Dance Instructors
Polly Creer Sutton
Polly brings years of professional dance and teaching experience to Fort Collins. Prior to moving to Colorado, Polly was a favorite ballet teacher at several Utah and California studios. She has also taught on the university level, teaching undergraduate classes at the University of Utah, as well as, being the Assistant Director of the Youth Artist’s ballet company at Brigham Young University.
Polly graduated magna cum laude with her BFA and Masters of Fine Arts in Ballet Performance from the University of Utah. She was awarded the Willam F. Christiansen Scholarship for four years, and danced as a soloist in the Utah Ballet and Character Dance Ensemble. While with Utah Ballet Polly performed at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. She was awarded the Dance Magazine Outstanding Dancer Scholarship to Craft and Choreography Summer Program, and scholarships to Pacific Northwest Ballet as well as San Francisco Ballet schools. Polly acted as the Ballet Mistress for Utah Ballet during her final year of graduate school.
Polly has danced professionally with Charleston Ballet Theatre, Anaheim Ballet Theatre, Bay Area Dancers, and American Folk Ballet. While with AFB Polly was a featured soloist for the 2002 Olympic Winter Games in Salt Lake City, Utah. Polly has also been a guest artist for several regional companies across the United States and Asia. She has performed principal roles in The Nutcracker, Le Corsair, Don Quixote, La Bayaderre, Swan Lake, Alice in Wonderland, and Cinderella. Polly has also been featured in many contemporary works by Bob Fosse, Jerome Robbins, Tom Ruud, Paul Taylor, and Bruce Caldwell to name a few.
Polly made her musical theater debut in Oklahoma! at the Tuacahn Amphitheatre in St George, Utah. She served as Dance Captain there for two seasons and was a featured dancer in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat (where she learned to ride a camel), Annie Get Your Gun, Utah!, and The Sound of Music. Polly has also choreographed for the stage production Bye-Bye Birdie as well as several cabarets.
In 2004 Polly moved with her husband Ty to Orange County, California. While in the OC she worked as a Dancer for Disneyland Entertainment. Polly danced 36 different roles in stage, street, and film productions for Disneyland Entertainment. She also taught weekly dance and conditioning classes for Cinderella and her many friends.
Polly is thankful to be able to have her passion as a career, and looks forward to imparting her love of dance on her students.
Contact Polly@contemporarydanceacademy.com
Mikenzie Nash
Mikenzie Nash started dancing at the age of six with Westin Arts Academy. When she was 13 she started commuting to Denver two to five times a week, to get more training. In Denver she started training at Starstruck Dance Academy and moved to Michelle Latimer Dance Academy for her last three years.
She danced competitively for seven years and has been involved in many different performances including; a lead roll in the Carousel Dinner Theatre’s production of Sound of Music, musical theater productions within her schools, Mrs. Colorado Pageant, Children’s Hospital Benefit, the Nutcracker, and recitals and competitive performances every year. She was a dancer in a TV pilot, called Cabby Tree, a show for toddlers. Also, she was a background dancer in Disney’s, High School Musical II. For 8 months in 2010, she lived and danced in One Man’s Dream II, in Tokyo Disneyland.
She has had the privilege of working with and taking advanced workshops from many choreographers such as Jason Parsons, Brian Friedman, Dee Caspary, Marty Kudelka, Travis Wall, Malaya, Mandy Moore, Ray Leeper, and more. She is excited to keep training as a dancer and teaching at the same time. She has had opportunities with teaching and choreographing and is excited to continue as a jazz and lyrical teacher at Contemporary Dance Academy.
Brittany Lott
Brittany Lott sparked her love of dance from the small age of two when she began taking lessons with Jerri’s School of Dance, predecessor of Glitz Dance Studio in Kaysville, Utah, under the direction of her mother. She danced alongside her three sisters for seventeen years, and started teaching at the young age of twelve. Performing became an addiction when she began dancing competitively as a soloist in her adolescence. After two successful years, she tried her hand at choreographing, which lead to another passion and creative outlet!
