbert. Upon returning from Germany, Miss Riess continued training in a variety of skills including Aerial Rope, martial arts and theater performance. She has performed as an Aerialist with Trapeze World and is co-founder of the LionHorse Dance Theater. Miss Riess is also certified by the American Council on Exercise as a personal trainer. Synthesizing more than a decade of diverse movement studies, Miss Riess is currently a member of Redding City Ballet and offering instruction in both Classical Ballet and Modern Dance.

Melissa Sides has been involved with the company for the past 6 years, she has taught dance/cheer for 7 years. Her dance/cheer team received 1st place for Northern California. Melissa has been dancing since she was little, she loves to dance and loves to watch kids dance. Hip hop is her favorite style of dance, she loves when a song comes on the radio and she can't help but pop her shoulders back and forth to the beat!
Melissa's view on dance.....
"Dance is all about having a blast and letting your own creativity show. One important thing I always teach to my dancers is, never say you can't do something!! With anything in life if you want it bad enough it's all in reach, you just have to work hard for it!! Most importantly let go and have a blast while doing it!"