She dove into the adventures of dancing with a team as a cheerleader in junior high and began choreographing competitive cheer routines and halftime performances as their dance captain. In high school, she danced on a nationally ranked Drill Team as a junior and senior captain, as well as on the Dance Company as vice-president. Her senior year, she was honorably selected as her high school’s Dance Sterling Scholar. As her drill team competed at the national level, she decided to test her solo and choreography skills, and successfully placed Top Ten out of more than 150 dancers from around the country at the Contest of Champions National Competition in Orlando, Florida. She was also chosen as a member of the Utah All-State Drill Team.
After graduating high school, she was selected as an instructor and judge for the United Spirit Association for their dance and drill team conventions and competitions. Brittany is a certified judge for the Utah High School Drill Team Association. She attended Weber State University and received a full scholarship as a dancer on the WSU Spirit Squad dance team for 3 years. There she choreographed several performance pieces and contributed innovative choreography to competitive routines. She was then given opportunities to choreograph competitive routines for several Utah university level dance teams.
Brittany graduated from Weber State University with a Bachelors of Science in Accounting, and has been working full time in the field for the past 5 years. To encourage adults to stay dancing and stay healthy, she became a certified Les Mills Body Jam instructor, which is a dance based cardio workout incorporating the latest dance styles and music. She taught Body Jam and hip hop at Gold’s Gym in Layton, Utah for 3 years, and has been teaching at the Raintree Athletic Club in Fort Collins for the past 3 years. Brittany also currently teaches ballet, jazz, tap and lyrical to students ranging from ages seven to seventeen at Danceworks in Fort Collins. She has also enjoyed taking adult classes at Contemporary Dance Academy for the past year. Excited for any opportunity to travel back to Utah, Brittany is often a guest teacher and choreographer for Glitz Dance Studio, the studio where it all began.
Brittany has been trained in a thorough range of dance styles through attending advanced workshops from Odyssey Dance Theatre, Eldon Johnson, Thayne Jasperson, Trey Barber, Ririe Woodbury Dance Company, Gev Manoukian, Chelsea Hightower, Tremaine, Dupree Dance, etc. Brittany has a creative, unique, and artistic style, and continually strives to have cutting edge choreography. She believes dance should be a positive experience for all those who dare to succumb to the obsession of dance. Her dance philosophy is to build versatile, well-rounded dancers, while building self-esteem and confidence. Dancers are not made overnight, but will develop gracefully through years of study and dedication.
Michelle Stovall
Michelle became interested in dance while experimenting with gymnastics and tumbling at the age of 8. She started training in Broomfield, CO at Taps N’ Toes Dance Academy where she fell in love with competitions. Wanting to train more seriously she joined Elite Dance Academy’s competitive company when she was in 6th grade and began competing locally in Colorado as well as nation wide. As a freshman in high school Michelle joined the Broomfield Poms Squad. This experience encouraged her to train more seriously in the studio-dance world where her passion began. Her last three years in high school she took Dance Conventions and competed on a monthly basis. She has had the privilege to take class from amazing choreographers such as Travis Wall, Mandy Moore, Nick Lazarini, Doug Caldwell and many more. Although Michelle was spending a lot of time at the dance studio, her desire to work with kids became known as she began instruction in Hip-Hop, Jazz, Lyrical and Ballet at Elite Dance Academy. When Michelle was 17 she also joined a pre-professional dance team called “Dream Project.” This team raised money for Colorado based charities as well as gave Michelle and the team a chance to perform for the community.
Michelle currently is beginning her second year in Fort Collins at Colorado State University where she plans to major in Business Administration. She is excited to begin her journey teaching Ballet and Lyrical for Contemporary Dance Academy in Fort Collins. Michelle looks forward to share her knowledge, skill and love for dance with all of her students!
